How to sow your free pansy seeds Butterfly watch: the comma

with AG’s gardening expert Ruth Hayes

‘Early Mixed’ pansies offer low-growing clumps of brilliantly cheery blooms in early spring Leaf spot is a common fungal issue affecting pansies and violas

Sow seeds thinly on damp compost

Add a lid to retain moisture The colours of spring

Sow pansies now for early brightness, says Ruth

F you have moved most of your seed trays of summer seedlings off your windowsills to harden off

Ior plant out, you will have made room for more.

So why not fill those empty spaces with this week’s free seeds, which guarantee a blast of long-lasting, early year colour?

Mr Fothergill’s ‘Early Mixed’ pansies flower in a rainbow of shades, the blooms having either solid colours or

F u t u r e blotched to bring variety and interest. The flowers are large and showy, and the plants grow to a height of 6in (15cm), making them ideal for baskets, containers and the front of borders.

Although you can sow your pansies directly (they are hardy perennials, so can withstand the cold), you will get more reliable results undercover.

Scatter the seeds thinly over pots or trays of dampened seed compost, covering them with a little compost or vermiculite. Add a lid to the tray, or seal the pot in a clear plastic bag, and set the seeds on a warm, light windowsill.

Once the seedlings show through, remove the lid/bag and grow them on until they are large enough to transfer to individual pots.

If you would rather start them off in your borders, sow in soil that has been raked to a fine tilth and cleared of roots, stones and weeds.

In a few months’ time, harden off and plant your undercover pansies outside, avoiding areas where they (and violas) have been growing previously, as the soil may contain leaf-spot fungal spores.

ButterflyWatch: The comma The colourful comeback kid of the butterfly world (Polygonia c-album)

THIS week’s butterfly is a canny in Gloucestershire, Herefordshire master of disguise, as an adult folding and Monmouthshire to almost its wings to resemble a battered old everywhere in the UK. leaf, or as a larva hiding in plain sight The comma is sometimes described by looking like bird droppings. as a ‘tatty tortoiseshell’ thanks to

The comma is also making the scalloped edges of its a remarkable recovery after wings. I prefer to think of it as nearing extinction in the a slightly tattered Persian 1800s, which was thought carpet, as its fiery colours to have been caused by a shine out magically reduction in hop farming, wherever it flies. that led to a sharp decrease It gets its name from the of its favoured caterpillar The rich colours comma-shaped white marks on food plant. of a comma its underwing, and is usually found

But over the past 50 years, the in woodland glades, though in late butterfly has increasingly used summer it will stray into gardens and nettles as its main larval host and has feast on nectar to build up strength for expanded its range from a few sites hibernating among fallen leaf litter.

The caterpillar is eccentrically patterned, with predominantly black and orange markings and Caterpillar with ‘bird fearsome spines. It poo’ markings also carries white blotches at one end, making it look like bird droppings to passing predators, which will hopefully then leave it alone.

Once they have reached maturity, the caterpillars pupate in silver-spotted green pupae and, as in all stages of the lifecycle of a comma, these too are wonderfully disguised so they look like dying, withering leaves. Ruth Hayes