Episode 26 Gardeners' World

Hello. Welcome to Gardeners' World.

Now, at this time of year, the short-day plants

are holding the colour in the garden together.

Long-day plants, which grow and work with the growing light

at the beginning of the year are really dripping away.

But if the plant is promoted by heat,

such as dahlias or cannas or marigolds,

then there's no reason why they won't go on flowering

until the first frost comes.

But if they go to seed, then that will stop them,

so it is really, really important to deadhead as much as possible.

With dahlias, which I think really carry colour

better than anything else at this time of year,

you can see the difference -

this is a bud that's not yet open,

and it's fundamentally spherical,

and this a flower that has finished,

and it's more or less conical.

If it's pointy and long, you can cut it off.

When you cut, don't just cut near the head,

but right down at a leaf,

and that will promote more growth.

So, if you do nothing else in the garden,

just wander around deadheading.

It's a lovely job because apart from anything else,

you get to see your garden up close and personal.

This week, Carol is flying high into a tree canopy

to discover why our historic trees are precious homes for wildlife.

Ooh, it's a whole different world!

The Dutch garden designer Piet Oudolf gives me

an exclusive look around his brand-new garden

that he's created in Somerset.

Why don't you take one of each you like

and just create something beautiful?

And later in the programme, I shall be giving Nigel a good prune!

Eh, Nige?

All right.

Come on.

Come on, Nige!

HE WHISTLES

I'm going to plant a couple of crab apples

here in the cottage garden.

A cottage garden, of course, can take anything,

anything that looks beautiful and is edible is allowed in.

Crab apples do all that.

They have lovely blossom quite early, in April,

and then the foliage is good, they make neat trees,

never too big, often the leaves will turn a good colour in autumn,

and of course they have beautiful fruit.

Beautiful to look at, primarily,

but crab apple jelly is delicious,

and some varieties make really, really good crab apple jelly.

I've chosen two varieties.

The first is 'Comtesse de Paris',

which will grow four metres tall,

not too big, ideal for a small garden,

and the fruits last, so you've got that decoration hanging

like baubles right up to the end of the year,

and there aren't that many crabs that have good yellow fruits.

And it has wonderful pure-white blossom in spring,

so what's not to like about it?

The other one, 'Evereste', has more orangey fruits,

makes a fairly round head when it's mature,

but also has white blossom.

The important thing is that crab apples are tough,

they're hardy and there's practically no soil or situation

that they can't grow in,

so almost every garden can accommodate one.

Come on, mush. Out the way.

As for planting them,

what I'm doing is, I'm digging a much wider hole than the pot,

plenty of room for the roots to spread,

because with any tree,

you want the roots to go outwards, not down.

The further they go out, the stronger the tree will be

and the healthier it will be.

Well...

So just tease the roots. Don't try and untangle them.

Just break them, and that will stimulate fresh growth.

Pop that in the hole.

Now, notice I haven't added any compost or goodness

into the planting hole. There are two reasons for this.

The first is that we want this tree to grow out into the soil

and if you put compost in the hole, it won't want to leave.

Why would it? The sooner those roots get out into the surrounding soil,

whatever it's like, the healthier and the stronger

and the better it will grow. The second reason is,

is if you fill a planting hole with compost or manure,

it acts as a sponge, and there's a real risk of waterlogging.

Once you've got your height and your position,

it will need staking.

Move the tree completely out the way...

Stake doesn't need to be tall.

It can be as short as two or three feet,

because what you're trying to do is support the bottom of the trunk

and let the top move around as much as it wants to.

The more it moves, the stronger it will get.

And now we can start to put the earth around it.

At this stage, really firm it in well.

This is very, very important,

that you make sure that those roots are firmly in the ground,

and because I've planted it slightly proud of the surface,

effectively, you're making a bit of a cone

and that's what you want. That's the perfect profile

for any tree-planting.

Next stage is to tie it.

You can buy tree ties of various forms.

This is the type that I tend to use.

You make a figure of eight so that the tree doesn't rub

against the support.

OK. That's planted - now give it a really good drink.

The final stage is to give it a generous mulch.

Now, this variety, 'Evereste', has peachy-coloured crab apples

and I'll put it in the same position in this border behind me.

Between them, I think they'll add colour, shape

and of course fruit to the cottage garden.

The other thing which they do is that they are fabulous pollinators.

They attract lots and lots of insects,

so they're good for really any garden.

But the one thing that neither of these two varieties will do

is grow into a large tree.

Now, that might be a blessing if you've got a small garden,

but there is something magnificent about any huge tree,

particularly, actually, if it's growing in a city.

And as part of her journey exploring the wildlife that we share

our gardens with, Carol has visited Bristol,

and a garden that contains a spectacular copper beech.

