Episode 22 The Beechgrove Garden

Well, hello and welcome to Beechgrove Garden on a summer's day.

-Summer in September.

-Yes.

-At last.

-Absolutely.

You know, I had a touch of ground frost in the garden,

that was at the end of August.

Yes, yes. Well, it's maybe as well now that we've got a decent spell

that we can assess the bedding plants for the last time.

Not a year for bedding

but perhaps we should say the point of this trial was looking

at alternatives to the busy lizzie

because of the problems with downy mildew.

Yes, yes. Well, shall we look and go on round in kind of methodical way?

Yeah, let's start with the begonia, which is a tuberous begonia.

That's "Go-go Pink Shades" and it's done pretty well, hasn't it?

For me, these have been the stars.

Throughout the country this year, even on dull days,

they kind of leap out at you.

It's not surprising, is it, that it's the number one bedder?

I think, even when you get the sunshine

and when you get to the rain and the cold, they seem to do really well.

-They still perform. You can't say so for this one.

-This is the New Guinea impatiens.

That's the alternative to your straightforward busy lizzie

and, although it doesn't get the downy mildew,

it's not liked that cold weather, has it, and the rain?

The thing about a bedding plant is it should cover the soil.

You shouldn't be able to see the soil.

They're alive but that's about all you can say for it.

I think they might do better in a pot to get a bit of heat.

The name gives you a clue. New Guinea, for goodness sake.

-We're talking tropics.

-OK, that's New Guinea but this one's Tuscany.

-Verbena "Tuscany".

-Yes.

-It's stunning.

Absolutely. I'm so chuffed.

I've always associated that

with a lot of sunshine and, less sunshine, less flowers.

But that one has been stunningly good for weeks.

-It's been going for weeks or even months.

-That's another surprise.

Now, I'm really surprised by the dianthus.

I would have thought, if we'd had a really hot summer,

I think that would've gone over a lot quicker.

But maybe that's preferred the cooler conditions.

That's what surprises me cos I always associate them

with drier, warmer conditions but there you've got

a complete groundcover and you've got flower all the time. Fantastic.

And then we've got the semperflorens begonia.

That's not as good as the tuberous, is it?

No, I'm not a great fan of semperflorens, really.

But they've been shredded at home. Ours have not done well at all.

-But, over here, your foliage...

-Yes, the foliage.

Well, the things that have done well,

I'm quite pleased with their progress now.

-For example...

-They're a bit late.

I know, it's really, really sad

but the castor oil plant's starting to grow up

and that lovely plectranthus at the back,

you can start to see now the big leaves on it.

You can mark these up for another time as dot plants.

It's similar with the cineraria, the "Silver Dust" and so on.

They're absolutely stunning. It wasn't the year for millet and rice.

-Or the kochia, it didn't like it.

-You've got plenty of water.

I tell you, I think it was the year

for the first year flowering perennials.

-Yes, yes.

-Now, we sowed those...

-Explain that again.

Well, packets of seed, we sowed them on Valentine's Day, remember that?

-We came in to the garden.

-How could I forget?

And, just from a packet of seeds, we got loads of germination and,

yes, they have performed, they have flowered in the first year.

In particular, I think the achillea, at the moment, is looking good

and that gaillardia has still got plenty of buds to come.

And we're going to keep those over the winter.

-Is that a salvia as well?

-There's a little salvia,

there's prunella with the bees on it at the moment, really enjoying it.

We'll keep them over the winter and see if they come through the winter.

So, if there's any time left,

this is what's going to happen in the rest of the programme.

I'm in Kilmacolm, helping to take the mystery out of building a pond

with our own step-by-step guide.

Welcome to the Scottish Borders.

This is reiver country where, of course,

there have been many battles in the past.

Battles are still going on but,

in the world of gardening and horticulture,

they're much more friendly, but still as competitive.

Well, the tattie story this year is a bit mixed, isn't it?

