Fruitful abundance on the allotment

I'm still getting to grips with my new allotment and am fast becoming an expert on bindweed. One of the best ways to find out what will and won't grow on an allotment (or garden) is to see what your neighbours are doing. Everyone I've met so far has been very helpful and been generous with their advice, courgettes and apples.

Autumn at Winkworth Arboretum (National Trust)

Winkworth Arboretum is National Trust-owned woodland, in Surrey, near to Godalming, and is famed for its fall foliage, mainly thanks to numerous species of maple amongst its collection of more than 1,000 different shrubs and trees, many of which are rare.

Wordless Wednesday - Trundling Along

The essential accessory for the flower show enthusiast

Wordless Wednesday - Wooden Fence

Wooden it be nice...

Lemon Queen

Lemon Queen Perennial Sunflower

About this time last year I bought two small pots of Lemon Queen, a perennial Sunflower chosen because it was said to be particularly attractive to bees. 

The soil was still warm so, I planted them in the back of the garden straight away. 

Then came one of the coldest winter in decades. When the snow melted this was what was left...

Walk like an Egyptian (Onion)

Pyramids at Giza

I was reading an article by Mark Diacono about growing perennial veg.

Now this seems like a great idea - instead of spending ages raising all your veg from seed each year - only to have to do it all again next year... you could grow perennials. Plant once and reap the benefit for many years.

Chelsea 2011: Our best in show

The garden we thought was best in show at Chelsea was the RBC New Wild Garden, sponsored by the Royal Bank of Canada and designed by Nigel Dunnett, Director of the Green Roof Centre at the University of Sheffield.

The judges only found it worthy of a Silver Gilt medal, but we thought it had more good ideas than any other garden, although at 10x12m (33x39 feet) it was one of the smallest of the 'large show gardens'.

Chelsea 2011: Cancer Research UK Garden

The Cancer Research UK Garden, designed by Robert Myers, won Silver Gilt, and had a lot of interest, especially in the interplay of textures, light and shade.

Chelsea 2011: Laurent-Perrier Garden

The Laurent-Perrier Garden, Nature and Human Intervention, by the Italian designer, Luciano Giubbilei , won Gold. It was built and planted by Crocus.

Here there was a modern take on a Japanese pavilion by Kengo Kuma, which used 16 revolving wind-driven panels made out of lots of thin pieces of bamboo, that provided interesting shadow and texture and looked a lot better at the show than it did on television.

Chelsea 2011: The Magistrates’ Garden

The Magistrates’ Garden, designed by Kate Gould, won Silver gilt in the Urban Gardens section. It was built to celebrate 650 years of the Magistracy, and had lots of little interesting features.