• Home
  • About & Copyright.
  • Photography.
    • Mug shots.
    • Hedge Fund.
  • The Garden.
    • The Garden Team.
  • Visiting the Garden.
  • My Garden Presentations.
  • Wildlife.
  • Feed the Birds.
  • My Music.

brimfields.com

~ Gardening, Photography & Music. The Life of Brian.

brimfields.com

Tag Archives: Plants

Autumn Project 4, Unexpected!

26 Saturday Oct 2019

Posted by Brian Skeys in Gardening, Our Garden@19, The Life of Brian., Wildlife

≈ 14 Comments

Tags

Autumn, Hedra, Our Garden@19, Plants

Banana Bench & Boston Ivy, Autumn 2018.

This year I noticed that the Parthenocissus Tri. Veitch, Boston Ivy, behind the banana bench, had been almost completely replaced with wild Ivy. Now while I like Ivy in the garden for its benefit to wildlife, here I would prefer to see a more colourful plant. I decided that it was necessary to remove the ivy.

This revealed that the Ivy was holding up the trellis, with most of it rotten along with two of the posts at ground level. I was left with no other option than to replace it all.

Picture from behind where trellis would have been.
From the front, with two posts waiting for sanding and staining.

I have, in previous blogs mentioned my inclination to watch TV gardening programmes for inspiration. On several occasions concrete reinforcing steel grid has been used to support climbing plants instead of wood trellis. With the advantages of not going rotten, not requiring painting (the rust look is on trend, so I’m told) and at 3.6m x 2m for just under £20 is cheaper than trellis. Two repair spikes were required with some rapid set postcrete to repair the two rotten posts, then a coat of wood preservative applied. Next grid was cut to size with a steel cutting angle grinder. The grid was fixed to the posts with 2×1” treated and stained timber screwed through to the posts.

Autumn Unexpected Project Completed.

Have you had any unexpected autumn Projects?

Autumn Project 3 Completed.

12 Saturday Oct 2019

Posted by Brian Skeys in Gardening, General Interest, Our Garden@19, Plantlife, The Life of Brian.

≈ 16 Comments

Tags

Autumn, Digitalis, Our Garden@19, Plants

I have long held the view that autumn is the beginning of the gardening year, preparing the garden and the plants for their winter rest before the explosion of spring and summer glory.

The main autumn project, this year, has been to move plants into their correct positions!

I am sure many of you can relate to the gardener’s curse of initially positioning plants in the wrong place.

Two of the first candidates for moving were the Cytisus, ‘Golden Cascade’ and Albus. While they produced wonderful spring colours and scent, they had become far too tall, even with some pruning.

I did not want to completely lose them, following a hard prune, I have moved them to the rear of the borders and hope with generous watering they will successfully establish. This has freed an area, which has been planted with Lupins and Foxgloves to flower in June for the open gardens. The lupins will be treated as annuals, in the Great Dixter way. Colourful exotics such as Dahlias and Cannas will follow.

I have for some time had a yearning for a Cornus Kousa ‘Miss Satomi’. After ordering one two years ago, I planted it in the garden. Sadly it died during the winter. The nursery that supplied it kept promising to replace it. When visiting Pershore College plant centre, they had some very reasonably priced Cornus Kousa ‘China Girl’. One was purchased, then planted in ‘Miss Satomi’s allocated position. Soon afterwards the nursery rang to say they had a replacement for me, although they could only obtain ‘Milky Way’. I decided this would have to live in a large pot, on the patio by the entrance to the oriental garden, while I decided where it was going to live permanently.

This turned out to be an ideal position, we could see it from the dining room windows. Three slabs were consequently lifted from the edge of the patio to provide a permanent home. Ironically the flower colours are more like ‘Miss Satomi’ than ‘Milky Way’, The nursery has not returned my email asking if there could have been an identification error!

Several years ago I was given a Rhus hirta Staghorn sumac. Because of its reputation for suckering, it has been residing in a pot on the patio where we could enjoy its beautiful autumn colour.

