Gardening
Respect your elders?
bluebells given the cold weather we’ve had, the wood was carpeted with them, along with primroses and wood anemones. The natural balance created by the dappled shade of the tree canopy and the acidic soil conditions produced through the rotting of the leaves each year has meant an abundance of ground-cover plants can thrive. There are undoubtedly many so-called ‘weeds’ present, but they are irrelevant to the overall effect. Back in my sister’s garden, like in so
Y
many, there is a problem with ground elder. Having been inspired, I’m inclined to accept the intermingling of this dreaded weed with its companions of cyclamen and primroses along the garden path, and to call it a woodland effect. But in certain areas of the garden, this definition just doesn’t wash, as the ground elder has engulfed other plants and will
54 Exeter Living
www.mediaclash.co.uk
Garden expert GILL MELLING tackles the tricky topic of removing ground elder
esterday I went for a walk in a woodland nature reserve close to where my sister lives. Despite my misgivings that it would be too early for
continue to do so, making for an ever- increasing problem. I was left pondering what advice I
would give to remove ground elder from a flowerbed full of mature shrubs and attractive, if not over-run, perennials. Anyone got a magic wand I can borrow? Before I address this, I want to explore
some options for keeping less robust weeds at bay.
Going back to the woodland, the lesson is one of ground-cover. The less exposed soil
A carpet of woodland blubells
there is, the less room for seeds carried in the air to settle and take root, and for those that do, to thrive or at least to be seen. If I look at my own garden, two of the
most successful ground-cover plants are bergenia and the pink flowered geranium endressii. They are fully hardy and nothing much else stands a chance.
Keeping weeds at bay There are many varieties of bergenia, but a good reliable spreader in my experience is bergenia ‘Sunningdale’. It’s not one of the most interesting bergenias, but it does the trick where under-planting is needed. It has large fleshy evergreen leaves,
which make a good foil for large shrubs. With a bright pink flower, it’s important to know the flower colour of any shrub you might be planting it beneath, as it tends to bloom several times throughout the year – even in winter. The nature of many ground-cover plants
like vinca major, for example, is that they can take over. Vinca produces wonderful blue, purple or white flowers early in the
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84