We had blight early and a lot of crops have been damaged by it.

Others have survived and here you see a blighted shaw there.

Couple of them there.

They would be cut down and we'd take what crop is underneath, regardless.

There's nothing wrong with the potatoes.

The rest of the green foliage

are varieties that are resistant to blight.

All the Sarpo varieties, for example.

But it's not actually about that that I want to speak today.

It's about the harvesting and maybe saving some potatoes for seed.

So, here we are, we're about to harvest a shaw of Maris,

one of the Maris varieties.

Look at that. Isn't that nice? Really lovely potatoes.

The story is, the big ones go in the pot

and the medium-sized ones are saved for seed if you want to.

And I'm saying

tatties about that sort of size

make ideal seed potatoes.

Now, there's a phrase that puzzles people - "seed potatoes."

I'm not saying potato seed

because potato seed you'll get there,

from that little tomato-like fruit on the top of the plant.

And I have to say to you, these are intensely poisonous

and that's not where our new potato crops will come from.

And for parents of small children,

beware, because they're just like tomatoes when they start to ripen.

No, no, we're talking about seed potatoes.

In other words, keeping some for next year to plant again,

so long as your crop has been healthy and is in good order.

Why bother?

Well, it's cheaper.

The only reason for buying new ones

would be to try out some new varieties

and where do they come from?

Well, from time to time,

we get shown or get sent varieties which have...

This one's only got a number, so far.

It's a bit of a piebald.

Isn't that quite nice? How it tastes, I don't know yet.

It was grown in a pot. That is the entire crop.

This one, TerraRosa.

And it looks like it too. Isn't it gorgeous?

Now, it might be gorgeous, but how does it taste?

We've yet to try that out.

But these are a lovely size for seed potatoes

and that's the job I'm looking at today. How do you keep them?

Well, you leave them out in the light so that the skin toughens

and they stop losing moisture

and then you find a nice dark place.

The old-fashioned cellar below houses was ideal because

it was a constant low temperature

and ever so slightly moist to keep them from shrivelling up

and then you bring them out to start them all over again.

Now then, our Georgie boy has been having a go

at growing show vegetables.

Well, he's been down to Kelso

to see the National Vegetable Society Show

to get a few hints and tips.

A trifle too late, I think.

So, welcome to the Tait Hall in Kelso.

This is where the modern battles take place,

all the competition between friends and acquaintances.

Colour, shape, form, fruit, vegetables - the whole lot are here.

You think this is good? Wait till you see what's upstairs.

Look at this. This is the hallowed hall.

This is where it's all happening.

This isn't the end result of a whole year, possibly 15 months' work.

Now, when you're presenting things on a show bench,

the thing which you are looking for is consistency.

It's not just about size, it's about quality

and it's about consistency of product.

Look at these onions. Look at the leeks.

You know, they're things which have taken a long time to grow

and, really, until you lift those,

you got no idea what they're going to be like.

One of the competitors which we've been following,

didn't know until yesterday

exactly what his things were going to look like.

Ian Stocks grows his vegetables on an allotment in Larbert.

OK, we're now in my long carrot tunnel.

These carrots were planted around about 7 April this year

and they're planted into 45 gallon drums

which are filled with coarse sand

and they're sitting on a bed,

probably about another two, two and a half foot of sand

to give me a length of about 5 ft, 5 ft 6.

And they're sown into a borehole made by a long pinch bar

and it's filled with a mixture of some commercial compost

and various fertilisers in it.

The big problem with long carrots is, once they've grown

to this stage and I'm now lifting them

for the National Vegetable Society show at Kelso,

is how do you actually get them out?

I've devised a method where the barrels sit on top of raised beds

and it allows me to scrape away the sand

from the bottom of the beds.

OK, so I've exposed the taproot now.

It is a very, very fine hair-like root

and is subject to breaking fairly easy.

So, it's now been released.

What I'll now do is just expose the shoulder and that gives me

an indication of the size of the carrot

because I'm trying to match three for size, shape, uniformity.