Until 50 years ago,

our city streets and gardens were full of big trees

but, sadly, they've begun to meet their demise.

And that has emphasised what a hugely important resource they are,

for both the communities here and the wildlife who inhabit

our cities and gardens.

Since he was a young boy, James Aldred has been

obsessed with trees.

This love has taken him all around the world,

from the Amazon to Asia,

exploring the canopies that tower above us.

Isn't it true to say, James, that without trees,

we wouldn't be here, would we?

-They're the kind of lungs of the world, aren't they?

-Yes,

and if you could strip away all of the wood and you could see the water

that's been carried up via capillary action,

you'd see a fountain of water here,

and that has a massively cooling effect on the urban environment.

But it all starts down here. This wonderful leaf litter,

which many people think is a nuisance, is actually a huge benefit

-for all those creatures.

-Oh, yeah.

For a start, all the things that snuffle around in there.

Absolutely. They're all there for a reason.

They're all eating these lovely invertebrates, like this,

and the woodlouse needs moisture to breathe.

It breathes through gills, essentially,

and this leaf litter locks that moisture into the ground

and provides a microclimate and a very important habitat.

I suppose one of the most important creatures in that kind of chain

-is the earthworm, isn't it?

-Absolutely.

Charles Darwin had nothing but praise for our humble little earthworm.

Worms play a huge role in breaking down fallen leaves.

Some of them live on the soil's surface,

feeding on the decomposing leaf litter.

Others live in vertical burrows in the soil,

but they come up to the surface at night to feed on fallen leaves,

which they drag down.

The burrowing and feeding of all worms improves the soil,

mixing the layers, making it more aerated,

providing excellent conditions for roots to grow,

benefitting our gardens immensely.

Just so I can truly experience what our tree has to offer

this city's wildlife, James, a professional tree-climber

as well as an expert on trees,

is taking me up in the branches of this rather large garden beech.

It's just so fascinating, isn't it,

to be up here and see what's actually going on.

-I think this is pretty squirrel-ish.

-Yes.

-We're in Squirrel-ville here.

All of this is quite deliberately placed,

and there's a whole load of beech mast which has been stashed in there.

But this is the best bit.

-This is the point where a big branch has come down at some stage.

-Yes.

Correct. So, it's come out of here, like a socket,

and the tree now is busy trying to cover it up.

All of this is the broken-down remains of wood

mixed with leaves. It's the perfect hanging basket!

Right, let's see how deep it goes.

HE LAUGHS

-It's right down there.

-That's the bottom.

So, that's right up from the bottom. Look at all that.

That's where the wood is breaking down,

-being turned into soil.

-Really, really squelchy, isn't it?

-Yes.

-It smells pretty funky, as well!

-It does, doesn't it?

-It must be heaven in the sky...

-It is.

-..for all those little insects.

-It is.

Within here, we have a lot of the same things that we have

down at ground level, maybe not the worms,

but certainly all the woodlice and earwigs,

but you've probably got nematodes, all sorts.

But all food for the birds who live in the tree, too.

Tree-creepers love it, especially old pollarded beeches like this,

because it's lovely old, wrinkled, elephantine-style skin,

so they can get right in here and pull all the little beasties out.

The only way a holly, for example, gets here,

to be seeded in this sort of soil,

is via a bird, so it would have eaten one of the berries

off one of these bushes down here,

-would have come up here, roosted...

-And wipes its beak.

This is fascinating, but can we go a bit higher

-and see what's happening up there?

-We certainly can.

As you go up, it just changes, doesn't it?

All of the little cracks, crevices, all the breakout cavities,

all of the dead wood, it's a wonderful habitat.

And as far as the bluetits are concerned,

there are all manner of caterpillars and aphids,

because bluetits LOVE those, don't they?

And it's all so perfectly timed, isn't it?

You don't see the bluetits nesting until those caterpillars are out.

-You don't see the caterpillars until the beech leaves are out.

-Exactly.

They're very important urban corridors, really,

the canopy of trees, really. Things can get through,

across between gardens, between large inner-urban green spaces.

-Let's keep on going.

-Yes.

So, this is a great perspective.

This is one of the things I love doing with a pollarded beech.

At this sort of height, if you now look down...

Oh, wow!

-Isn't that fantastic?

-It's beautiful.

I think, when you're up here, you begin to get some idea

of just what it must be like to be one of the creatures

-who lives up here.

-I know. It is an island in the sky

and its only real connection to down there

is obviously the tree trunk

but really, in terms of most of the habitat,

it's here inside this bubble, inside this canopy,

and of course, it's a lovely way for them to feel safe

-whilst they're surveying what's going on below.

-Right.

And by getting up high, they'll use these as perches to sing from -

thrushes, blackbirds...

