Episode 20 The Beechgrove Garden

Well, hello there. Welcome to Beechgrove.

This is the time of year when we start preparing

the lawn for winter by putting on a specially formulated fertiliser.

I was going to do it last week,

and it was chucking it down with rain,

so it had to be moved forward a bit.

No harm done, there's still plenty of time to do it.

You see, Maddy there is putting on fertiliser with her distributor,

which is an off-the-shelf standard product.

It's got no weedkiller and no moss killer in it,

it's just straight fertiliser.

I'm trying out a new one here, which is an organic material.

It's from the same stable as the moss killer that we used earlier.

And I'll tell you a little bit more about it.

It has eight parts nitrogen, five parts phosphate,

13 parts potage and three parts magnesium.

A wee bonus there at the end,

and it's all to build up the strength of the lawn

and improve it for the winter.

It's in a carrier which is made of fulvic acid and humic acid,

but forget about that.

It's humus, it's well-rotted organic material, which actually

is also adding to the fertility of the soil itself,

improving the structure,

which is gey important going through the winter.

That amount goes on one square metre.

And I actually apply by hand, and I put it on like so.

The important thing is to try and get it even.

It seems a lot when you see it like that, doesn't it?

And when I've finished doing it that way,

I then turn round and do it this way,

and by so doing, it means that you don't miss any bits.

It's slow-acting, it's organic, so I don't worry about standing on it,

sometimes if you stand on these things, you can damage them.

Right. Now, then, it's the big job.

So, what we've done is we've put the quantity measured out

for this whole area, and I've put it in two lots,

so that I can do one this way and one that way. OK?

Here we go. Round the edges, and then back this way.

And I am mindful that I've got to get to the end before I run out.

How's that? That's not bad.

Put the other half on. Going the other way.

Now you know what's supposed to be done.

This is what's on the rest of the programme.

I really love my job.

This week, Beechgrove have splashed out and sent me on a cruise!

And I'm in Gartcosh to show you what you can do

with two manhole covers in your front garden.

Well, you know, I'm absolutely delighted

with the growth on these Jerusalem artichokes.

And indeed, if you just want a temporary wind barrier,

then this is a plant that you can grow, but I'll take you back,

these plants, or the tubers,

were actually planted back in the springtime.

I've got two varieties, the common Jerusalem artichoke

and a named variety called Fuseau.

Some are grown in tubs, or containers,

and then the others in the border.

Now, we won't be cropping these until September time,

and then I want to compare them, you know,

do we get as good a crop in the container as in the border?

They belong to the sunflower family, and if they do start to set bud,

and we haven't got any sign of that at the moment,

I would suggest you take those off, because if you let them flower,

that can give a bit of a check to the crop down below.

Just like potatoes, they've been earthed up.

I'm also growing, for the first time, Chinese artichokes.

Same comparison, in containers and in the border.

They belong to the mint family,

and just like the Jerusalem artichokes,

we will not be cropping those until September-October time.

But, you know, at the moment,

they're looking really healthy plants.

And speaking about healthy plants, just look at this asparagus.

Wonderful news, because we had problems a couple of years ago

trying to grow asparagus here, but fresh soil was put in,

Jim planted these crowns back in April time,

and now we've got wonderful growth.

No cropping, though, because the first year

when you buy these plants in, you need to build up the crowns,

and that's why you let these fronds grow up.

Now, you treat them like a herbaceous perennial.

In other words, these fronds will eventually start to go yellow

in the autumn time, then you can cut them right down to the base.

And then, fingers crossed, next year,

we are going to have some lovely asparagus to taste,

and there's actually four varieties in there.

Now, this is another trial. This is all about sweetcorn.

Two supersweet varieties, and we are growing some plants from seed

and some plants were plants that were brought in.

So this is the block that was grown from seed,

and they're quite cheap,

because it's only cost us about 6p-7p per plant.

And then these were the plants that were brought in,

working out at about 35p a plant.

And, you know, at the moment, these ones are further ahead.

They're also at the moment being pollinated.

It's all about these flowers that are forming here, or the tassles,

and with the wind, that's why you plant them in a block,

the pollen drops down onto the female silks,

and each of these silks is connected to one of the cobs.

Today, I'm on the outskirts of Glasgow,

and I'm here to help a young couple

with what is a common cosmetic problem in a new-built home.

-Susan and Roddy, how are you?

-Good, thanks.

-Nice. Good to see you.

-Hi, there.

-This is the problem, isn't it?

-It is.

-Two manhole covers in a perfect lawn. Have you tried to disguise these at all?

