Autumn Life in a Cottage Garden with Carol Klein

I'm Carol Klein and this is my garden -

nestled in the heart of north Devon - 15 miles from the coast

and surrounded by this tranquil and beautiful countryside.

I've taken care of my garden for 30 years.

I know every inch of this place and every plant.

Each season brings its own delights.

There are plenty of challenges too

but that's what makes it so exciting and so fulfilling.

In this series, I want to share with you the four seasons in my garden.

And, over the next half hour, we'll see the garden give up its bounty

and take on its glorious, golden mantle of autumn.

It's autumn and the garden reaches the height of its fruitfulness.

The whole place is rich,

redolent of the smell of wonderful ripening fruit.

There are sheets of colour everywhere.

Bright and brilliant yellows. Blues of the first Michaelmas daisies.

And there are all those exuberant plants - cannas and dahlias -

just jostling with each other to be front of the queue.

Autumn is its own season.

It's not just a corridor between the summer and the winter.

You've got to be out there and collect those seeds.

The first of the spade work starts.

And, in the background, there's a smell of wood smoke

and the very first scents of decay.

It's not nice out there.

You feel as though September is going to be an Indian summer,

wonderful weather, but today's definitely not.

It's absolutely pouring down and it's so blustery too.

But it gives me an opportunity to catch up with loads of those jobs

that I keep on delaying. That's the thing, isn't it?

You can't win. You want to be out there all the time.

If you're out there, you feel guilty about not keeping up with this.

These are aquilegias that I sowed just a few weeks ago.

Especially with things like aquilegia, that flower early,

you can collect the seed, get it sown straight away.

If you get on to it, you can prick them out

and have decent little plants by the time winter comes.

Next spring, hopefully they'll go into the garden.

And it gives you an opportunity when you're doing things like this.

There's something very automatic about it and very restful.

It gives you a chance to think about why you're doing what you're doing

and about this whole wonderful cycle.

These are my two hot borders - a sort of stage set for late summer colour.

They've been a triumph but I really want to extend the excitement.

I think it's really important - with these hot borders -

which have really sort of been at their peak for a few weeks now,

to try and maintain it and make sure everything is as good as it can be.

This rudbeckia usually stands up for itself.

Just occasionally it gets pushed forward by all these other things

which are just jostling for space.

But there are a few leaves and stuff

along here, that have got rather mauled.

Come and have a look.

This is how this canna's supposed to be.

Look at that! Pristine and gorgeous.

But look what's happening at the bottom of the plant.

Those slugs and snails have been in.

This is manna for them really.

So, a bit of pre-emptive action

and we might keep them off these beautiful leaves.

As well as stuff that's flopping and things that have been damaged

by slugs and snails, it's really important

to keep on top of deadheading,

because that encourages lots and lots of other flowers.

You can always tell with these dahlia buds.

It's the squidgy ones you want to get rid of.

You want to cut them back right to the next leaf axle.

Scissors will do. They're quite different from the buds.

The buds are round and solid because they're full of petals.

What we want is flowers, flowers, flowers.

Once upon a time, the only place you would see dahlias

was confined to allotments and out of public sight.

Lots of people used to grow them to show.

They were that sort of a flower.

But nowadays, they've been accepted far more into polite garden society,

and no wonder. They're positively dazzling. You can tell

where they come from. They're from Mexico.

If you've got a dahlia and you want lots more of it, bring into growth

in about March, water them, feed them.

When they've started to make big, solid, robust shoots,

just a few inches tall, you slide your sharpest knife

right down the side of the shoot,

so it's almost in contact with the tuber,

and sever it. Just pull it away, then plunge around the edge

of a clay pot in gritty compost.

And if you put them into a warm place, water them well,

occasional little bit of liquid feed, you'll get big, strong plants as soon

as the pot is full of roots, then just tip the whole thing out

and pot them up individually and then grow them on.

I wouldn't put them out in the garden the first year,

but if you overwinter them, they'll have made tubers by then,

and the next year, they'll be quite capable of holding their own

right out in the open border.

Autumn's the time when the garden gives up its bounty.

There's the last of the beans to harvest.

Not bad, eh?

I love this noise.

My onions can be dried off in the last warming rays

of the autumn sun.

And these apples have to enjoyed straight away.

I mean, it's great sharing your garden, but not with this lot!

Just look at them! The whole place is teeming.

Tomorrow is my special, special open day for the National Gardens Scheme.

And, erm...

It's lovely to share your garden. I just enjoy it so much,

talking to other people about all their hopes and aspirations

and hearing all their ideas, and on the whole, pretty encouraging things.

