Growing Kerria in a Cottage Garden

Kathy and Stuart Pickering created their rustic cottage garden in a stretch of field.

Growing herbs makes your garden look nice and gives you the advantage of spicing up your meals with fresh greens. Creating a herb garden requires only a small chunk of effort and, after investing a little bit of time as well, you will bear the fruits of your hard work soon enough. Even if growing herbs outdoors or indoors doesn’t require plenty of gardening knowledge on your side, you might still want to check our extensive guide on how to grow a herb garden.

All varieties of squash will cross pollinate with each other, resulting in some unusual squash varieties. They are also intentionally bred in an effort to produce squash with unique traits. Some of the weird squash varieties that result may be found on the dinner table or may simply end up as interesting yard art.

Features to Expect in a Japanese Garden

Despite my garden being full to overflowing after the spring rain I have decided to create a new area for a Japanese Garden. When starting a new project I was advised to have a name that may colour the end result. I opted for the grand title of ‘Japan Land’  This will be a long term project and I won’t rush it as I have on other projects in the past.

Mesclun is a name for a traditional melange of salad leaves. The name mesclun doesn’t feature in any of my gardening reference books before 1980 so old gardeners may not recognise the term.

This summer has been damp and the plants have grown lush. In some way this has contributed to a dramatic cut in the number of greenfly on my roses and other plants (perhaps they found other feeding grounds or did not mate as prolifically).

Lilacs are members of the Syringia family and are named for the colour. There are deep lilacs verging on violet and light pinkish lilacs even some pretty floriferous white flowering Lilacs.

London Holland Park’s water feature in Kyoto Garden.

Previously I have stuck to traditional names for bits of my garden. Veg plot, rockery, orchard (when I feel posh), rose bed, border, hedge and similar names have delineate what and where I was trying to grow.

In the cold wet winter it is a good time to plan where to visit as the year improves. The South West is the obvious place to start your visiting tour of gardens containing exotic plants.

Flowering Cherry trees contribute most to the floral pageantry of spring blossom and they are easy to grow. Cherries are graceful and well shaped trees and many varieties have excellent Autumn colour. (Scarlet leaves of Prunus sargentii and pubesens, yellow of hybrids Pandora or Tai-Haku or coppery Ukon.)