So, I've now exposed that.

I'll take the foliage off, some six inches or so above,

and then, what I'll do is, gently,

just apply some pressure on the carrot

and with the taproot already being released

it, hopefully, should come out.

However it is a lucky dip because I can see the top,

I can see the bottom

but we need to sure that the whole carrot is reasonably good.

You can see it's now coming out

so that means that the taproot has been released.

The carrot is coming out.

I think the lucky dip has paid off for this one

because we've got the length in the carrot

and it looks a reasonable shape.

So, what I now do is I'll give it a quick wash outside

just to make sure there's no blemishes, marks, pest disease, etc.

And then we'll try and match up another two

to give us a set of three for the show at Kelso.

Now it's time to lift the parsnips.

This probably will be more of a struggle than the long carrots

because they are bigger, they're longer roots

and they're thicker roots.

Again, like the long carrots, this is a bit of a lucky dip

because you don't know what's coming out and they have a fair grip.

What I want to do is to remove the sand,

probably about six inches or so,

in order that I can get both hands around the parsnip

because it does become, sometimes, a bit of a struggle.

Almost like a wrestling match.

The bonus is, if it's a wrestling match,

you know that they're right down.

OK, it's now loosening.

So, I'll see what comes out.

Again, we're looking for that length.

Looks good, so far.

And that's the parsnip out.

Now, as you know,

I'm growing carrots for the show bench at Beechgrove

and who better to come and ask for some hints and wrinkles

than Jim Williams, who's the president

of the Scottish branch of the National Vegetable Society.

Jim, I'm growing "Sweet Candle" and that's what this is.

What should I be looking for when I lift mine?

As you say, George, "Sweet Candle" is an excellent show variety

and it's also an excellent eating variety.

It's got a good name, "Sweet Candle."

When you're looking at these, the striking thing is the colour and appearance.

They've got to be mouth-watering

and that's what you go for when you're looking at carrots.

-So, colour is really important?

-Nice bright orange colour.

They have got to be pest free,

no holes from slugs or beasties or anything like that.

No carrot fly, then.

No. And no green tops on them.

And, at the end of the day, they must have a true stump.

Stump carrots take 20 weeks to grow and they must have a good stump.

You can see here that these haven't stumped up properly.

So, these are still immature?

Immature. Could do with another two or three weeks growing.

Then, lastly, you've got to have them alike

in size, shape and colour.

-Uniformity is very important.

-We've got three here.

How many do we have to lift to get three?

Well, on a good day,

you'll probably have to lift about 25 to 30 carrots to get three.

I think I'm maybe struggling then.

-Well, Ian, congratulations.

-Thanks, George.

-First prize.

Yeah, I'm absolutely delighted.

First prize at the Scottish Championships is always a bonus.

I have had four or five second prizes in this over the years

so I've finally managed to win it, which is

a personal achievement for me.

-So, I'm absolutely delighted, George.

-Well done. That's superb.

-Second with the carrots though, so...

-Upset?

-No, not at all.

I'm happy because it's a good exhibit I've put on the bench

and the chap that won it, Joe Proudlock, is a very good friend

and his stuff was better on the day.

So, there's always next year.

I have to say that they're an awful lot better looking

than mine will possibly be at Beechgrove

but I've still got to lift them.

Well, as we said, it's a lucky dip when you lift it

-so you may just hit the jackpot.

-Might!

Well, George, I think that's quite a challenge you've been set.

It's now mid-September, so it's an ideal time to start trimming hedges.

Here, in the Garden for Life,

this hedge has been designed to encourage wildlife.

But it's safe to trim it now.

What I mean by safe is, all risk of nesting has now completed

and so we're absolutely fine to go in here.

We're not come to disturb any birds at all.

This is a mixed hedge - it's some deciduous plants and some evergreen.

This is the well-known one, this is privet or ligustrum.