But what are they going to think of my lobelia? Look at that!

It's completely mullered. There's nothing left of it.

And you're the little critters who're responsible. Look at that.

Aren't they...

..revolting?

Here you go, into there.

I've really got to do the rounds though.

During the past 25 years, I've been opening my garden for charity,

and I love doing it.

The National Gardens Scheme has raised more

than £25 million over the past 15 years for good causes.

But it's not just about fundraising. Gardeners love getting together

to share what they know.

Clematis like alkaline soil, they love alkaline soil.

But they also like plenty of substance. Really strong stuff.

-Keep working with the water?

-Yeah, keep mulching it with muck.

-This is the grass that I grow with rudbeckias.

-It's the taller one.

Cos it's a millennia, but it's not huge like those great arching ones.

It's completely sort of upright, so you can grow it even when you've got

-tight corners like this.

-Beautiful.

That's a wonderful butterfly plant.

That's an agastache, yeah.

-So the butterflies adore it and the bees and all the insects.

-Yes.

-We've just been having a look, watch. Can I?

-Yes, do. Go ahead.

Watch.

-Look at that.

-Blimey.

-So there's next year's plants already.

-I was going to say, yeah, that is next year's plants.

-Yeah.

I ought to give you these back, shouldn't I?

Put them in somebody else's pocket, they'll get a surprise.

Are you sure? Shall we put some in? Sprinkle a bit.

That's the great thing about gardening, isn't it, sharing stuff?

Each year, about three quarters of a million people go to an NGS garden

open day, from the old to the very young.

Well, haven't we had a lovely day, girls? Hasn't it been wonderful?

I've had the most marvellous day.

You get so used to being in your garden on your own.

It's a very solitary sort of business, gardening.

I love that. I love that kind of, you know, instant communication

you get with the earth and with your plants and nothing else matters.

But then to open the garden, to have all these people to share it with,

is so rewarding. People make observations about things

you've never thought of, they make loads of suggestions too,

but I suppose the really satisfying thing is that what they have

to say is so encouraging. I suppose you feel you're doing the right thing

and everything's going well.

October can be so golden.

There are all sorts of changes.

In the morning, when the alarm clock goes off, it's dark outside,

and when you come in in the evening and...

breathe, you can see your breath.

But on these beautiful, golden days, you almost feel as though

the garden's gathered together. It encapsulates all that summer's been,

and yet, at the same time, you can hear it breathing out.

You can hear it dying down and saying, "My work's done.

"I'm just at the point of going to sleep."

The brick garden sits between the hot beds down here

and the top terrace, and it's a kind of hub, it's a sort of centre

of the garden, really.

Of all the places within the garden, it's the one that changes most.

It's a calendar. You see each season coming along,

and each season has its own different persona.

At this time of year, it's glorious,

and probably the centre of the whole thing is the four big clumps

of hakonechloa. I just love the way this swishes about and moves.

Earlier in the year, in...

in early spring, I suppose, late winter,

I got right down into the middle of this

and chopped it all down right back to the ground

so I could see all those wonderful, brilliant spring shoots come up.

It's difficult to do but it's essential.

This euphorbia, it's palustris, and in the spring it's bright

and vigorous and very upright with its big, lime green bracts.

But I think I love it just as much at this time of year when,

in its death throes, it becomes golden and amber and wistful.

It moves about beautifully.

It's a good companion right the way through the growing season

for this lovely rudbeckia.

Now this whole garden is packed with North American daisies.

Rudbeckia's probably the most dominant of all of them.

Bright, vivid splashes of yellow for a couple of months.

But then, when those petals start to fade,

look what it leaves behind.

It's almost another set of daisies,

the green calyx with the black cone in the middle.

And I'll leave those right the way through the winter,

cos the birds and the insects love this plant.

It's covered with autumn butterflies,

and then afterwards, the birds move in and take the seeds.

And this beautiful Aster, that was a cloud of blue earlier on.

Soon all its seeds will have disappeared, flown away,

and they'll leave behind them, all winter long,

these little silver twinkling stars.

I do love this place. I could sit here for ever.

Sometimes I feel really sorry for the plants in my garden,

cos no sooner do they come into flower than I'm already thinking

about them setting seed and being able to collect it.

It's the perfect day for it. It's sunny and warm.

And I made notes about these two eryngiums earlier on.

Even took pictures, because they were quite distinctive,

and they're both really desirable plants.

This one was deep rich purple,

while this was this brilliant, sparkling sort of blue, really scintillating.

