Treat your plants like you would yourself – and you won’t go too far wrong! That’s the advice many new to gardening don’t fully appreciate when they ask for gardening advice.
One of the biggest problems facing newbie gardeners is their own lack of self-confidence when faced with cultivating their strange new plants. After all, buying plants is expensive nowadays and “a fool and his money are quickly parted” as the saying goes. But for all that, and as someone who cultivates over 3,000 different plant varieties, I’m always being amazed by just how resilient most plants actually are – if given just half-a-chance.
Like people, there are very few plants (aqauatic and carnivorous plants) that actually like to spend the winter with their ‘feet wet’ all through the winter. And like people, most plants, certainly those above 2 feet high, fare much better if they are not exposed to high winds. When they’re young and/or from a warmer climate, wrap your more tender plants in frost fleece (especially during their first winter) or locate them within the protection of another plant. Berberis, Eleagnus and Escallonia are especially good, hardy, fast growers that your more tender plants can shelter behind.
Plants can survive – without a drink – much better than people. But they will need a drink eventually. . .
But what is not generally known, is that a plant, whether it’s dying of thirst, or ‘drowning’ will have floppy, limp-looking leaves. So how do you tell the difference I hear you ask? Well, if your suspect plant is in a pot – simply pick it up. The heavier pot is the wet one. If your plant is in the ground you can probably see the ground is sodden.
Very often, most plants will survive better in colder climes IF their compost is left to dry out. Plants like cannas and agapanthus which originate from South Africa and Northern India can happily survive the colder UK climate provided they are kept dry during the long, grey winter months. But actually how dry is ‘dry’ you might ask?
Here’s my example. Around late September many, but not all, of my cannas and deciduous agapanthus will be turning yellow – this is the time to stop feeding and go easy on the watering. You will find at this time they are not taking up water as they once did. By mid-October I have stopped watering them altogether and put them inside my frames and, except for a brief splash towards the end of March next year they will not receive a drop of water. April is the reverse of September – add water, but easy does it and gradually increase as individual plants ask for it. Don’t do what the garden centres do and water everything in sight whether they like it or not.
Pruning is another common area of indecision for newbie gardeners. “Pruning” for me conjures up images of genteel Victorian ladies with a trug daintily removing flowerheads in summer. But this is NOT what most plants need during Autumn. “A good HACK” is much more accurate and descriptive example of what most plants actually NEED and THRIVE upon. Of course there are exceptions to this – aren’t there always? And two of the most common of these are hebe and ceonothus.
This blog can not possibly cover every eventuality in the newbie garden, but it should help towards providing anyone new to gardening the confidence to get out and enjoy gardening even more. And if, as a new gardener, you do treat your plants like you would yourself, you will be well on the way to mor enjoyable and successful gardening.
