Spring - did I mention I hate gardening?

[Woodbloke]

But we do have more apples than we know what to do with, plums, bullaces and a cherry. And gooseberry, but those are in the wrong place. There's a quince somewhere too.

Apple wine etc is yer answer! I gave up making the stuff decades ago 'cos I could never (strangely) make it weak enough. I once gave a case of my very dry, very palatable Hockish type apple wine to a work colleague who thought it might initially taste a bit watery and not up to much; he and his missus polished off it off inside 48hrs and then came back asking for more - Rob

 

[AndyP]

But we do have more apples than we know what to do with, plums, bullaces and a cherry. And gooseberry, but those are in the wrong place. There's a quince somewhere too.

Apple wine etc is yer answer! I gave up making the stuff decades ago 'cos I could never (strangely) make it weak enough. I once gave a case of my very dry, very palatable Hockish type apple wine to a work colleague who thought it might initially taste a bit watery and not up to much; he and his missus polished off it off inside 48hrs and then came back asking for more - Rob

Living in a part of the world famous for it’s orchards whats wrong with cidre? Never actually made any from ours as surplus gets frozen for apple grumble* all year round.



*not a typo, tis actually what we call it here

 

[AndyP]

Please tell me more about box blight and whether I should be worried? Should I try to prevent? How many traps.

Here is my petit potager


Those box hedges, not sure of the variety, were all made from cuttings and cuttings of cuttings from a large, 2m high, bush in our old garden in SE London. The oldest one on the left has been established for about 10 years now. Easy to see the sequence of when the others were planted. The cuttings take years to establish so I would hate to lose them.
I pruned them all about 3 weeks ago on a cloudy day (I read somewhere to avoid pruning in bright sunshine). I will try to remember not to prune in the autumn as we get a lot of heavy dews all year round as once the clay gets wet it doesn’t dry.

 

[Woodbloke]

Living in a part of the world famous for it’s orchards whats wrong with cidre?

Agree about 'le cidre' Andy and the Normandy stuff is a cut above (IMO) the usual fare from the West Country. Even more delumptious when it's distilled into Calvados. I rather thought though, that you needed a special variety of apple trees to make 'le cidre'?- Rob

 

[AndyP]

Living in a part of the world famous for it’s orchards whats wrong with cidre?

Agree about 'le cidre' Andy and the Normandy stuff is a cut above (IMO) the usual fare from the West Country. Even more delumptious when it's distilled into Calvados. I rather thought though, that you needed a special variety of apple trees to make 'le cidre'?- Rob

Evidently not Rob. This place is just down the road from us.
https://www.domainedesrougesterres.com/nos-produits/
Their cidre is made from 150 different varieties of sweet, sour and bitter apples. I guess the blending might be key

 

[AJB Temple]

Andy there are two different issues:

Box blight is a fungal disease, of which there are at least two varieties. It mainly attacks clipped buxus in humid conditions so, autumn is worst. There are various sprays you can use that are targeted at box among other things but I am not sure what is available in France. If you need details of the commercial one that we use, then please PM me. You will notice die off and leaves going brown, usually on the top of the plants. Act fast if you notice that.

Edit: we use Signum. I think you have to claim to be commercial to buy it. It is sprayed as a fungicide, preferably mixed with a foliar feed (we use liquid seaweed which I get in a 20l drum). Signum is an agri product and not just for box, but various crops that get blight. It comes in powder form.

First of all though I would ask around in your area to see if it is prevalent. We don't have blight presently, so my spraying and clipper disinfecting is precautionary. All of our box was grown from clippings too.

Box moth caterpillar is a serious pest and entirely independent of blight. If you have it then the leaves will be being eaten. The caterpillars are voracious, small dark grey things, and they will strip a plant of all leaves in a week.

The best control is prevention, so you hang up pheromone traps - to give you an idea in our garden all the box is at the house end and we have two traps about 25m apart. The season is from early April to mid July, and the idea is to kill the male moths. Pheromones can be had off eBay or Amazon, or PM me and I will give you direct contact details. You can buy them with the plastic traps for about £15 for two traps and enough product to last the whole season.

If you get the caterpillar, then act straight away - that day as they destroy plants very fast. Just check the plants over each week for caterpillars or what looks like thick spider webs, especially if you see any leaves eaten back to the stalks. It is worth having a stock of the treatment Xentari (again Amazon etc) which is a German product and highly effective. However, it needs to be applied via a high pressure spray (pump action sprayer type) and at least two applications are needed a week apart. Don't believe internet rubbish about using washing up liquid: that just results in clean, but still hungry, caterpillars. You have to get the spray to the underside of the leaves. I actually jet washed ours as well as that destroys the white webbing that they produce and cling to.

Don't wait until mid season to get the products - last summer it sold out fast. We buy ours in Germany as it is much cheaper than the UK (half).

Collect and burn box clippings: do not compost them if you have any risk of blight or caterpillar as that guarantees re-infestation next year.

Sissinghurst lost much of its box - they reacted too late and were not vigorous enough with cutting out dead areas. Monty Don lost about 30 large box balls by his house. Many gardens have been very badly affected. It is super prevalent in London for some reason.

 

[Windows]

I’m loving the pics of your gardens. Don’t have much going on here - haven’t had to start mowing yet, so my primary activity is flattening mole hills, removing mole stones from the lawn, and clearing some brambles. Was expecting to start mowing this week, but the snow currently falling suggests I won’t have to worry about that just yet. We tried a few plantings when we moved in, but only daffodils and honeysuckle have survived. We have been keener gardeners in more southern climes, but as Roger noted, it’s a rather unrewarding climate, so just going to stick with basic maintenance of the areas currently there.

