Innehållsförteckning för September 2016 från BBC Gardeners' World

• Discover our app Explore our award-winning digital edition for iPad in the App Store – with video clips and links to further content. Get two free issues and a 30-day free trial if you subscribe for a year. • Just press play We’ve crammed our new-look website with video guides, including Monty on How to propagate strawberries from runners – for free! • Hog the screen Find out how to help hedgehogs thrive in your garden and make them a feeding station with new videos in our ‘How to’ area online. • Time to discover the Secret Garden! This month’s subscription offer to get a Roberts radio worth £59.99 (see p32) also unlocks an exclusive area on gardenersworld.com. Explore extra videos, problem-solving tips and galleries in the Secret Garden.…

 There still seems to be a prevailing assumption that we British are especially good at gardens, and part of our pride is bound up in being the best – indeed, not being the best is not only a horticultural slight, but a challenge to our national identity. I am not very good at pride. I don’t tend to feel particularly proud of things not least because all too often a fall trots close behind. The line between pride and vainglorious seems awfully thin. What is particularly British is that the plants come from all over the world What is interesting about national gardening identities – and they do exist – is their distinctiveness. We make gardens in our own image even though we are usually unaware of this. Hence, the…

• I’ve got a builder arranged to come and sort out the end of my garden. He is also digging out a space for a wildlife pond and asked me if I could get a fibreglass pond so that the paving that will be close to the pond can be made more secure. I am having trouble finding something suitable online that has a sloping side. Pete8 • Tell your builder you want a flexible liner so you can have the shape of pond that you want. Nutcutlet • I agree with Nutcutlet. Butyl rubber is probably the best – and most expensive – but there are excellent PVC alternatives. Ladybird4 • I think you should be able to use sand (washed first to get rid of anything poisonous!) to…

Local attractions Westonbirt Arboretum Tetbury, Glos GL8 8QS Tel: 01666 880220, forestry. gov.uk/westonbirt Discover more than 15,000 species of trees from around the globe. Batsford Arboretum Moreton-in-Marsh, Glos GL56 9AD Tel: 01386 701441, batsarb.co.uk Home to one of the largest private tree collections – don’t miss the autumn show of maples. Cotswolds Distillery Whichford Road, nr Stourton, CV36 5HG Tel: 01608 238 533, cotswoldsdistillery.com Take a tour of this working distillery and enjoy a tasting. Whichford Pottery Whichford, nr Shipston-on-Stour, Warks CV36 5PG Tel: 01608 684416, whichford pottery.com Traditional terracotta pot making. Rollright Stones Great Rollright, nr Chipping Norton, Oxon OX7 5QB rollrightstones.co.uk Neolithic and Bronze Age megalithic circle. Kelmscott Manor Kelmscott, nr Lechlade, Glos GL7 3HJ Tel: 01367 252486, sal.org.uk/kelmscott-manor William Morris’s Arts and Crafts-inspired secret garden. Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam…

Personalised Trug This lightweight pine trug can be personalised with your name. 30cm x 23cm. £35.95, sortedgifts.com Willow Flower Basket Ideal for harvesting cut flowers, this pretty basket-style trug measures 53cm x 27cm. £29.95, sarahraven.com Classic Trug The Classic range comes in seven sizes, the popular No.5 measuring 38cm x 23cm. From £29.80, trugmakers.co.uk Garden Trug Made of dark-green plastic, this easy-to-clean trug is 53cm long. £3.93, homebase.co.uk Kitchen Garden Trug A galvanised metal trug that’s lightweight and hard wearing. 45cm x 32cm. £19.99, crocus.co.uk…

BEST IN SHADE Cheery gold and white • Galanthus nivalis H x S 10cm x 10cm Flowers Jan-Feb Plant Sep-Oct (bulbs), Mar-Apr (in the green) • Eranthis hyemalis H x S 8cm x 5cm Flowers Jan-Feb Plant Sep-Nov (bulbs), Apr-May (in the green) Plant in drifts under deciduous shrubs and trees. Enrich soil with compost and place snowdrops 10cm deep, with the yellow aconites 5cm deep. Bulbs dry out fast, so plant as soon as you buy them. Luxurious purples • Cyclamen ‘Miracle Deep Rose’ H x S 15cm x 10cm Flowers Dec-Mar Plant Sep-Oct • Helleborus atrorubens H x S 30cm x 15cm Flowers Feb-Mar Plant Sep-Nov/Mar-Apr The cyclamen creates a swathe of pink beneath the dusky hellebores. This mix is perfect in the shade below deciduous trees or…

Gather autumn raspberries UNLIKE their summer-fruiting relatives, autumn raspberries are able to produce fruit on canes made during the current growing season. If cut to the base at the start of the year, the new shoots or canes will now be 120-180cm tall and will have produced flowering sideshoots that are now carrying ripening fruit. The harvesting season starts this month, so put netting over the plants to make sure the birds don’t get to them before you do. Pick the fruits when they’re fully coloured, pulling the berry gently to separate it from its cone-shaped core. 30 mins to spare? DIRECT SOW a crop of salad leaves to harvest through the autumn and winter. Lambs lettuce, rocket, oriental leaves such as pak choi and mibuna and winter lettuce…

