Hortoris

Slugs and Snails

 There are many plants and ways of using them to boost your health and help with healing. Herbalists since the 17th century like Nicholas Culpeper have recorded some of the best garden plants for healing.

Red, White and Blue the patriotic colours of the Hydrangea are augmented by pinks and purples like H. Ayeshia above as a variation on those themes. Flowering from mid-summer these shrubs give a magnificent display with very little effort. Did you see Hydrangea maritima on seaside holidays in large displays of sugary pink and sometimes blue.

When storing potatoes you need to exclude light and moisture but retaining an even temperature. Do not wash spuds before storing. Do not allow them to be stored too cold or the starch will turn to sugar and start to go black. A fridge is too cold.

I received a pot plant as a gift and thought it was a Cineraria. The plant was in bud but the leaves looked like soft grey-green Cineraria or Senicio.

Violas are more than just small pansies in fact Pansies are just over blown Violas. They are both in the family that also includes many species of Violets, Violas and Violettas.

Hellebore sap can cause irritation to skin or an allergic reaction. No part of the plant should be eaten. Hellebores flower in winter or early spring from buds formed during the previous summer. They may benefit from some watering during a dry summer to encourage more buds.

Decorative gardens can benefit from growing seedheads for their own sake. Flowers With Seedheads

This natural pattern of succulent leaves was spotted in my garden as the Autumn flowering Sedum Spectabile burst forth this Spring. This follows the patten in the leaves at the end of a branch of Monkey Puzzle Tree and set me thinking. Many gardeners spend a lot of time and effort to get patterns of colour and texture, variety of shape and form or harmonious patterns to please the eye but nature does it best.

Codiaeum variegatum is a houseplant or tender shrub with multi-coloured leaves.

The Lime is a tall growing well shaped tree which is often grown along avenues and public places in the UK. The flowers have an exquisite fragrance.

Lawns are cut regularly to encourage side shoots, prevent flowers and to keep the grass tidy. Some attention should also be given to other grasses and bamboos to encourage production of fresher growth at the beginning of the growing season.

Seductive plants from Madeira are best viewed on the island but it is tempting to bring some how as bulbs or plants. I avoid bringing plant material home as it may bring back pest and disease. As a Yorkshireman I don’t want  to loose my money and the plant markets are just tourist ‘come and buy me’ traps.

Can you tell what this frosted yellow flower is that is starting to show colour and now getting into full scented blossom? It still thinks it is 2015 and our mild wet weather has contributed to a range of ongoing flowers.

The main trace elements and micronutrients are molybdenum, manganese, zinc, iron, boron and copper plus calcium for tomatoes. These elements are best provided as water-soluble chelate salts rather than granules.

It shows how long this blog has been operating. The Rio Olympics 2016 will be the third time we have commented on suitable Olympic  flowers. See Beijing 2008 and London 2012 below. Today is the ‘Anniversary Games’ in London a curtain raiser for the Brazil games. For Brazil we should start with the nut (OK so that is the author) and then the Cacti as he is a prickly sort of guy. Feeding plants and flowers with fertiliser or hormone treatment will not fall foul of the drug testing rules – there are no plant urine samples to test!

Nasturtiums or Tropaeolum majus are also known as Indian Cress as the peppery leaves can be eaten. However, the best reason for growing Nasturtiums is the large volume of red, orange or yellow flowers you can get on a trailing plants that is planted in poor soil.

Greenery is all very well but I like to see swathes of colourful flowers. I try to envisage how mixed planting will shape up in terms of colour but generally my minds eye falls short when it comes to the imagination department. The best tip is to keep it simple with only a very limited number of varieties chosen because they are due to flower around the same time.

The best trees for chalk soil conditions tend to be locally grown and not be Dutch imports. In fact they resemble shrubs more than trees but there are the odd exception that are tree like.

Red food stuff is a popular trend at the moment. Good leafy crops add vibrancy to a salad and you are probably eating well if you grow them yourself.

I admire Cyclamen more and more as the years go by.

The 18th century Union Jack Gardens at Wentworth Castle were originally called the ‘wilderness’. It was dense with shapes, texture and contrasts of shade and light. Now it may be a suitable place to take a seat in the garden and see the original Yew trees and the variegated ‘creamed’ Hollies.

To maintain the species plants have developed many strategies for dispersing their seed. They make flowers and fruit attractive so gardeners buy them in seed packets or propogate them to eat.

Herbs to make a bouquet garni can be grown at home and used later for cooking. All these herbs you can grow in the garden or on a suitable windowsill. The ingredients for our basic Bouquet Garni are the herbs Parsley, Thyme, Bay and a clove of Garlic. Tie them together with undyed string. Then add other herbs that are specific to the dish you want to cook.

True nuts include Pecan, Sweet Chestnuts, Beechnuts, Acorns, Hazel nuts and Hornbeams. True nuts are a simple dry fruit with one seed in which the seed case becomes very hard on maturity. True nuts do not split apart like Brazil nuts or horse chestnuts but the seed and the fruit are one and the same.

Blue is not the colour you associate with foliage but if you can bend your eyes just a little around the silver – grey through to green spectrum there may be some surprises.

A well maintained green sward with stripes from a lawnmower is the epitome of a British garden. It could be something to do with the amount of rain we get but it also depends on the type and care of the grass.

My father grew exceptional roses before many of the varieties had been discovered or reached their current prominence. One thing he did to get special blooms was to restrict the number of flower buds by pinching out the runts.In many circumstances a good big one is more important the several also ran small ones.

An unusual tree with even more unusual fruit.

Ants can be an unsightly nuisance and inspire concern. However they do not directly damage plants but are more a sign that you have another pest problem.

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Conifers can be kept neat and tidy by regular pruning. Equally Conifers can become feature plants with there own personalities.

Marguerites are a small genus of plants ‘Argyranthemum’. They are part of the wider daisy family and look very similar to Chrysanthemums.

Think before you allow poppies to proliferate. Poppies rob a lot of goodness from your soil.

The Papaya is a widely grown fruit tree of the tropics. It’s large fleshy fruit contains many seeds but can weigh from 1 pound up to 20 pound on some varieties.