Anything with leaves is doing wonderful things for your gardens,

whether it's a beech, a silver birch, a poplar, an oak,

whatever it is, it's all good.

Not only is it providing infinite variety of wonderful food

and shelter for wildlife,

but for us all, it just makes you feel better, doesn't it?

-It does.

-Thank goodness for trees!

-Yeah.

We saw in the beech that Carol was looking at

how you got a nice, neat callous where a branch has snapped off.

The damage that's caused to this apple

won't heal quite so easily.

It's a variety called 'Arthur Turner',

it's an early cooker, a big apple

and it's slightly prone to breaking and has broken badly

because the apple harvest has been so huge and so early.

This has left a very jagged edge, huge surface area,

pointing upwards, so the rain can get in.

That will bring fungus, disease

and all kinds of problems may ensue, so I need to sort it out.

First thing to do, is to cut back to the clean wood

and make the cut at an angle, so that any rainwater drains off it,

so we'll just cut like that.

That piece of wood with its ripped and torn surface,

all the way around, has taken off.

However, this branch is ripping off

and that does need to come down, so I'm going to try and clean that up

and see if I can leave a clean wound that will heal itself.

It's not the cleanest wound,

because there is a hole in there, that is

a possible source of problems, but I would say,

when you have wounds like this, don't paint them.

Leave them exposed to the air and let them callous

and heal naturally

because the dangers of trapping in any fungus, disease or even

just moisture is far greater than the danger of an exposed wound.

Actually, while I'm up here, I am going to cut off below this wound.

HENS CLUCK

Right, I must tidy all this up,

but the first thing I'm going to do is pick up some windfalls.

They'll last for a week or two at the most,

but, essentially, you want to use them up

as quickly as you can and Arthur Turner is a really good

breakfast apple, stewed apple for breakfast is

one of life's great delights, mix in a little bit of yoghurt,

maybe a spoonful of honey - fantastic!

Now, even if you're not gathering Arthur Turner windfalls

for breakfast, here are some other things you can be doing.

If you sow spinach seeds now, it will give you

a harvest of baby leaves this autumn and more mature leaves next spring.

Sprinkle the seeds thinly in shallow drills.

Draw the soil back over them and water them in well,

then cover them with a cloche or fleece

and they should germinate in the next week or two.

Now is a good time to take penstemon cuttings as an insurance

against winter losses.

Choose nice strong stems that don't have a flowering bud

and cut them to about six to nine inches long.

Put the cuttings straight into a polythene bag

until you're ready to pot them up, then strip off the lower leaves

and make a clean cut just below a leaf node.

Pop them around the edge of a pot using a free draining compost,

put them somewhere warm and then give them a water.

Mist them daily so they don't dry out.

Unlike apples, pears should be harvested before they ripen.

Hold the still-firm fruit and gently raise it to the horizontal.

If it comes away in your hand, it's ready.

Handle it very gently and store in a cool, dark place, then bring out

a few at a time to a sunny spot on a windowsill to ripen more quickly

and, as soon as they are ripe, eat them immediately.

The garden might be gently declining,

but grasses are coming to their very best now

and they last easily till Christmas, looking good,

and one of my favourites is Miscanthus,

Miscanthus Malepartus, with its purple plumes of flower

which then change colour to gold as we go further into autumn

and one of the first people to bring grasses into use

as a border plants was Piet Oudolf.

He's now one of the most famous garden designers in the world

and the Gallery Hauser & Wirth has commissioned him

to create a garden for their new gallery down in Bruton

in Somerset and, a week or so ago, I went down for an exclusive look.

When I walked in here, I saw this big, open site

which initially looks like one giant border. What led you to this?

I put out a make of the field, a field of perennials,

so it's not really a border, it is

perennials that don't grow very tall, so wherever you are, you can

overlook the area and see everything in a different perspective.

'It's easy to see Pete's overall idea

'when you look at the original plan

'for the garden, which is a work of art in itself.'

We see that we obviously divided it up in one, two,

-three, four different ideas.

-Right.

This is a planting which has some basic planting of where plants

emerge from, we call that a matrix.

So matrix is where you have one dominant plant or group of plants...

Yes, or sort of basic plants where all the other plants or groups

-emerge from.

-OK. Whereas these are in...

-I call that a block plant.

Block planting.

I put lists together on the side with names that

I can possibly use in that sort of particular idea.

It's like taking a corner and pick a plant and put it...

I start here with this one plant and just put it everywhere,

next plant, plant, plant, plant.

-Next plant...

-Right, right.

'This garden is still very young, but even after just a few months

'the real thing is every bit as striking as Pete's plan.'

Now this, I guess, is matrix planting,

so dominating is this grass which, to be honest, I don't recognise.

What is this grass?

It's Sporobolus, a North American grass, which is a prairie grass.

It's very durable, very reliable

and it's recently introduced in the UK.