Plant strawberries EVERY GARDEN has room for a few strawberries, and everyone enjoys picking and eating these tasty fruits when they ripen to their glistening scarlet glory. A small patch of well-drained earth in full sun is all they need to grow and crop well. Now is the ideal time to plant bare-root strawberry runners, and they’re currently available from mail order suppliers. Before planting, beef up the soil with garden compost or well-rotted manure, as the plants will be there for at least three years, then add some blood, fish and bonemeal. To reduce the need for weeding and help retain moisture, you can plant through a membrane. This means you won’t need to lay straw around the plants at fruiting time. Turn to p122 for more ways to grow…

What does your garden say about you? Are you a free spirit, ready to share the space and decisions with Nature’s guiding hand? Or have you a plan, brought out and honed as the seasons unfold? Most of us fall into one camp or the other, and September is one of the milestones in the year, as we shift noticeably from summer to early autumn. Which path will you follow? Is it ‘out with the old, in with the new’ for you, clearing your borders ready for fresh planting? Or nurturing what you have, eking out any last flowers and relishing the skeletal remains to see you through winter? There’s no right or wrong in either path. But acting decisively now will pay dividends through to next summer. The enticement…

‘Polish Spirit’ A deep and sultry blue-purple, darkest as it first opens. Often flowers into October. H 2.5-4m ‘Abundance’ Prolific crinkled flowers. Ideal with white or pink climbing roses and very vigorous. H 2.5-4m ‘Betty Corning’ Scented, bell-shaped flowers are held on long stems. Lovely on a free-standing obelisk. H 1.5-2.5m ‘Minuet’ Striking flowers feature purplish red veins and margins. Pretty in posies. H 2.5-4m ‘Purpurea Plena Elegans’ Fully double flowers weigh down branches, so grow through a stout shrub. H 1.5-2.5m Clematis can be a worry. How do you prune them? How big will they grow? When are they going to flower? Will they strangle the roses? Will they get wilt? Well, here’s one that comes with few concerns. Varieties of Clematis viticella are ideal for growing through roses,…

Most UK spiders have a one-year life cycle, overwintering as eggs hidden inside a silken igloo in a quiet nook, and hatching as tiny spiderlings in spring. Now is the peak month of full-blown glorious adulthood. All spiders hunt invertebrate prey and kill by injecting venom through hollow, hinged fangs. Despite tabloid headlines, only a few have fangs long or strong enough to puncture human skin – so handle spiders carefully and respectfully, or not at all. Most spiders produce silk from the tip of the abdomen, but not all spin the distinctive circular orb webs you see bedewed on cool mornings. Other uses for the silk include trailing a safety abseil line in case of accidents, trussing up prey, covering eggs and even wrapping a gift for a potential…

Continue to bee alert If you spot a bee with a number on its back in London then grab a camera and take a photo. In June, biologists from Queen Mary University started releasing hundreds of bumblebees and honeybees, each with a numbered tag on its back, as part of the London Pollinator Project. The initiative was aimed at getting the public to help observe and track bee movements, and to see how successful urban bee-friendly gardening is. Although this project to incentivise bee spotters has closed, project leader Dr Clint Perry says, “It would be great to continue receiving data on tagged bee spotting and bee-friendly London green spaces.” Visit savelondonbees.co.uk Top award for The Beth Chatto Gardens The Beth Chatto Gardens in Elmstead Market, Essex, has been awarded…

These days we want a lot from our gardens. We want to grow a range of fabulous plants, but most of us would also like our plots to be versatile outdoor living spaces – somewhere to relax, cook or entertain. To make any space function well and look good takes a little thought. Measure meticulously and try to buy products that together will help create a cohesive style. Fortunately, there is an increasing range of well-designed products on the market that help us to use our garden e ciently and give it a desirable look. As ever with design, it’s all about planning and being clever with the available space – and there are many easy solutions that don’t have to break the bank. Alfresco essentials Shade and shelter I…

Alchemilla mollis I once saw a picture of an enclosed area within some grand building captioned ‘Alchemilla mollis in complete control’. This lovely plant, with its soft, dew-gathering leaves and froth of lime-green flowers, is a profligate self-seeder and indispensable for softening edges. H x S 60cm x 75cm F Jun-Sep Astrantia varieties Astrantias happily self-sow. It can be easier to collect self-sown seedlings from around the skirts of the mother plant than to sow seed deliberately. Many varieties are fertile and dark-flowered plants will often produce offspring with darker crimson flowers. H x S 70-90cm x 30-60cm F Jun-Aug Lathyrus vernus This delightful spring-flowering sweet pea relative is typically magenta, but can be more blue in L. ‘Cyaneus’ or pale-pink – L. ‘Alboroseus’. In flower just when…

