Read
these extracts from Fran's eBook
The Ultimate
Guide to Gardening for Beginners
Chapter 1 - What You Need to
Know
gives
you information about how to get started, including:
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... There is some technical
‘stuff’ that garden experts usually tell you is essential before you
can create
a successful garden. One of these is …
Soil
Type
The type of soil you have is
important as it determines which plants will do well and which will
struggle to
grow. In case you’re interested, this soil type is a result of the
underlying
bedrock and its constituents in your area!
How to identify some of
these differences:
·
clay
soil – when it rains, clay soil becomes heavy, sticky mud, slow to
drain away,
but when dry, the soil becomes hard and forms cracks. In your hands,
this soil
is easily formed into a smooth solid ball.
...
·
sandy
soil – this type of soil feels gritty and is difficult to form a solid
lump in
your hands, and water will drain away very quickly.
....
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Chapter 3 covers The Gardening
Year to help
you have year-round interest in your garden:
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... Yes, there are flowers for
winter, though admittedly not a great number. Amongst the most
beautiful are
the hellebore family, including the Christmas rose (helleborus niger)
with white flowers and helleborus orientalis that have green or
pink or
purple flowers. ...
Other possibilities are
winter-flowering pansies – what a versatile plant this is – and
ornamental
cabbages (brassica oleracea), in striking colours of red, pink
or cream.
They have been used extensively by public parks departments in the last
few
years, so they may not be to your taste!
Evergreen plants provide continuing interest in the
garden during winter, and conifers come into their own
at this time of year. They don’t have to be large and
fast growing – you can get dwarf, slow-growing conifers.
... Combine these
with the coloured-stems of dogwoods, cornus alba for red stems
and cornus
stolonifera for yellow, and you really can have a colourful garden.
Another way
to keep interest in the winter
garden is to leave the seed heads on perennial plants such as grasses;
leave
the skeletons of bronze fennel (foeniculum ‘purpureum’) or the
old
flower heads of sedum spectabile – they can look really beautiful on a
frosty
morning. So don’t be too quick to cut down these dead-looking stems, as
they
also help to protect the crown of the plant during cold weather....
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Chapter 4 is on Friends and
Enemies in the Garden, with hints and tips on how to deal with
the enemies and encourage the friends:
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... I also have brambles (rubus fruticosus).
Again, I try and keep them in one
corner of the garden as,
although it takes a lot work to keep them from spreading, I do enjoy
the
blackberries they provide each autumn!
Wild ivy (hedera helix)
is another plant I happily live with, as it is a great habitat for
wildlife.
Although it won’t harm trees or shrubs, it can damage walls, so just be
aware
of that.
...
Alternatively, you can chop
the plants down to the ground, and if you don’t want to dig the roots
out, then
a flame gun is very useful to kill the new shoots as they appear (do
make sure
to take care in the vicinity of other plants, and follow the safety
instructions). This won’t be instant death for these weeds, and you may
need to
do this several times, but if you combine this with digging the roots
out then
you will get rid of them much sooner....
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Fran Barnwell
Rowan House,
Gunnislake, Cornwall, PL18 9NT
© Fran Barnwell
All Rights Reserved
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