I've come out under the cover of darkness with a can of spray paint

and tried to match up with the grass, but it didn't really work.

There's various things we can do to try and disguise them.

We could put pots on top, we can plant round about,

but, you know, it's part of a service strip that occurs in many gardens

in these new housing estates,

and we've got to be careful

that we don't stop the local authorities getting access to it,

so the people who want in there need to get in.

So, what we have to put here

is something which is maybe ephemeral planting,

it's not going to be big trees or shrubs

that are going to take up a lot of space and take time to develop

and fill the space too much.

So, it'll be some gentler planting, but it will disguise it,

-because they look terrible from the house, don't they?

-Yeah.

And it's spoiling your lawn.

Well, you put a lot of effort into it, you know, autumn feed,

your spring feed and weed down, and it's just an eyesore.

So, we'll do the planting around the manhole,

but then there's this other bit at the side, the hedge.

That's there because you want to define the outside space

of your garden space, don't you?

The reason was to just create a barrier between the communal grass

and our own grass, there wasn't a clear definition between the two.

What we'll do is, we'll take out a strip and we'll bulk it up

by putting in the same sorts of plants, some more boxwood.

We're going to take out this strip,

dig it over and put the hedge in there.

Of course, this clean edge...

Roddy will be able to cut the grass in a straight line!

This lawn's becoming obsessive, it is!

This is quite a useful tip when we're actually looking to make a bed

or something like that where you can just feed the hose round.

Do you want to bring it round there to see where you would maybe like it?

Now, is that the shape you want?

That's kind of kidney-shaped, isn't it? Would that do?

Yeah, that looks good.

So that gives us a line that we can cut round,

and that's the shape of the bed.

We're going to lift the turf,

but we want to retain as much soil as possible,

because we want to be planting straight into the soil,

there's no membrane going down here,

we're just putting gravel straight onto the top.

Sssh, sssh, sssh!

BABY BEGINS TO CRY

Because we want something to detract from the manholes,

I thought we would get things that would be giving you constant movement,

little bits of colour within them as well.

This plant here, this is a thing called chionochloa.

It's a New Zealand grass, and we can actually put three of those

in that pot, and that will then arch out over the top.

We've got this, which we'll put underneath it,

that's called prairie fire, and it's got this wonderful bronze on it,

and in between it we'll put the eryngium

and we'll also put the lavender so you get a wee bit of scent.

Then, we've got some rosemary, which if you sniff it,

it smells like ginger beer.

-OK, right.

-You can prove it later on!

And then, for round the edges and places, I've got this one.

This is a black grass, that's what we call it,

but it's not really a grass, it's got long, thin leaves,

but it's got flowers and when you look at the flowers,

it's actually the same family as the onion.

So, we'll plant this, and that is one where

when you put it at the edge, it kind of camouflages the edge of a bed.

And then for the hedge behind us, we've got these.

Now, this is ordinary boxwood, it's the same as you've got at the back.

OK. Looks a bit...better.

THEY LAUGH

-The nurseryman fed this, and you didn't feed yours!

-OK.

So, we'll just make sure, we'll put these in between, bulk up the hedge,

and then it'll grow away, and you'll need to feed that as well.

Let's go for it.

The eryngiums in the middle, see these flower heads?

All you need to do then, once they're finished,

is clip them right back to ground level.

That will die right back in the winter

and it will come away again in the spring.

The lavender, just shear the top once it's finished flowering.

OK. On with the planting.

Ooh! Can I do it? No!

-OK, gloves off time!

-OK.

We've planted this here, Mike's just finished off the hedge there.

-This looks super, doesn't it?

-It looks lovely. Really nice.

-OK?

-Yeah.

-You're not just saying that because I'm standing here?

-No, no!

That should give you colour for, I would say, 52 weeks of the year.

-And not a stank in sight!

-We've done what we set out to do.

-Thank goodness.

-That's it, yeah. We've also done the hedge.

We've got the dark green and we've got the light green,

but they'll soon all come back.

Make sure you give that a water. OK?

Make sure you soak it, because these newly planted ones

will just need a good drink to get them started.

Give those a water as well.

You might remember that I grew a range of house plants from seed

back in July, that's when the greenhouse is pretty empty

from the bedding plants.

Looking gorgeous, and these are coleus,

which are grown for their leaves. That's beautiful!

Yeah, that's a variety called Pallisandra, and it's like velvet, isn't it?

I know I always go for purple,

but there's another one here with that pink down the centre.

Black Dragon, that one. But, you know, you've got such a range.

Look at that one with the lovely green edge there.

-That one is part of the wizard series.