Last year we inexplicably lost a five year old Snake-bark Acer from the middle of the blue border. This completely unbalanced the border, there is an Acer griseum on the opposite side. Not wishing to risk another reasonably sized, quite expensive tree, I decided to plant the Rhus there, after seeing one looking stunning with it’s autumn colours, in a Piet Oldoulf garden.

I may pot up any suckers to sell on our open days. I think it looks very colourful in its new home among the Asters and grasses.

Moving the plant theatre in project one, freed up an area. This provided a space to plant a Greengage tree that I had purchased as a young bare root tree two years ago. It had been growing on in a pot, now it is planted along with the rhubarb, emptying more large pots.

Having admired large pots packed full of colourful exotics and annuals in other gardens, all these freed up pots will provide an opportunity to do the same.

Now to plan filling these!

Autumn Project 2 Completed.

23 Monday Sep 2019

Posted by Brian Skeys in Gardening, Our Garden@19, Plantlife

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

Autumn, Our Garden@19, Plants, Roses

I have to confess to watching many of the gardening programs on television along with reading gardening magazines, books and of course blogs, for inspiration in planting and design.

One programme featured, what I thought was a good structural design for supporting climbing plants.

When I had finished building my version, I thought it looked too much like railway signals. The original one had used wider timber.

My design consultant (Irene) convinced me it was okay and would soon be covered by the Rose.

I have either been brave or stupid (you will, I am sure, have your own opinion) planted a Rosa banksiae ‘Lutea’, which I have grown from a cutting, to help screen one side of a shed. This is the one I have built the support for.

This is the rose the cutting came from! It has never been pruned.

Will it be ideal to ‘train’ a Rose over?

It will certainly need to be pruned.

← Older posts

National Gardens Scheme Link.

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 465 other followers

Follow brimfields.com on WordPress.com

Social

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Google+
  • WordPress.org

Blogs I Follow.

  • A coastal Plot
  • A French Garden
  • elizawaters.com
  • Frogenddweller
  • Gardening Jules
  • Green Tapestry
  • Hillwards
  • Karen Gimson
  • Life in mud splattered boots
  • No Dig Charles Downing. The organic no dig Gardener.
  • Off The Edge Gardening.
  • Our Plot at Green Lane Allotments
  • pbmgarden
  • Pirus Tabernus
  • Rambling in the garden
  • Rusty Duck
  • Smallsunnygarden
  • The Anxious Gardener
  • The Blooming Garden
  • The Chatty Gardener
  • The Garden Barn House
  • The Gardening Shoe
  • wordsandherbs

Favourite web sites.

  • Black Pear Gardening Club. A Worcestershire based club sharing a love of gardening.
  • Douglas Gregor Photos Wonderful wildlife photography.
  • Hardy Plant Society
  • NGS The garden charity.
  • No Dig Charles Downing. The organic no dig Gardener.

Categories

  • Garden visiting
  • Gardening
  • General Interest
  • Guest publisher
  • Landscapes
  • Our Garden@19
  • Photography
  • Plantlife
  • The Bark Collection
  • The Life of Brian.
  • Travel
  • Treelife
  • Uncategorized
  • Wildlife

Map

Hanley Swan, Worcestershire. UK

Blog Stats

  • 17,374 hits

Recent Comments

tonytomeo on Garden visiting…..rememb…
carolee on Garden visiting…..rememb…
afrenchgarden on Garden visiting…..rememb…
Cathy on Garden visiting…..rememb…
Brian Skeys on Garden visiting…..rememb…
Eliza Waters on Garden visiting…..rememb…
Jill Briggs on Garden visiting…..rememb…
afrenchgarden on A seasonal delight – in…
Noelle M on A seasonal delight – in…
Brian Skeys on A seasonal delight – in…
Eliza Waters on A seasonal delight – in…
Brian Skeys on Happy New Year.
Cathy on Happy New Year.
rusty duck on Happy New Year.
Brian Skeys on Happy New Year.

Archives

  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • November 2016
  • May 2016
  • February 2016
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • August 2015

"Every Day is a School Day"

Translate

Website Powered by WordPress.com.

Cancel

 
Loading Comments...
Comment
    ×
    Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
    To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Our Cookie Policy