But, what you maybe don't realise is, it has these gorgeous white flowers

which have a really heady fragrance.

A very, very good nectar source.

And what I'm doing is just trimming back to the shape which it was.

It's actually providing the division between these two gardens.

One of the other plants he got in here this cotoneaster.

The use for that with wildlife is it has berries

in the autumn and winter, for the birds.

The deciduous plant in here is the dog rose.

Very prickly, it's had its flowers and, again,

it's got lovely hips there which the birds will eat.

And also there is green beech.

Now, this isn't technically deciduous but although the green leaves

go a sort of coppery colour, they stay on right through to spring

so it's a really good roosting and nesting place for next spring.

I'm trimming up just back to where berries and flowers are,

keeping a nice straight edge.

Maybe a bit wider at the bottom, if I can.

The other challenge for this hedge is, it's gone far too tall.

I really want to maintain it just above the level of the pergola.

So that's going to be a little bit of a difficult task there.

That's going to involve ladders and a little bit of a palaver.

No, I'm going to be looking at our evergreen hedging.

It's all about conifers and this is Thuja occidentalis

and it's in its fourth season and I'm really pleased with the result.

You can start to see now it's starting to knit together.

A fairly slow-growing conifer, though.

However, I'm, sadly,

rather disappointed with the Lawson's cypress

It's a variety called "Grayswood Feather"

and over the years we keep replacing the odd one

and there's another one there, dying out.

So, what I want to do is take the whole of it out

and try a different variety because, I'm sorry,

I don't know why those ones have died out.

Then we've got the yew, Taxus baccata

Again, fairly slow-growing but it's doing it's stuff,

it's starting to knit together.

Maybe what we need to do is trim the sides a little bit.

That one, again, is fairly slow growing.

However, western hemlock. Isn't this absolutely great?

And if you want something that's fairly vigorous,

this is definitely one that you could choose.

Now, I want to start taking out the tops.

I don't want to use a ladder like Lesley was speaking about

with her wildlife hedge.

So, you let it grow about a foot above the height you want

and I'm going to go for that height.

I can take that one out and, if I wanted to,

I could take that one out as well.

I'm also looking at the sides because we want it to bush out.

And you want to shape that's like a sort of A frame

so that if it does snow, you can knock the snow off.

So, little bit of trimming to do.

And finally, to a landscape feature

which I think is under-utilised in suburbia.

It's a suspended hedge or a hedge on stilts or a flying hedge.

Basically, you plant standard trees.

These are silver lime for the Silver Garden, of course.

Standard trees, and create the hedge at the top of the stem.

You can walk underneath, you can utilise all the ground underneath.

So, where space is short, this might be the answer.

It needs pruning once a year.

The point is, it maybe gives you a bit of privacy from nosy neighbours.

Well, I'm still in the Garden for Life.

You may remember, this spring it had a really brutal pruning.

The shrubs have recovered so well

and the herbaceous is looking fantastic.

This ligularia is glorious.

It was also overgrown. In fact, we had lost sight of this patio.

So, we've regained a lot of space

and one of the joys of doing that planting

was that we actually now have some open ground

in some of the borders where we cleared.

This is looking lovely.

This lythrum is gorgeous and now it's time to be planting bulbs.

They will flower in the spring.

Now, what bulbs like is sunshine and good drainage.

So, anywhere there's a space, I'm going to pop in some bulbs.

In the middle of the bed here, it needs some height.

So, I'm going to put in allium purple sensation.

I'm not going to do this in rows,

just going to toss them so they're nice and random.

Wherever they land I shall plant them later.

Now, I have had a little bit of trouble

with wildlife, in the past, and bulbs.

And that is, mice have eaten the crocuses very badly.

So, I'm also going to do some pots where I'm going to

pop the crocuses out of their reach.

In this pot, I've already got some wallflowers.

At this time of year, if you're planting for autumn and winter,

you need to make sure you're using a pot which is completely frost proof.