-Wizard Scarlet.

-And if they put any flowers up, you just nip those off.

-Yes, you do.

Easy to take cuttings as well, and if you want to bring them

through the winter, you need to give them a bit of heat.

I think we need to mention this plant, and I think we planted this up together.

We did. It's got basil in it, it's not been very happy.

Well, you've got to water from the top,

so it gets really wet, and it's rather wobbly, isn't it?

But, you know, I like the idea of vertical planting, don't you?

Yes, of course, cos if you've only got a small amount of space,

you get a lot of plants in, so in principle, it's good.

But the basil here is really quite happy in pots,

this is the second sowing, because the first sowing,

with the cold weather, it didn't like it, but try that.

There's a lovely, lovely basily smell anyway coming out, and then...

Oh, that's gorgeous.

-That's lemony.

-Lemon sherbet.

-Really citrusy and sharp.

That is Mrs Burns' lemon, which I think is gorgeous.

-I'm sure you're like the purple one.

-Of course, of course.

-Purple ruffles.

-That's really nice.

-And then I think this is slightly unusual.

-A lovely dark stem.

-Oh, that's lovely.

-That's really interesting.

-Cinnamon.

-It's pretty.

-And it's got those purple stems.

-Wonderful.

-That's a nice one.

-However, the aubergines are a bit disappointing.

-I know.

Pretty flowers on them, I mean, they look very healthy.

Yeah, they're very, very healthy, but we can't get them to set

and I think this is the same problem that Jim was speaking about

a few weeks ago with the tomatoes not setting.

You know, the light levels, the temperature -

it's nothing to do with what the gardeners have been doing,

-I just think it is...

-Just the season.

-..this year.

And I don't think we're going to enjoy aubergines and basil together.

-No, well...

-Anyway, I'm going to go and have a look at the tomatoes.

Well, I want to have a look at our trial here

with our grafted and non-grafted tomatoes

of the variety called Shirley

and basically the way we've set it up is at the top there

we've got a bag there which is the non-grafted variety of Shirley,

then this is grafted, then we go non-grafted and grafted.

And, of course, what they speak about with the grafted plants

is they are meant to be far more vigorous,

they're meant to crop earlier,

they're meant to be more disease resistant

and we're meant to get more tomatoes.

Well, we're at the stage now where we can really compare them

because we've started cropping.

We started cropping on 15 August and that was with the grafted tomatoes.

However, it wasn't two to three weeks later

that we started cropping on the non-grafted ones -

it was only a day later.

We've also had a chance to assess the number of trusses

and what we've found an average

is the grafted ones has one more truss than the non-grafted ones,

so obviously that's good news -

in other words, hopefully we are going to get more tomatoes.

As for the actual cropping we've had, we've had 2kg from the grafted

and 1.4 from the non-grafted,

so again that's good news because the grafted plants are far more expensive.

You're speaking about £3.30 on average for a grafted plant

and only a pound for the non-grafted.

What about healthiness as well?

Well, have a look down in this box here.

We've had quite a few of the tomatoes on the non-grafted

have suffered with botrytis, whereas I would say the grafted...

They are far healthier.

So, again, that's good news for the grafted ones.

Obviously we'll have to come back in a few weeks' time

and have another assessment.

Last autumn I saved a lot of seed from annual plants

and then we've sown it out this spring to see what we're going to get.

Now, with something like limnanthes or the poached egg plant,

it's come absolutely true to seed.

In other words, all these flowers match the parent plants from last year

and hoverflies love this plant. We've got some cornflowers -

that's a species as well - so it's come true to seed.

We've only got one of those. Not exactly sure why.

Three different poppies have given us a really lovely display.

The Shirley poppy here with soft pinks and reds,

the middle one is the opium poppy with this purple -

normally I'd expect that to be a bit taller, but that's maybe the season -

and this lovely fringed red one. They've all worked so, so well.

And then there's a bit of an experiment -

I actually saved some seed from the sunflower that I grew last year.

Now, that was cold Little Dorrit. It's very dwarf and it's an F1.

Now, to show you what it looked like last year

we've sown a fresh row of it this year

and you can see it's really uniform, nice and compact.

That's because F1s are very, very carefully controlled in their production.

Their parents aren't pollinated by anybody

so you can really keep your eye on what traits they have.

They usually are very uniform and very floriferous.

We saved seed from this and then we sowed it out this year.

And I wanted to see what I'd got and obviously they're all sunflowers,

but they don't look anything like the parent and that's because

they've been pollinated by bees and other insects in the garden

so we've got some tall ones, we've got some short ones, large flowers,

small flowers and one that's got a real, sort of, jagged leaf to it.

