Vivid Ground Cover Plants and Ideas

New Trees: Recent Introductions to Cultivation by John Grimshaw, Ross Bayton and illustrated by Hazel Wilks. Amazon

Facts about Hostas

Ornamental Japanese Maples are widely available for planting in your garden. The autumn colouring makes these trees spectacular when planted en mass in a woodland or Japanese garden setting.

You don’t need global warming to get a warm glow in your garden if you plant some Canna. The fiery hot flowers and leaves on some Cannas are hard to beat and are worth a place in any passionate garden.

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.

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.

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.

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

Oak trees conjure up images of Robin Hood and mystical Oak forests. Britain has made good use of Oak trees down the centuries. ‘From little acorns great Oak trees grow’

‘The Garden of Reading: An Anthology of Twentieth-century Short Fiction About Gardens and Gardeners’ edited by Michele Slung.