Gardening

BIG BEDDING

Mike Burks, Managing Director, The Gardens Group

June can be a glorious month in the garden – the risk of frost should be over and once planting is done there may even be time to enjoy the rewards of your earlier efforts. Sometimes, though, you spot a gap in your summer displays and there is a need for an instant splash of colour to complete the season’s show. I like to call on what I describe as big bedding and the following are favourites of mine as they can be really quite dramatic.

I love the name of the Begonia Dragon Wings and these are a stately begonia admirable for their foliage and then a superb display of red flowers for the rest of the summer.

As impressive for their foliage as their flowers, are the Nicotiana sylvestris with their white tubular flowers. This variety grows up to four or five feet and really is a talking point particularly after the scent is experienced, which is best at night.

More scent is provided by the Heliotrope or Cherry Pie. It only takes one whiff of the flower to understand where the name comes from, as the fragrance is very distinct. I often plant this in a pot underplanted with Nemesia Wisley Vanilla. I was told by a group of schoolchildren that the nemesia reminded them of custard, and they will therefore go well with the Cherry Pie!

The range of petunias is quite extraordinary and is ever-growing. One to look out for is the Easy Wave collection which includes blues and whites. These varieties are spreaders and produce an extraordinary number of flowers – they are great spreading over the side of a large pot or in a hanging basket.

A really interesting plant is the Cuphea sometimes called Tiny Mice because the small red flowers have large outer petals looking like ears. They grow up to around 18 inches and are a delight. This year we have the variety Torpedo.

Many people have discovered Cosmos in recent years and these feathery foliaged plants produce a fabulous show of large daisy flowers in various colours including whites, pinks and reds. I like to pinch the growing tips of young plants out to make them branch from lower down. This makes the plants grow in a bushier, more compact fashion and also means that more flowers are created.

Lantanas too give a great show of flower which is loved by a number of butterflies and insects. Anyone who has lived a colonial life turns their nose up at

Heliotropium arborescens Marine

Lantanas as they apparently grow like weeds in parts of Africa. However, they are a great summer bedding feature plant and also a useful conservatory plant too. Some varieties are yellow, orange and red whereas there is a great white flowering form too.

And finally, not for the subtle and sophisticated amongst you are the Coleus. These foliage plants were fashionable in the 70s and 80s but lost their way until recent years. The change came with the Kong varieties – the name inspired, I guess, by King Kong. The leaves are huge and powerful colours of purples and reds.

All of the above are very pleasing at this time of year as they will create an immediate wow! I love choosing a pot, or a series of pots and planting them up for an instant impact – a good feeling before the return to the deckchair.

UMBRELLA FLOWERS

Simon Ford, Land and Nature Adviser and Gardener

Common Blue butterfly (Polyommantus icarus) on cow parsley

As the year progresses, the hedgebanks turn from the vibrant yellows of primroses and cowslips, studded with bluebells, red campion and stitchwort to a froth of white cow parsley.

Cow parsley is part of a large group of flowers called umbellifers, with an umbrella-like lattice and mostly (but not entirely) panicles of white flowers. They are a real sign of summer, with their delicate scent and often line footpaths and verges, where cows like to take a passing nibble.

It is tempting to group all of the umbellifers together, but they are actually surprisingly different in many ways. Some are edible, including wild carrot, from where our vegetables originate. The wild version has a white root and the flower starts as being concave, but as it develops, it becomes convex with a tiny pink flower in the centre to attract pollinators. If crushed, the carrot smell is quite evident. Wild parsnip is another plant which has been domesticated and this flower head is one of the few yellow umbellifers. Both of these can be found on chalk downland.

Parsley is another in this group and if you allow it to set seed, then you will see the umbrella-shaped flower. Gardeners will be all too aware of ground elder,

which spreads at an alarming rate in the beds and vegetable patch, but was actually brought to Britain as a food plant by the Romans. It can be steamed like spinach. On the coast where there are few frosts, an early flowering glossy green leaf and yellow flower is Alexanders, which is another plant brought to our shores from the Mediterranean. It can be cooked as a vegetable but has an aniseed taste.

In lawns and unimproved grassland, yarrow has a feathery leaf and white flower and has been cultivated in a variety of colours as a garden plant or for cut flowers.

Follow a hedgerow, particularly next to an arable field and you might see a very tall umbellifer, maybe 8 or 9ft (2.5 to 3 metres) tall, with long red blotches on the stem. This is the famously deadly poisonous hemlock and has been used as a poison by Socrates, as well as inadvertently killing some people who foolishly mistook it for parsley!

Along riverbanks and marshy areas, hemlock-waterdropwort is quite common and can form dense stands. However, like its relative, it is also extremely toxic and can be eaten by cattle, especially after ditching work exposes the roots. In the steam itself, you may be lucky enough to find peppery watercress, especially if you are on a chalk stream, like the Sydling, Wylye, Chalke or Cerne valleys. However, far more common, especially in muddy streams is a species which looks similar, but is not related (and you don’t want to put it in your salad), is the aptly named fool’s watercress!

Hogweed is a common hedgerow plant and is more robust than cow parsley. There is also a much larger cousin, known as giant hogweed, which can grow to 4 or 5 metres tall and was popular as an architectural garden plant until it was realised that it could be dangerous. It has highly caustic sap, particularly during sunny weather, which can cause bad blistering of the skin. Those people who use a strimmer without protective clothing can suffer severe burns or even be blinded.

One of my favourite umbellifers, which is a rare plant nationally, but is a speciality of wet grasslands in Dorset and Somerset, is the wonderfully named corkyfruited-water-dropwort! To be fair, it is not very big or spectacular (and is also poisonous), but with a name like that, what is not to like?! Also growing in similar areas is another small umbellifer, which is a favourite food of pigs, called the pignut. If rooted up, there is a small round brown corm, which wild boar love (as I saw recently in the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire).

Like mushrooms, please don’t go eating anything unless you are absolutely sure of its identity!

Insects absolutely love umbellifers though. The nectar is very rich and may attract 20 or 30 insects to a single panicle. Additionally, the hollow stems of species like hogweed and angelica make a wonderful place to hibernate.

Even in the autumn and winter, plants like cow parsley and hogweed in their skeletal form can make beautiful flower arrangements. A pretty versatile umbrella, even though it doesn’t keep you dry!