I think it's a very pretty mix.

It's a really good way of getting a lot of flowers cheaply.

You never know - you might get an unusual colour break

or a really different plant.

The other annuals we were having a look at were climbers

and I wanted to see how much growth we could get in three or four months,

particularly if you've got a new garden

and you want to screen something or instantly get some height.

We're growing them up wigwams which we painted nice colours

so it would contrast with the flowers.

The first one is canary creeper - bright yellow flowers,

it's reached the top of the wigwam

and now it's gone venturing into the hedge.

That's done really well. Next one, eccremocarpus.

Now, it's called tresco mixed

and I think it would like to be on the Scilly Isles.

It's obviously not hot enough here, it's only about six inches.

Two morning glories or ipomoeas.

This one is Spanish flag and it's going to be yellow and red.

Hopefully we'll see some flowers this year, but not yet.

And Hazelwood blues, and these are contrasting blues with the bar inside

the flower and that looks really pretty with this purple wigwam.

And you can tell it's me - another purple one. This is rhodochiton.

It looks like a purple fuchsia.

Now, this started off slowly, but, do you know,

it's now two-thirds of the way up so it's doing pretty well.

I reckon this is the runner-up, but the winner is canary creeper.

'The gardens at Westfield Estate just outside Aberdeen

'have only been in existence for 20 years,

'but it has undergone a major transformation

'in the last four years since head gardener James Fraser took it over -

'especially its four-acre walled garden.'

Now this is a lovely feature to come into.

Yeah, this one we wanted to create something exciting

when they came through into the garden to go, "Wow, look at this."

And I think water's so important, too.

Yeah, it brings this garden to life, really.

A brilliant part of the "wow" factor as you come through the gate.

-And movement of the water, isn't it?

-Indeed.

What I like as well, James, is you've kind of created a room,

-haven't you, with the copper beech?

-It creates a great bit of shelter,

a good backdrop for all the herbaceous stuff.

-It's worked well for us.

-How long has that been in, the beech?

Just a year. Just a year, so it's had its first clip just a week ago.

So that has come through the season and quite enjoyed it then?

-It has, yeah.

-And so much herbaceous planting.

If I was to pick just one, maybe the anthemis there.

Yeah, Mrs Buxton, she's a really good "lifting up" kind of plant

cos she's lovely and bright and yellow.

Yeah, yellow does it, doesn't it?

-Whether it's grey or whether it's sunny.

-Indeed.

-Perfect.

-Another water feature here.

-Indeed, another project

that we brought back from the brink, so to speak.

An area that was surrounded by conifers

and planted up with conifers and a few penstemons.

Well, this maybe gives me an opportunity to speak a little bit

about your background, because its garden design, isn't it?

I went to college and did horticulture and then went on

to university to do garden design and that was really where

I found myself just being completely taken away with garden design.

It's just an amazing opportunity to do that, really.

So it's something that you've always wanted to do?

From a young age I've always been interested in horticulture

and how gardens come together.

Now, this garden is massive so obviously it's giving you

an opportunity to practice your garden design.

The family have been great to trust

the design work that I've come up with and the planting,

and without them this garden wouldn't have been able

to come to what it has now, so I have a lot to thank them for.

I like the fact you've got them labelled, which is wonderful.

None of the herbaceous are staked at all, which is great.

We have to rely on the plants to keep everything up

cos if we had to stake everything here it would just be a never-ending task.

Plus I really don't like seeing bamboo canes here.

Neither do I, but, I mean, it works, doesn't it?

Cos the plants are holding one another up. For example, the angel's fishing rod.

Yeah, a real favourite of mine.

I remember my uncle planting it when I was quite young

and just being wowed by it, really.

Just the way it just arches over and comes into flower.

And then look at the red-hot pokers there. Beautiful.

They're one thing that've really enjoyed this weather this year.

And the minarda as well.

The minarda's looking absolutely brilliant at the moment.

I find it hard to believe that we're still in the walled garden

because this is a completely different environment.

Yes, it's fantastic, isn't it? I mean, we've got these wonderful acers

that would otherwise struggle if they weren't sheltered by the rocks.

I mean, it's quite important to have that shelter, isn't it?

Because there's not a mark on them. Do you do any work at all?

We just cut back anything that's... Any stems that have died

-and really that's about it.

-Gorgeous.

A lovely area to be

when the herbaceous stuff's died down for the autumn.

So this is the golden pathway

that we're coming up now, another redesign.

We ripped everything out. It was roses and brambles before.

