GROWING FOR CHRISTMAS
Although it’s seems a little odd, early summer is the ideal time to start planning if you want to serve homegrown vegetables on December 25. If you are growing your own Christmas dinner, why not experiment with unusual varieties that you can’t find in the shops?
Confuse the sprout dodgers in your family by serving up ‘Red Ball’ Brussels which are a dark wine colour. It is a bit late in the season, but if you sow them where you want them to grow and keep them well-weeded and watered, you should have a crop in time for the festive season.
Alternatively, buy plug plants or try growing scarlet kale from seed. Carrots can be sown directly into the ground now. They like sun and light, and well-drained soil.
Award-winning ‘Eskimo’ is a good winter variety as it has a high tolerance to frost and produces a lovely, sweet flavour.
‘Napoli’ is a flexible carrot that can be sown early or late in the year and takes about 90 days to mature.
Early summer is the ideal time to start planning if you want to serve homegrown vegetables on December 25
It is not too late to plant spuds for roasting. Late season varieties can go in the ground as soon as the seed potatoes arrive. Try Maris Peer or Nicola.
Wallflower Erysimum cheiri (pictured)
SOW FOR SUCCESS
Next year Wallflowers (Erysimum cheiri) and Sweet Williams (Dianthus barbatus) are cheerful spring bedding plants.
Both are biennials — meaning you sow them one year to flower the next. Seeds are inexpensive and there are plenty of colourful varieties.
Sow into a tray of peat-free compost and keep under cover until ready to be pricked out and potted on. In autumn, the young plants can be planted out for a display next spring.
PLANT OF THE WEEK
Cornus kousa var. chinensis
The Chinese dogwood can be a large shrub or a small tree. In early summer, it is covered in creamy white bracts with tiny green flowers. After flowering, these turn into dark pink, strawberry-like fruits.
Leaves are dark green, turning purplish in autumn. Cornus kousa is fully hardy and likes full sun or partial shade in moist, well-drained soil.
Cornus kousa (pictured) is fully hardy and likes full sun or partial shade in moist, well-drained soil
READER’S QUESTION
Why has my peony only produced one flower?
Jane Marks, Wimbledon.
Is your peony getting enough sunlight? These gorgeous big blooms need plenty of sun to put on buds and flower. If it is in partial shade or has become crowded by other plants, that could be why it is not fulfilling its potential.
Have you moved it recently? Peonies don’t like to be uprooted and transplanted. They can take years to recover.
They also don’t like to be planted too deep. The eyes of the tuber should be no more than two inches below ground level.
It might also be sulking about the long, wet winter, preferring a cold snap. If it is planted at the right depth and gets plenty of sunlight, try applying a liquid fertiliser such as seaweed to boost flowering.