I want to keep those seeds separate and actually sow them separately

and bring the plants on in two different batches.

Now, I marked each of the best seed heads on here

with a piece of red ribbon, cos it was a very special plant.

Now I'm just going to snip them off. It's a very, very prickly business.

So that's my bright, bright blue, and then the purple.

And when you're doing it,

your mind goes backwards to just how wonderful these plants were.

And then forwards to the spring when these things start to pop up,

and you get a whole new cycle starting again.

Look at this beautiful little thing.

Isn't it lovely? It's a scabious, obviously.

Scabiosa ochroleuca.

And what's lovely about it is these pale, pale lemon flowers.

The insects adore them.

But also the seed heads are so sculptural, so beautiful.

Each one of them is individually attached to that central bit.

And at the right moment, they all just sort of fly away in succession.

But these aren't going to, cos I'm going to have them.

That's what you call a decent haul.

Lovely. But there's something else deep in the woodland

that I want to collect - it's a berry.

This is one of my favourite foliage plants.

It's Arum italicum 'Pictum'.

This is why you grow it, for these beautiful leaves

that are there all through the winter.

But while they're making a fine display,

my seedlings are going to be growing,

cos I'm going to collect a whole load of these and sow them.

And inside here are one or two enormous seeds.

They're big enough to be able to sow.

Look at this, Silv! Eh? Isn't that great?

I'll have a trayful of seedlings.

They'll grow on. By next spring, I'll have nice little plants.

I'll be able to prick them out individually.

Grow them on some more. And by this time next year,

I can just put them around the garden where I'd like to,

cos it looks beautiful when you can see it in the...

a whole drift of it.

Still there when the snowdrops come up in the spring.

Everywhere stuff's sort of dying down, going to sleep.

You get this kind of feeling of dampness and sadness.

It's all getting a bit dank, but it's still very, very beautiful.

The magnolia that's, em...

just lost all its gorgeous amber leaves,

they've been tumbling over the last few weeks.

Now you can see all those furry buds behind.

It's like they've got little grey, fluffy overcoats on.

And you know that that's next year's flowers,

and they're all kind of disguised amongst this gorgeous lichen.

But there are so many things to do. You've got to put the whole garden to bed.

And it's your last opportunity to plant bulbs.

I think that...that should do it.

Energetic stuff, this!

When I'm potting my tulips up,

I don't like using straightforward multi-purpose,

cos I feel I've got to give them the very best sort of...

The best home I possibly can provide.

So, I'm making up my own mix.

I give them equal parts multi-purpose and sterilised loam.

Plenty of grit for good drainage.

I think they're really going to adore this.

I'm so excited. I nearly tipped the lot out on the floor!

Here are my tulips, the very first ones.

And I'm going to start this rather long process of potting them up,

cos I grow thousands of tulips, I really grow masses of them.

And... I just love that moment.

I mean, I ordered these weeks and weeks ago.

But, em, there's all that anticipation...

of your bulbs actually arriving. And then when you get them,

you know, you delve in here, and here are these beautiful...

Look at that, I mean, they're like little pieces of sculpture.

I can't grow tulips in my ground

cos I've got heavy, wet clay,

and what they love is light, well-drained, alkaline soil.

And they love to get baked too.

Now, it looks like I'm packing these in very close. Well, I am.

If you were putting them in the ground, you'd never do this, of course.

You'd have to leave them the opportunity to expand,

and they'd rot if they were touching. But in here,

in this very, very gritty compost,

and clay pots, the water's going to drain away,

and they'll sit out here on this top terrace all winter long.

Tulips need a period of prolonged cold to get them to flower properly.

Then in the spring, I'll see these little shoots starting to emerge,

and within a matter of weeks, they'll have just burgeoned.

Great big masses of wonderful colour.

The colour this autumn has been magnificent.

My Cercidiphyllums over here have been just beautiful,

every colour imaginable.

Golden, yellows, ambers, russets.

And as for the Fothergilla, this little shrub up at the top,

I've never seen it with such brilliant colour.

But of all of them, this has got to be my favourite.

This is Acer osakazuki.

My mum gave it to me,

so it's got very, very special significance.

And any minute now, the whole thing is going to become this most glorious scarlet.

The whole garden is glowing.

But you come out one morning, and you look up at the branches

and you realise that there are more leaves on the ground

than there are on the trees!

Underneath this acer, the whole thing is sort of crimson confetti.

But then the wind starts to blow, and it's a northerly wind.

It's a chill wind.

You turn the collar up on your coat.

And you reach for your warmest clothes and you realise

that winter's on its way.

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