We just kept in these beech trees as nice vista plants.

It works really well, I think.

The whole line of alchemilla, but how do you maintain this?

We let it all go to flower and then we cut it back

and dig it all up as well, give it a good weed

cos it self seeds fairly prolifically and then plant it

as quite small clumps again and then it comes back in as it does.

-Keeps it fresh then?

-Indeed.

Well, it's good to see that the walled garden is slightly productive as well.

Yeah, well when we redeveloped the vegetable garden, which is now

the water feature that we started with at the beginning,

we tried to move all the espalier fruits over to the wall here.

Just thought it would be the best place for it with all the sun.

Well, absolutely. It's getting the sun

so it's going to get the warmth, isn't it, off the wall?

And the shelter, although I have to say this year,

with the late frost, fruits haven't done particularly well.

Not well at all, but there's one last thing

I'd like to show you that we've redeveloped.

-So not just the walled garden then?

-No, not just the walled garden.

Well, James, I'm glad you brought me down here. This is just amazing.

-It's pretty special, isn't it?

-Now how did you go about designing this?

I just tried to take the pond and tried to work in proportions

with the size of the pond, really,

and the deck and posts and the building itself.

Just trying to bring it all together as one.

So you say you like the size, I mean, obviously, you designed

the building and things have got to be quite chunky and large.

Yeah, the landscape out there

just deserves to make it what size it is really.

So you designed the building as well as the decking and all the planting.

And that slate is a beautiful colour to set off the plants.

It just helps highlight things really well.

I mean, that ligularia, the rocket, is just thriving, isn't it?

The bees, they love it, too,

and, yeah, it's a great plant for down here.

Well, I'm so impressed with what you've done in four years

and no doubt, ever the designer,

-I'm sure you've got other projects you'd like to do.

-Indeed.

Here in the garden for life,

the monoblock path has got nicely furnished with plants.

There's thyme growing through the cracks, two sorts of sedum,

a little bit of self-heal and even the dwarf alchemilla,

but we do need to manage the situation

and there are weeds coming in.

Things like dandelions here, plantain,

and also there's campanula, which will get too tall

so I need keep my eye on this and remove them where necessary.

Well, it's cabbage harvesting time

and I'm about to take the top out of there, like so.

Nice, fresh, young cabbage.

Absolutely super.

But don't go away and take the plant out the ground

because if you take the top out you can get the side shoots to grow,

so here's one that was done last week.

Take a knife, just split the top one way, split it the other like so...

..and there's one that was done a fortnight ago

and just look at the little buds beginning to grow,

so you get four mini cabbages later on in the season.

Well, I have to say this has not been the year for roses

with all this rain, but a constant job is dead-heading them

not only to tidy up the plant,

but that puts the energy back into the plant itself

rather than setting seed and then hopefully

what you'll get is a second flush of flowers.

You know, I think it's a long time since we've grown

a collection of gladioli and they can make wonderful cut flowers.

-Splendid colours.

-Yes.

-But they are past their best just within a week.

It's a shame, the weather's affected them.

It really has hammered them and that's the sad thing about it.

I've got to point this one out because it's bi-coloured purple.

It's beautiful. That's large, and also in bud.

-It's almost architectural. It's beautiful.

-It is very attractive.

We've got a couple of mixes behind me and I must admit

I would rather go for the single colours, then you know what you're going to get.

You've got different classifications cos there's one which must be much later flowering.

-The buds are there, but...

-Whereas this one's meant to be single colour,

-it's meant to be white and we've got some pinks coming in.

-Quite a pretty pink though, isn't it?

-I prefer it to the white, to be honest.

-This is the one I like -

Mexico. I mean, is that not a beautiful deep, rich red?

Good texture to that one.

And that's really large flowering and these are great for exhibition.

Peter Pears there, absolutely gorgeous colour and spoiled.

That discolouration there is weather spotting. It's just a shame.

And then you get the bi-colours, which I think can be nice.

I'm not quite so sure about that combination.

-That one is definitely a bit mad for me.

-Puke. No.

But I mean, if you get good corms to start off with

then you will get good flowering and I think that's quite important.

If you'd like any more information,

maybe about the gladioli or perhaps about the lawn fertilisers,

it's all in the fact sheet and the easiest way to access that is online

and don't forget as well more information about us on Twitter and Facebook.

She's still mentioning Twitter.

Now, next week none of us are going to be here in the garden.

It's going to be our second community garden of the series

and we are going to be in Kilmarnock.

-My hometown. Until then, goodbye.

-Bye-bye.

-Bye.

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