Regarding pheromone traps, maybe worth stating the obvious that the pheromones attract moths, so if you don’t have an issue with moths, be careful with them.

 

[AJB Temple]

Windows, the problem with Box moth is that they are active at night and for a short period. The female laying period is 3 or 4 days. It is highly likely that you will never see the moths and only realise that you have had them when your box plants are already eaten. We never saw the moths - just the outcome. We were hit for the first time last year and were lucky to catch it before we had wholesale destruction. Individual moths apparently range 10-15 miles.

The Box Tree Moth emanates from Asia. It is now very well established in London and the whole of the South East (and through most of Europe). Infestations were reported as commonplace in the Midlands in 2020, as well as the Chester, Leeds and Newcastle areas. Outbreaks since 2015 appear to have roughly doubled or tripled annually. Gardens with a lot of Buxus clearly are attractive.

It's worth remembering that it probably takes at least 10 years to grow a Box topiary or hedging plant from a cutting to say a 0.5 metre diameter ball. Garden centres in the South will sell these for getting on for £100 each. So established Box in an ornamental garden is a high value and difficult to replace plant. The preventative measures are pretty cheap. But each to his own.

Our garden is opened to the public and specialist garden groups such as the Japanese Gardening clubs and societies, several times a year (for charity) and so we probably take some care to make sure it looks OK. We do get a lot of questions about box problems. We are in Kent and about 20 miles from Sissinghurst, Leeds Castle and Hever Castle, all of which have a fair bit of box.

 

[Windows]

Adrian, didn’t intend to imply you hadn’t given due consideration. My comment was more intended for others. For example, pheromone traps are available for clothes moths and they work, but I’d recommend that if people use these at home that they keep them in airtight containers when not in use and keep windows closed when in use, since it’s my experience that they trap a percentage of the moths they attract.

I had noticed you were based in the T Wells area. I’m in Cumbria now, but from Sevenoaks originally. It’s definitely a different growing zone down there!

 

[AJB Temple]

Thanks Windows.

The recommendation for Pheromone storage for this product is that they remain in their sealed foil sachets until use, and that the sachets are kept in the freezer. They are small - abut the size of a condom packet.

The syringe type are also in sealed sachets and are a single shot product when opened. The active life outside is three to four weeks.

 

[Tiresias]

Thank you. Fantastic. I am super jealous as I would really like a garden like that. What is the cause of the die back at the end of the tall hedge in the background?

Not sure I could handle the accurate clipping required to keep the topiary in that condition though. As a matter of interest, what are you using to keep the two types of box blight and the box caterpillar moth at bay?

We are trialling some new products for free as the firm making them has us as a trial garden this year. If it works out then we will recommend through the NGS network. This includes an entirely new natural product to stimulate Buxus S. into rapid re-growth after attacks. Though our primary strategy is to avoid the attacks in the first place. Pheromone traps went up this week.

Feedback from the local horticultural college is that Buxus is much less afflicted by fungus if it is not clipped, or, if it is clipped, then this should be well in advance of autumnal humid conditions, and that all clippings should be collected and burnt. We have taken to disinfecting shears and secateurs as well during use. I've already done the first clip as I want to get air into the plants, even though growth is appearing rapidly.

OK. I’ll answer as well as I am able, but I am not a gardener, so please excuse a few ‘dunno’ish sort of responses.

It’s not die back. The stupid hedge had decided to put up another branch obstructing the path. Which has been removed. The leaves behind said branch weren’t getting any light, unsurprisingly, so are brown. We are dealing with a bit of benign neglect from some years ago, as we are in the rest of the garden. It’s yew, it will grow back.

I wouldn’t even contemplate trying to cut the knot garden myself. I’ve done some straight bits, and even that’s a pain. Takes the professional chap about 2 to 3 days.

I wouldn’t stake the hound’s life on it, but I think we are using Signum. We started a process about 7 years ago of removing all the plants around the base of the box hedges, and thinning out where it didn’t affect the appearance. Also feeding with Topbuxum. Seems to be working.

Box moth isn’t really a thing up here at present. Very isolated cases in Scotland, and you must remember we are half way up a hill: it’s too cold for the blighters.

And on top of the -7C last week - snow as well. Thinking, just thinking about chitting the tatties.

 

[AJB Temple]

Ha! Thanks. Interesting. I am growing Yew (Taxus B.) here as well, but struggling with it a bit as the ground is too wet in winter. Being up a hill you will have no drainage issues.

It actually snowed down here too last week. Three days in a row, but it was more of a flounce than a flurry and everything melted in moments.

 

[RogerS]

Well, after well over 40 years of gardening to an exceptionally high level and growing many varieties of tulips, now for the first time her tulips have all got Tulip Fire. It's fungal. The conditions to encourage that fungal growth ? Why...low sunlight, continual rain and driz zle, hardly anytime ever to dry out. Remind you of anywhere

She puts a brave face on things but, seriously, when you see day upon day her prized collection of 400+ very rare and for the most now irreplaceable peonies and irises die, one after the other ...it really saddens me to see the toll on her.

And, of course, we still have that cretin up the road to worry about. He came down again today trespassing on our land and fiddling with a fence he's erected ...trying to goad us into some sort of provocation. His be all and end all is confrontation. Ignore him and laugh at him and after 15 minutes he goes off. Trouble is he then mithers away and so probably tonight either he will switch off our electric again or will make another false allegation about me to the police.

 

[AndyP]

Following the advice early in the thread i have now planted my sweetcorn in a nearly square square, 16 plants. As I had to cut some rhubarb to make some room I used the leaves as a weed mat, not sure if that will work but can’t do any harm.