Month: July 2019

Let the ‘Weeds’ Grow

Professor Dave Goulson, University of Sussex

Successful wildlife gardening is as much about what you don’t do as what you do. This is not to say that a wildlife garden has to be untidy. Many imagine a wildlife garden as an unruly tangle of brambles, nettles and dandelions, and it is true that a laissez-faire garden like this will certainly attract a lot of wildlife, but it is also perfectly possible to have a tidy and beautiful garden that is teeming with life (though tidiness does of course tend to require a little more work).

If I could give you just one wildlife gardening tip, it would be this. You can get rid of all the weeds in your garden in a heartbeat, just by renaming them wildflowers. The concept of a weed is something we have constructed. Why do we endlessly persecute dandelions, groundsel, willowherbs and so on, at great personal effort, and usually without much success? Does it matter if there are buttercups and daisies in your lawn? Many of us spend money on spraying their lawn with selective broadleaf herbicides, intended to kill everything but the grass. Buttercups and dandelions are beautiful native wildflowers. Ease off on the mowing, and they will burst into bloom, adding colour and attracting insect life; bees, hoverflies and so on.   

            Aside from those in the lawn, wildflowers can be an attractive addition to herbaceous borders. I have teasel, viper’s bugloss, marjoram, foxgloves, mallows, campions, comfrey, betony, deadnettles and woundworts mixed up with the usual garden favourites; lavender, catmint, coreopsis and so on. Viper’s bugloss is one of my favourites – producing beautiful blueish purple flower spikes in July and August that bumblebees adore. Controversially, I also have ragwort, loathed by horse lovers as it is toxic when dried in hay. But this is a wonderful plant for insects, attracting bees, hoverflies, butterflies, and of course the yellow and black caterpillars of the cinnabar moth. Native wildflowers are worth including not just for their beauty but also because they are often the foodplant of herbivorous insects such as moths, butterflies, true bugs or leaf beetles, so they help to support a whole ecosystem. My red campion flowers attract bees, but also attract the campion moth which lays its egg on the seed pod and the young caterpillar feasts on the developing seeds.

Relax, soak up the summer sun, and enjoy the weeds!

Dave Goulson’s new book, The Garden Jungle, is on sale now in all good bookshops.

The latter part of 2018 saw us, as a nation, commemorate a number of centenary events linked to the First World War. By the very nature of the original events these were sombre events, and rightly so.

By contrast, 2019 will allow us to commemorate such uplifting centenary events as the first non-stop transatlantic flight by Alcock and Brown, and Lady Nancy Astor taking her seat in the House of Commons as the first women member of parliament.

Additionally, hidden in the depths of the New Forest, there is a garden that was the passion of a banker, also celebrating its centenary. The banker, in question, was Lionel de Rothschild a passionate collector of plants and a keen supporter and sponsor of the early 20^th century plant hunters and the garden Exbury. The garden was created in 1919 and was developed over the following 20 years to become a stunning 200-acre garden paradise in the New Forest filled with rare plants, shrubs and trees.

The centenary is being marked with the unveiling of a new ‘secret’ garden and a showcase display at the world’s most famous flower show, RHS Chelsea.

Visitors can now get to glimpse the new Centenary Garden designed by Lionel’s great grand-daughter, and RHS gold medal award-winning designer, Marie-Louise Agius. This was planted within Exbury Gardens in 2017 and has been carefully hidden from public view, whilst it grew and matured.  Given the scale of the rest of Exbury Gardens, and that it’s had a 100 years to mature to what is seen today, the Centenary Garden is necessarily more intimate in scale. It is planted on the site of one of Lionel de Rothschild’s former tennis courts!

Grown in secret – Centenary Garden 

 It is contemporary in style, focusing on late flowering summer perennials, interwoven between a strong vertical planted structure, with the existing Yew hedging proving an evergreen backdrop. The central area is sunken – enhancing the 3 dimensional space – with the Rothschild 5 Arrows in black Caledonian slate set into York stone paving. At the far end of the garden is a curved timber bench surrounded by cloud-pruned evergreen azaleas, a modern salute to the core history of the Gardens.

Thomas Clarke, head gardener at Exbury, said: “The 1920s were the golden age of woodland gardening and Exbury, under the careful eye of Lionel de Rothschild and his staff, was at the cutting edge of this movement. The location, climate, existing oak woodland and acid soil all allowed for the creation of one of the finest gardens of its kind in the UK. Combine this with the legacy of the great plant hunters, and the extensive plant breeding programme at Exbury, and we are fortunate enough to have inherited a truly wonderful garden packed full of horticultural treasures.”

“In this centenary year we are delighted to be unveiling some fantastic new projects plus a continued focus on our work to conserve and develop the plants and landscape at Exbury for the next 100 years.”

Exbury Gardens, located in the New Forest near Southampton, is open daily until 3 November 2019 10am – 5.30pm. Adult tickets £12.50, children (3-15yrs) £4, under 3s are free and a family ticket is £29. Full information at www.exbury.co.uk

Exbury Gardens aims to enable visitors with disabilities and additional mobility needs to use and enjoy the gardens, railway and facilities.

www.thepureimageworks.com

Trevor Judd is an experienced photographer specialising in the photography of flowers, nature, and landscapes.

