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On My Oasis – Cordon’s and Cannas
What a difference some sunny drizzle makes. The past week has been a turbulent mixture of smothering grey clouds and bright blue skies, bringing much needed moisture and sunlight to the garden. It’s the time of year when things are taking off in abundance – both plants AND pests. Has anyone noted the vast plethora of green fly this year? I vividly remember a lack of these pests in 2014, mostly because I’d run out of food for my tiny baby dart frogs and was hunting high and low for a aphids. In 2015? Everywhere! And to make matters worse, I’ve only seen one ladybird larvae. I scooped it up from the soil it was rumbling across and popped it onto a rose where it began to get a huge and delicious foodie fix! Take that greenfly!
The first cordon…
One of the first things I did in the new garden was to get an apple tree. I’ve wanted to grow fruit for a long time, but I’ve never been too keen on actual trees unless there’s plenty of space. Luckily, Dobies had some wonderful Braeburn trees, and though not specifically grown as cordons, I was able to prune away a lot of the material and get the single trunk formation I wanted. This variety is spur-bearing, which means apples are produced on older material instead of newly grown shoots; ideal when you’re creating a cordon. Pruning trees in February/March when the first leaves have started to appear is not advisable, particularly as you’re stunting flower product and, therefore, your fruit harvest. Luckily, as you shouldn’t harvest fruit from a cordon in its first year – a step which helps boost root growth and set a good foundation for later seasons – I wasn’t too worried. Now it’s been a couple of months and I’m really happy with growth that’s appearing and have high hopes for 2016’s crop! I still need to clear away most of the bed that it’s planted in, but there’s A LOT of day lily, and I’m waiting to see what colour they are before I decide to replant or chuck.
The tropical bed….
Meanwhile, the tropical bed is coming on really well considering there’s only been a border there for a few months. It’s not tropical in the true sense of the word because I’m not a huge fan of wrapping plants up and moving them inside during winter – I like to work with what I’ve got. To this end, I want to create a feeling of lush tropics, rather than including a vast array of extremely delicate plants. At the moment, the ferns are uncurling, there’s a highlight of dark-leaved heuchera and the whole bed is interspersed with red and orange geums. As the year goes on, I’ll be placing out the banana plant – in it’s pot – amongst the bed and planting in the vivid dahlias ‘Arabian Nights’ and ‘Bishop of Llandaff’. These, I hope, will not only create some height but also add a little extravagant colour. Being on the budget I am – i.e. being skint – I’m also growing Cannas from seed. Yeah – they’ll take quite a few years to develop, but they’ll be mine. I wasn’t expecting a huge amount because the banana and tree fern seeds I sowed in January haven’t made the slightest movement and, like them, cannas are subject to rather erratic germination. However, the first one has popped up today after only 10 days – I’m delighted!
All in all, the garden’s coming on extremely well. There is a VAST amount still to do, and I’m hating all the bare patches of soil, especially because it’s RHS Chelsea this week. But, alas, most of us don’t have the thousands of pounds required to product an instant garden, so it’s lots of loving and nuturing care from here on in.
What’s growing on your plot or garden? Let me know in the comments!
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