The worst of this year’s mistakes have been queuing up and shouting. Be warned and don’t blunder like me!
- If you plant asparagus crowns, WATER them in drought. I relied on their love of saline sandy conditions and many died from lack of a drink.
- Do NOT plant sunflowers in the vegetable patch, they will put on titan girths by stealing all the nutrients from the vegetable neighbours. Sow them anywhere else – but not there.
- Don’t PANIC BUY more bamboo. If you go bamboo shopping, have a bit more patience than me. I panicked when no early culms sprouted in the spring and went back to the nursery and bought another. Now the bamboo becomes a thicket and before long will march out of the flowerbed and into the drive.
- BLIND BELIEF in plant labels is not a good idea. Be vigilant as something horrible might slip in under the radar. Read labels carefully of course but never entirely trust what is written on them. I have, unbelievably been nurturing the worst sort of thistle in the hope that despite my eyes it might turn out to be an artichoke.
- Watch out for VIGOUR with climbing plants. ALWAYS check the vigour of a climbing rose and match that up with how much wall space you can give it – I seem to be cutting off great armfuls of rose branches almost by the week round my back door.
- SPURN the wrong marrow/squash. Do not encourage really profligate marrows or courgettes in the vegetable patch – right now we have strangulation and the fence being pulled down by some over boisterous squashes that are equally slow to fruit up.
- AVOID tulip greed. This goes with buying bulbs and squashing far too many into a pot in pursuit of magnificent display. Too many people in a lift will run out of air and it is much the same for the bulbs hard jammed up against one another. Leave at least a bulb’s girth between each one.
- DO not leave those fat and juicy APHIDS on the lupins and hope they will go away.
- Don’t let your annuals go to seed – keep PICKING the flowers to extend the display. Left alone, they will literally flower to death.
- Keep your nurtured seedlings out of reach of MARAUDING PUPPIES. They are far more destructive than an army of slugs.
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