And the other thing, which is very significant, is a drainage hole

in the bottom so they don't get too soggy and crock it.

Using a multipurpose compost -

you don't need to use bulb fibre in this situation

if you're using it outside and as long as it has got the drainage.

Wallflowers are also a really good early nectar source

and this one is a gorgeous bronze colour.

And through that, I'm going to team it up with an allium.

Now, this is caeruleum -

bright, bright blue.

And I think that is going to look startling together.

What's also starting to happen, very helpfully,

a lot of the bulb suppliers are starting

to put a little logo on the packet saying if it's friendly for bees.

What I'm going to do, I've got the wallflowers in already,

and then, in the little spaces, I'm going to pop in the allium

so I can see where they're going to go.

The other bulbs I'm putting in here is a crocus.

And this one is "Pickwick" - it's got that nice purple stripe.

In the second pot I'm using myosotis or forget-me-not.

Blue flowers in the spring, again, good for wildlife.

I'm going to have Muscari "White Magic"

coming through the top of that

and, again, another crocus.

This one is really pretty.

It's a lemon one, slightly purple barred.

This is called "Gipsy Girls".

This is going to be a real super source of nectar in the spring.

I'm here in Kilmacolm

beside this magnificent stretch of water behind me

and I've come here to help local gardener Karen Perry

create a miniature version of this in her own back garden.

So, now, I can see that you've already started to dig a pond.

-Tell me about it.

-We have, yes.

-What happened?

Well, I started to dig it out.

We thought we'd got to the right depth and we got stuck.

I knew about the liners, I knew about the ledges

and it had to be so deep

and then little bits for pond life and stuff to get in and out,

but I just stopped.

You've already done the hardest part, digging it out,

so for that I'm very grateful.

What do you actually want from a pond? Why do you want a pond?

Well this is my private area in the garden.

I love sitting on that little bench over there with my cup of coffee

or my glass of wine in the evening.

It's just relaxing - I read a book, a magazine or just think

and I like my little water feature there

and I just thought this would really lend itself to a pond.

What we'll do is, we'll take that edge back a bit,

make a ledge, put some rock underneath and put soil back in

-so you've actually got a border under the water.

-Fantastic.

So it holds the plants and they grow better.

Then we'll put rocks round about it

so the wildlife can get in and out

without falling in and not being able to get out.

So, that's what we're going to do.

-Amazing.

-But first, we need to dig a bigger hole.

-OK, I'll help.

Very nice!

This week, I'm ably assisted by pond expert Fraser Barry.

What we've done so far is

taken this block edging off the side of the pond,

pushed the gravel back,

we're going to dig another eight inches or so deeper

and here we're going to make a shelf.

This will make the pond a bit wider

and give us space for an underwater border.

Even if you haven't got fancy equipment like this,

it's really important to make sure that your pond is level.

But he can do that with a spirit level and a length of wood

just as easily.

All this topsoil that came out of the top layer of the pond

is actually good soil.

So, that, we will use back round about the edge of the rocks

and in the deep water margins.

The bit at the bottom is very stony

so Karen is just finishing digging that out

to get us down to our two feet deep

but the water keeps coming back in again!

This is the fleece that we put down underneath the liner.

You need this because it stops any stones coming through your liner.

The last thing you want is to do all this

and then end up with a hole in your liner and a leak.

You just need to measure it so that it fits the size of the pond

and a little bit excess round the edge.

This is a really good quality one millimetre thick rubber liner

with a lifetime guarantee, so it'll last you forever

but not if you put a fork through it by mistake.

I feel like a weightlifter.

So, we've put the felt down, we've put the liner on top.

Now, the construction of the internals of the pond.

So, we've got raised areas round the edge

to give us margins for planting round the edges there.

At the side there's parts where the liner goes underneath,

behind the stones and gives us a boggy planting area behind that.

At the back, we've brought the liner up in front of these plants.