And what about maintenance? Is it high maintenance?

Everything we see here, whether it's the block planting or this,

has a lower level of maintenance when it is grown in.

If the soil is good enough, you look at the plants,

they look healthy, I wouldn't use compost or mushroom compost,

I would use a neutral mulch, like pine bark, very small fraction,

not too thick, but the good thing is these plants will cover ground.

-There's not much space for mulch.

-OK.

At what point do you cut it all back?

People ask me, "When do I have to cut back?"

I say, "When you're bored with the plants you see."

This is one of your block planting beds.

There we have a great block of helenium.

I love it because after flowering, it still looks good.

The seed heads, they stay for over the winter,

so it's all about the dynamics too, you know.

It's about when they start to flower

and after flowering into the winter, so it's all about the seasons.

What goes on in here in spring?

Because it won't look anything like this, will it?

No, we're going to put bulbs in, not too much,

but a lot - eremurus, camassia, allium, crocus,

and a lot else we put in, but we do that in masses.

If I have a small back garden, but I like this style of planting,

what's the smallest scale it will work on?

Do I need clumps of five or three? How much can I take it down?

-You can take it down to single plants.

-Really?

-Yeah, really.

Gardening doesn't have to do with scale, it has the do with, you know,

how you put things together.

Let's say you have a small garden, you love all the plants here,

why don't you take one of each you like

and just create something beautiful with it? I can do it, you know.

In this scale, I can do a lot wrong.

On a smaller scale, you're happy to potter around with your plant

and next year say, "OK, it was in the wrong place and we put it there now."

That's gardening.

That is how I started, you know, if you don't do things wrong,

it will never go right.

Come on, then. Come on.

You can go and see Pete's garden and I do recommend you do.

I thought it was stunning and it's only going to get better.

It's free but opening times do vary,

so give the Gallery Hauser & Wirth a ring

or you can go to our website and get all the details

and if you get there before October 5th,

do go into the gallery

and see the exhibition of Pete's drawings, not just of that garden,

but other great gardens he's done also - really, really inspiring.

Now, Pete hasn't included any topiary here at all in his garden

and Nigel is extremely upset about that

because he's got a great interest in this...

Now I've had a letter...

Hope it doesn't get too soggy in the rain.

..from Martin in Cardiff

and Martin says, "Dear Monty, "around this time last year,

"Monty revealed plans to create box topiary of Nigel in the garden.

"My children Owen and Menna..." Hello, Owen and Menna.

"..watch Gardeners' World with me

"every other Friday when they come to stay and almost without fail

"ask whether the statue of Nigel will be on this week.

"Do you have an update on its progress

"and are there any plans to show it before the end of the series?"

Well, the statue of Nigel, the great statue of Nigel,

not made out of box, made out of yew

and there is a really significant difference, not least that it

won't get box blight like every other bit of box in this garden.

Here's the model, so we've got the head, we've got a nice long back...

..and...Nigel posing. Good boy.

So, you've got a back along there, the head will come up and then go

along, so at this stage, I can start cutting quite a lot of it away.

So the first thing is to take this off and, like any plant,

yew wants to establish a leader and where you have a leader,

like this one, it suppresses the growth of the shoots below it.

So, by cutting off that leader, I'll make these grow more strongly.

That is now the top of Nigel's head and his jaws and mouth

and nose will come from these three here,

so I'm going to have to train those in, which means...

And we've got a little bit... We've got ears and things to go there,

I won't need that, so that can come back.

And I won't need that, and I won't need that.

The point that I'm trying to do is to create a woody framework...

-NIGEL WHINES

-What? Oh!

I can tell you something the topiary will have to have

and that's a ball.

It will either have to be a ball just in front of him with him

fixated on it or else in his mouth. Which would you prefer?

In your mouth, I guess.

So, if that's the head coming up there, we can take this back,

we can take this back.

Now if we've got the head, that means the chest is coming down

so we can cut that back, and that back and this.

OK, let's tie that in.

Essentially, I'm making Nigel's spine.

There, that can get tied in too.

Now, at this stage,

it obviously doesn't look any more like Nigel

than it did half an hour ago,

but we're beginning to get the sense of a framework

and that really is the secret of nice, strong topiary -

cut it and shape it and build it up as you go.

Yew can be put on the compost heap, it will compost down.

Of course, not all fruits have to justify their place

in the garden by their produce.

The banana that I put in after seeing it at Hampton Court

has been fabulous from the day I planted it, really looks good,

but I'll never get a banana from it.

In fact, it won't overwinter, so when the weather gets colder,

I'll be lifting it and taking it in,

but that's all we've got time for this week

and next week we're back to the more familiar time of 9.30,

so I'll see you then, back here at Longmeadow.

Till then, bye-bye.