“When people look at my pictures I want them to feel the way they do when they want to read a line of a poem twice” – Robert Frank

One way you can help Gardening for Disabled Trust Charity (GDT) is to open your garden to the public and donate the entrance fee to help us continue our life changing work.

One such garden that has done that is Fursdon House in Devon.  Their stunning gardens are regularly open to visitors in the summer and they dedicated one day where the charity would receive a percentage of the garden entrance fee.

We have 9 volunteer committee members and work tirelessly to fundraise, enabling us to get more people back into their gardens by offering grants.  We organise a number of events but by people opening their gardens and donating the income from it we do need to find manpower to carry it out. We assist with publicising the event but the garden owners deal with the logistics of the day.

GDT was invited to attend Canterbury Cathedral Open Gardens because we had been nominated as a beneficiary of the day and received a third of the garden entrance money.  The other benficiaries were Perennial Charity and National Gardens Scheme.

The Duke and Duchess of Grafton have invited GDT to attend their Garden only Open Day at the magnficent Euston Hall on 16th September from the 10am until 2pm.  The park and gardens are open and we will receive a portion of the profts form the day.

Please consider supporting these events or opening your gardens, or allotments etc and donating the income from it to us  to enable us to continue our life changing work.

Visit our website gardeningwithdisabilitiestrust.org.uk to find out more about our work .

The Best Wedding Flowers You’ve Never Heard Of:

At Eco Roses, we have the best wedding flowers which you have never seen before. Yeah! You heard it right… We provide a unique range of Wedding flowers, which are always the stars at any wedding. Our explosion of Roses, colours and textures including red, pink, spray, Tinted, Austin roses, Bicolour Yellow-Red, Hot Pink and Garden Roses combined with large new variety Roses.

If the couple isn’t careful an impressive floral arrangement or top quality flower can overshadow the couple themselves! Classic varieties of roses come in white, cream, tinted and dual coloured roses, which you never think of before.

But luckily there is only a place, in this world that is blessed enough to be able to grow more than just those colours and many new forms of different varieties flowers. That place is Eco Roses. Let me show you how:-

• First range of beautiful flower, has a very delicate soft orange/peachish centre with bold dark red edges. To put it mildly, these are truly a unique breed of rose we name it – Bicolour: Yellow-Red
• Another variety has it all and connects with the soft and bold sides of the human personality and according to the decoration of wedding arrangements.
• You can compare the presence of our freshly deliver roses, you will see the power that it holds in and the energy which presents the positive vibe that our flower brings to any event, indoor or outdoor, is contagious.
• Our wedding flowers are fully appropriate to adorn both the bride and the groom, because it is the classic wedding tradition white and red? Our Red & White Bicolour roses are best for wedding functions.
• The peachy orangish red outer petals, which contain some of the most beautiful colour connectivity by the best team growing team, blending found in nature.

Every wedding or event we cater, we focus on its nature, a truly unique event with its own combination of elements makes it special occasion with flowers by Eco Roses. Occasion like, weddings and any wedding related functions; we at Eco Roses, try to design and arranged several beautiful table displays for a wedding party. We requested for giant gathering as well as small gathering, spherical mixed rose bouquets to place in ornate cut glass vases.

We Work closely with our clients to ensure that you do not forget any of the important parts to your wedding arrangements.

Selecting wedding flowers seems simple and straightforward enough… until you dig into it and realize the dizzying array of choices, we at Eco Roses provides you Top quality unique roses for weddings. There are so many options by our farm to your doorsteps, all of them are incredibly beautiful, and never seeing designs; here is our compilation of most required handy FAQs to selecting the perfect wedding flowers for your one-of-a-kind celebration.

Take Cues from Your Venue

Chances are that if you love the idea of an untamed outdoor venue, you probably drawn to the look of wildflowers too. Similarly, if it is on the big villas and home, then it is completely your style then you are likely attracted to elegant.

Wedding Arrangements for an outdoor venue also tend to be less structured. In formal venues, according to us, classic flower choices and polished styles are a good choice.

Don’t Obsess Over Flower Knowledge

Maybe, you know your roses from your simpler colours but Eco Roses has made a victory over variety of roses. Therefore, most of our customers get badly confuse. Yes, they pretend as if they love all of them, as all the range is best and fresh for roses.

Some brides-to-be get their hands and hearts set on a particular flower, not realizing that it may be hard to get at the time of the wedding but we make it possible to them by our better preservers.

It is Possible to Start Too Early

The early bird gets the worm; if you arrive before your last days to wedding then it would be fun, because we give you complete knowledge of our certainly unique roses that you never find anywhere. It is quite exciting to start nailing down wedding details as sooner as you could.

Selecting you own wedding flowers should be great fun!! In addition, not overly stressful. Plan, but stay open to suggestions by our experts, where required.

You will asked most certainly by many of your friends or guests to name the rose variety on display and wedding arrangements. You can proudly say that, this is by ECO Roses, grown in their fresh farm to your wedding destination, they are home of the best wedding flowers in South America.

Website: https://ecoroses.com.ec/