Late winter isn’t the time to put away the gumboots and spade. Keep up with the gardening chores because spring is just round the corner
Pot to pot
Potato planting time is upon us, and with it the thrill and incomparable flavour of homegrown spuds in early summer. Often, when space is an issue, potatoes are the first vegetable to get the chop, but no need if you grow them in containers which can be tucked into any sunny corner. As a rough guide you need one potato per 10 litres of soil – a typical bucket is just under 10 litres. Ensure the container has drainage holes. First chit or sprout the potatoes by placing in a single layer on newspaper or egg carton in a dry place until the sprouts are about 1cm long. Half-fill the container with soil, place sprouted potatoes on top, then cover with more soil – either to the top of the container, or gradually, adding more as the sprouts and foliage emerge. Do not let soil dry out, nor should it be kept too wet. Early potatoes are fastest to mature, try Rocket or Swift – or your favourite variety. Expect the crop to be ready for the pot in 12-15 weeks.
Steal the look
A laburnum arch dripping golden-yellow flowers is a wondrous thing. For maximum impact, such arches or tunnels as they are also called, need to be about two metres wide to enable two people to easily walk side by side along them; a good 2.5 metres tall to allow for the dangling racemes; and arguably the longer the better. A curve is desirable for that sense of mystery, but not vital. The arches are best made of powder-coated galvanised iron by your foundry or local blacksmith (yes, there are still such craftspeople) as it’s unlikely you’ll source a readymade one. Native to central and southern Europe, fast-growing laburnum performs best in the sun. As glorious as it is, it does have one downside, all parts of it are toxic to humans and animals. If that’s a concern, worthy alternatives include apples or pears, or wisteria. Due to their flowering habits, rambling roses and clematis are used to best effect at the ends of the tunnel.
Edibles in
If the soil is too wet and heavy, or the weather still very cold, then wait a little before sowing and planting. Otherwise, broad beans, peas, spinach, radish, rocket and spring onions may all be sown directly into the garden, and asparagus, broccoli, cabbage, kale, onions, shallots and silverbeet planted outside.
Undercover work
To hasten soil warming, use cloches, which can range from simple clear plastic soft drink bottles with the bottoms cut off (and lids left on) to cold frames made with timber and glass and hinged lids. Have these in place for several days before sowing or planting.
Landscaping 101
Rewilding is the word on the lips of gardenistas everywhere. Nonetheless, some still felt it a tad scandalous that the top prize at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show went to a garden advocating what can almost be seen as anti-gardening, or letting nature take control. Winning designers Lulu Urquhart and Adam Hunt explain that when designing they consider habitat as well as aesthetics, and “when you realise what habitat does, what it can look like, you can start to find it beautiful.” Which in a domestic garden scenario can be as simple as “leaving a little part of your garden wild, unmowed,” they say.
Their beautiful rewilded garden featured a brook, riparian meadow, native wildflowers and grasses, a drystone wall and, almost unheard of at Chelsea, plants sporting their previous year’s seed-heads and dead foliage.
Many other gardens went for modified forms of this nature-centric aesthetic resulting in perhaps the most naturalistic, informal show ever. Plants were at the fore, with hard landscaping and other fabricated structures taking a back seat. Plantings were wild, free, unrestrained, unclipped, biodiverse, lush. The flowers were bold, with a preponderance of moody purples and plums.
With nature at the fore, so too were umbelliferous flowers for the insects. Spring blooms were popular; echoing the zeitgeist for height and the shelter it offers, and for the notion of the garden as a haven for all creatures, not least humans. Their mental and physical health salved by spas integrated into the plantings, yoga zones and flowing water.
Old has become the new new with many gardens highlighting recycled products from fences to containers. And black is the new black. Inky and moody, it was seen almost everywhere, on furniture, on screens, and most beautifully courtesy of shou sugi ban or yakisugi, the Japanese art of charring the surface of wood charring.
Ornamentally speaking
Feed spring bulbs with a side dressing of compost, failing that a liquid fertiliser. There is still time, just, to prune roses before their sap begins flowing again. Buy seeds for sowing under cover and planting out once the days warm up.
Consider this
With smaller gardens, more people are growing plants in pots and more people are coming up with ingenious ideas to make it all a little easier. Thus, the Prosperplant Potato Planter and the Potato Bag. The former is more or less a basket within a pot, enabling effortless, mess-free harvesting; and the latter a porous fabric bag designed to prevent overheating or watering of the crop. Intriguingly, it has a flap that can be unbuttoned to check growth and allow sub-surface harvesting. Both, too, are aesthetic enough not to shame your balcony or deck.
Prosperplast potato planter, $29.99, from Kings Plant Barn
How to get ranunculus and anemone to flower again and again
Who doesn’t love the dazzling ranunculus and anemones as they burst into flower in the early spring garden? And who doesn’t get frustrated when they fail to grow back the subsequent spring? It’s not foolproof but this may be the best chance you have of plants returning – and even multiplying.
As their flowering season winds down, deadhead the plants so they don’t spend energy setting seed, and leave the foliage to feed the bulbs. Mark or make a mental note of where they are and once the leaves have died down, dig up the plants, cut off the leaves and spread the corms and bulbs out to dry off in a dry spot for a few days. Store them in a dry, dark spot until autumn planting time returns.
EXPERT PROJECTS
Create the home of your dreams with Shop Your Home and Garden
SHOP NOW