So, this is actually going to be dry plants at the back of here.

-Right.

-So, in the middle, this is the deepest part of the pond,

so we've got deep water plants and this is a water lily.

So, that's going to sort of grow up and the leaves will just float on top

and have lovely flowers, hopefully. Then we've got marginal plants.

Things like ranunculus, houttuynia there at the back.

-Behind you, some irises and a juncus.

-Stunning.

Mint, right at the back there.

At the back, this is actually a dry border.

It won't be a boggy border.

We have got things like lovely blue geraniums

and some foliage plants like the heucheras,

a nice coloured grass, more heucheras.

So, it's going to give you lots of colour right the way around the pond

and they'll all, kind of... They look like new when they go in

but once they start to move about and just merge the line between

the outside and inside, it just softens it beautifully.

-Right, Karen, this is your pond, you can start filling process.

-OK.

If you undo that then the water just goes straight in.

Oh! Oh!

Beautifully done. And now we wait for two hours.

-We can have tea and caramel shortcake.

-Oh, yeah.

Carolyn, I'm blown away.

-It's just above and beyond anything I expected.

-Oh, good.

It's just everything - the planting, the rocks, the gravel,

-it is spectacular.

-I'm so pleased with it too.

You have this vision in your head about what you can do in a day

and I did think, "I'm pushing it here, I'm really pushing it."

But, you know, we've done it and it just looks marvellous.

I can't thank you enough.

You and Fraser just... He has worked so hard.

And, you know, the planting is just going to get better and better

as it settles into the surroundings.

It'll soften it, the plants will just start to grow

and merge into each other.

I love it. I absolutely love it.

My hint for those of you, this week,

that are absolutely scunnered

with herbaceous plants being knocked flat by the weather,

think Phlox paniculata.

Look at this -

no staking, absolutely stunning and a bit of late flowering as well.

You don't get them that colour, you get them pink and lavender shades.

Remember where you heard it first.

Here's another plant that's looking

absolutely great at the moment. It's the French lavenders.

We've got the variety "Papillon"

and a nice compact form, "Devonshire Compact."

I think we've just found the right spot for them,

considering the summer. We've got a raised bed

and when it does get sunny, that gets warmed up

and it's got good drainage.

Well, finally, the nasturtium bed is a blaze of colour

after quite a slow start.

They've steadfastly ignored the obelisks

and scrambled across the ground.

My favourite is "Empress of India"

with a red flower, dark foliage. In fact, I do prefer the single colours.

It's worth saving seed at this time of year.

Even something like Alaska here, which is variegated,

will come true from seed.

Just pop them into a paper bag

to keep them dry and cool over the winter, sow them next year.

The bees love these flowers.

We're here in the Equinox Garden, which is designed to look good

in autumn and spring. It's full of colour now, isn't it?

-Really pleased with it.

-It's filled out.

Yeah, this "Rozanne" geranium, climbing through that vitus.

-Absolutely spot on, just at the moment.

-Gorgeous.

And I like the hypericum with the berries.

That's one at the front's kind of salmon pink. It's gorgeous.

-It is. Very nice indeed.

-Continuing with the harvest as well.

Mm! It's looking good.

All is not lost, is it, in the garden? If you keep at it.

-A good selection.

-Prize-winning carrots? What do you think?

-Hmm...

Early bunching. Early bunching. It's reached its potential.

That's true.

Well, if you'd like any more information

about this week's programme, it's all in the fact sheet.

Perhaps you want that advice about hedging

and the easiest way to access that is online.

Don't forget, as well, Twitter and Facebook,

you can find out about us too.

Now, next week, George and I won't be here in the garden

because we're going to be in Milngavie

with a community who are creating a very unusual garden.

-And we will be here, in the garden.

-We will.

Getting up to all sorts of things.

-Fruitful, fruitful.

-Fruit and veg, I think.

Fruit and veg. Well, see you then.

-Goodbye.

-Bye.

-Bye.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd