Homes & gardens
Gardening with Hadlow College
Experts from the college’s Broadview garden gentre offer their seasonal maintenance advice...
Bringing its rust-hued kaleidoscope of colours and dramatic golden sunbeams, autumn presents a great opportunity to undertake vital work in the garden and prepare for the year ahead.
There are a number of important tasks to carry out to help improve your garden. These may include some of the following:
available bee and butterfly collections. These packs contain a large amount of bulbs in several different types, which are all perfect pollinators. Snowdrops can also be planted as a bulb, but it is important to ensure that smaller bulbs such as these do not dry out too much, so keep an eye on the watering if it is a dry autumn.
2. Collect seed
Many plants can be grown every year from seed. Some of the easiest include nigella, cosmos, scabious and cleome.
3. Divide herbaceous plants
Herbaceous plants will often benefit from splitting to encourage new vigour and to allow you to plant more elsewhere in the garden. These may include plants such as hemerocallis, paeonies, geranium, astilbe and hosta.
4. The greenhouse 1. Planting spring bulbs
Autumn is the ideal time to plant spring bulbs for a wonderful display next year. There is a wonderful selection to choose from, including the ever-popular daffodils and tulips, small iris or large alliums – which can give height in a border. If you find it difficult to choose between several different colours of tulip, why not try a combination pack, which generally contains two or more varieties in one packet. Also available this year are collections of three different types of bulb (eg daffodil, iris and crocus) all in one packet, which are perfect for planting in pots and available from all good garden centres. If you want to encourage wildlife into your garden, how about one of the widely
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Allow as much light into the greenhouse as possible for maximum growth by removing shading - and think about washing the glass and replacing any damaged panes, greasing vents, and disinfecting it too.
5. Tidy borders
Clean borders of weeds and top dress with well-rotted manure to get nutrients back into the soil and increase its ease to work with next year. Some perennials can be cut back, but bear in mind seed heads can be attractive and a source of food for birds.
6. Planting
A great time to plant, especially trees. It will give plants time to establish a new root system over the winter, ensuring they are less work to look
after the following spring. Plant Liquidambar and Nyssa sylvatica trees now for stunning autumn colour. Top- worked trees such as cherries and weeping willow are great for very small gardens, as they grow slowly and stay compact. Crab apples and ornamental cherries are extremely useful for early flower colour and attractive foliage. The attraction of a crab apple is that you can also expect a profusion of colourful fruit in the autumn.
7. Lifting Lift tender plants such as begonias, dahlias and cannas, and store frost-free in trays of dry compost, ready to replant in spring.
8. Lawns Remove thatch with a spring-tined rake and aerate and improve drainage with a fork.
9. Make leaf mould By raking up all the leaves in the garden and composting
10. Plant winter bedding Brighten up your borders with wallflowers, pansies, polyanthus, primroses and bellis.
Mid Kent Living 55
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