Why we garden

[Rhiannon]

Lovely little interview with Monty Don.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05pk06l

[floo]

I can't say gardening has ever floated my boat, although my husband enjoys it. However, I have always done the heavy stuff, I even built a soakaway years ago, my husband does the weeding etc.

[ippy]

I find gardening totally relaxing, it could be that there's an absolute lack of pressure involved when I'm out there in my garden.

I've just planted a load of Lucifer corms given to me by a relative, come to think of it, it's always a bit on the hot side for me when I'm at their house, I wonder?

Does anyone out there have any good growing tips for Lucifer plants?

Regards ippy

[Rhiannon]

I find gardening totally relaxing, it could be that there's an absolute lack of pressure involved when I'm out there in my garden.

I've just planted a load of Lucifer corms given to me by a relative, come to think of it, it's always a bit on the hot side for me when I'm at their house, I wonder?

Does anyone out there have any good growing tips for Lucifer plants?

Regards ippy

You mean the crocosmia variety Lucifer, right? IME they are pretty indestructible, just plant in any reasonable soil. They are bright red and look good with oranges, yellows and purples. You could try planting them with some orange or yellow coreopsis and some purple verbena or Michaelmas daisies.

[wigginhall]

Gardening blends so many different aspects - aesthetic, physical, spiritual, and just staring at worms.   Today we widened our strawberry bed, and straightened other edges.   No reason. 

[Rhiannon]

Yes, I did herb garden things last week, felt renewed after.

[floo]

I like having herbs in the garden having planted quite a number over the five years we have lived here. The one, which is my namesake, has taken off BIG TIME and is a huge bush now, which I have to keep clipping back.

[Rhiannon]

Floo, if That Herb flourishes it is said to mean that the woman of the house rules the roost. 

[Robbie]

I'm frantically trying to find out about a herb called Floo.

I too like planting and growing herbs but when it comes to really, "Doing the garden", prefer to have someone who comes in and does it otherwise we'd be spending so much time gardening. However I love gardens, particularly natural ones, with lots of perennials. Trees too.

[floo]

Floo, if That Herb flourishes it is said to mean that the woman of the house rules the roost. 

I keep telling my old man I am the boss, but funnily enough he doesn't see it that way.

[floo]

I'm frantically trying to find out about a herb called Floo.

I too like planting and growing herbs but when it comes to really, "Doing the garden", prefer to have someone who comes in and does it otherwise we'd be spending so much time gardening. However I love gardens, particularly natural ones, with lots of perennials. Trees too.

You haven't come across a herb called 'floo'? Goodness me, you had better go to gardening school tout suit!  

[Robbie]

Maybe it is more commonly known by its Latin name......

[Rhiannon]

I'm frantically trying to find out about a herb called Floo.

I too like planting and growing herbs but when it comes to really, "Doing the garden", prefer to have someone who comes in and does it otherwise we'd be spending so much time gardening. However I love gardens, particularly natural ones, with lots of perennials. Trees too.

I like someone else to mow the lawn (I’ve got a huge amount to cut and leave some of it to go wild) and to do the heavy landscaping, but I love digging out borders and planting them up. Sometimes I’ve not been able to get the dirt off my hands properly and I like that. I’ve planted trees, hazel, hawthorn, holly and elder.

[Robbie]

Apple trees are lovely too, I adore the blossom as well as the fruit.

[Shaker]

Monty Don is the first and only person to inspire an interest in gardening and to get me watching Gardener's World - his presenting style is a joy to watch (I skip through the segments that aren't him). He's written lots of books but I'd like him to do one on the therapeutic/emotional aspects of gardening - I gather he's suffered some fairly gruelling bouts with depression in the past as well as a stroke a few years ago so it would be great to see how gardening helped him through both. Perhaps too personal, though.

[Rhiannon]

Monty Don’s account of how gardening got him through depression is in his book The Jewel Garden, co-authored with his wife Sarah.

[Rhiannon]

As an aside, the Dons were the first designers to use Swarovski crystal in jewellery.

[Rhiannon]

Apple trees are lovely too, I adore the blossom as well as the fruit.

I’ve got two big tubs by the steps up to my garden, not far from my back four, that currently have two spiteful palm trees growing in them. I want to get them out and replace them with two medium sized apple trees. I like the idea of walking under an arch of blossom, and then later picking apples on my way to the herbs and flowers.

[floo]

Maybe it is more commonly known by its Latin name......

I have never looked up the Latin version of my name before now, how interesting I had no idea of that or its meaning. Thanks for that. BTW the herb is always known by its English title.

[Aruntraveller]

I garden to relax and to lose myself. In fact I was out in the garden on Sunday morning losing myself. Funnily enough I was cutting down my Lucifer plant, Ippy. As Rhi says nigh on indestructible ime - as is Montbretia of the same genus, of which I have a lot in my garden - which is lovely until this time of year when you realize the garden bin isn't ever going to be big enough and the collections not frequent enough   

[floo]

This thread has reminded me to order a compost bin. Most of our food waste is vegetable peelings, so it might as well service our garden once it has composted down.

[Rhiannon]

Crocosmias and montbretias are useful as they flower that bit later, and they make great cut flowers.

[floo]

We had montbretia in our garden when we first moved here, it looked pretty but it had gone feral, and almost taken over the garden as it grows like a weed. I have cleared most of it now, thank goodness.

[Rhiannon]

I had some that stayed pretty contained but it was in poor soil at the base of a wall and I wonder if that stopped it from getting out of hand.

In the right spot it’s a useful plant.

[floo]

I had some that stayed pretty contained but it was in poor soil at the base of a wall and I wonder if that stopped it from getting out of hand.

In the right spot it’s a useful plant.

Useful?