“The one thing traditional gardeners could all do to help wildlife is to allow a little more tolerance into their lives, plans, practices and gardens. Give a little, receive all” 1. Don’t burn anything Please don’t burn anything you’ve cut in your garden. Don’t release that carbon – allow the natural forces of decomposition to play their role. A significant percentage of life thrives through death, and nature’s decomposers need resources, so make sure everything goes to composting. Find a corner and make a pile. 2. Stop over-tidying Don’t over-tidy your space. Nature has its own order and it’s the ultimate in beauty, so relax, take a deep breath, summon the tolerance and harmony, and let it go. Don’t fret about that stray dead branch, leave that tuft of dock…

Growing bulbs in containers is one of the easiest ways to bring spring colour to your garden. Simply pop a handful into a pot, forget about them over winter and they’ll perform like clockwork when spring arrives. Now’s the perfect time to plant bulbs and there’s little else to do till March/April when it’s time to add spring-flowering bedding or perennials. Wait until you see the bulbs peeping through the compost so you don’t plant on top of them, but don’t leave it so late that the bulbs’ foliage has filled the pot. Here are six easy combinations for pots, each using just three different plants. It is easy to create these displays, and don’t worry if you can’t find the exact plants we’ve chosen – use the combinations as…

SEPTEMBER is one of the best months of the year at Longmeadow. The days are warm and the nights pleasantly cool, and above all the light has a faded quality to it, as though thinned down and filtered through a cobweb or gossamer, that adds delicacy to everything it touches. However, the colours remain strong and the Jewel Garden in particular can be at its best. To maintain this area it becomes an increasingly important job to daily deadhead, suppressing all attempts by plants to set seed and provoking more flowers for as long as the days – and nights – remain warm enough. In the grass borders, the flowering miscanthus is gloriously penanted in silvers and golds, and there is a strong sense of the year slipping away, with…

STEP BY STEP Sow seeds of hardy annuals SWEET PEAS, cornflowers, larkspur and other hardy annuals can be sown in pots or trays now. They will then overwinter as young plants and flower early next summer. 1 Fill small pots or seed trays with seed compost. Lightly tap the sides to settle the compost, so it sits just below the rim. 2 Sprinkle small seeds over the surface, then cover thinly with compost. Push large seeds individually into the compost. 3 Water thoroughly using a can with a fine rose. Alternatively, stand the pots in a tray of water to soak it up, then allow to drain. Plant hyacinths for Christmas PREPARED hyacinth bulbs can be planted now for flowers at Christmas. Prepared bulbs cost a little more, but…

WHILE THE memory of summer picnics on the grass is fresh in your mind, put in some hours to make sure your lawn is green and lush next year Now is the best time to work on smartening up your sward or even to start from scratch. Here are the essential tasks for making the perfect lawn – get to work this month while the weather is warm and rain likely. Buy new turf and seed FOR A NEW lawn, first decide whether you want to start from seed or turf. Turf is more expensive but the effect is instant, laying it is easy and you’ll be walking on it within a couple of weeks. Seed is cheaper but takes days to germinate and weeks to grow, then must be…

DAVID SAYS Check bulbs carefully when buying to make sure that they are firm and plump, without any sign of damage or grey mould. Q Should I buy spring bulbs now? A September is when spring bulbs appear in garden centres and while it might seem too early to buy and plant them, there are benefits in doing so. Think about how bulbs grow. The foliage dies down by early to midsummer and the plants then go through a period of underground dormancy in the hottest, driest months of the year. In this state they can be lifted, stored in a cool, dry place and then replanted before they start back into growth. With sufficient moisture in the soil, bulb roots can start into growth in September even though the…

Bob Flowerdew Bob is an organic gardener and a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4’s Gardeners’ Question Time. Matthew Wilson Garden designer Matthew was curator of RHS Hyde Hall and Harlow Carr, and often appears on television. Anne Swithinbank A keen fruit, vegetable and houseplant grower, Anne was formerly the glasshouse supervisor at RHS Wisley. Q How do I look after my new begonias over winter? Sally Brogan, Glasgow A ANNE SAYS Most bedding begonias grow from tubers, though they vary in size, from massive, large-flowered upright plants with large tubers, to pendent ones with medium-sized tubers and species like pretty B. sutherlandii with tiny ones. Tubers are easier to look after during winter than growing plants. In autumn, dry off the plants, let the growth wither and, before the…

Dive into autumn Everything you need to know • Your top 25 autumn garden questions answered • Our pick of tools to get the jobs done • Carol’s ultimate planting guide 50 FREE* TULIP BULBS 5 vibrant varieties: ‘Purple Prince’, Queen of Night’, ‘Candy Prince’, ‘Royal Virgin’ and ‘Seadov’ * just pay £5.95 postage PICK OF THE CROP Discover Raymond Blanc’s 10 tastiest apple varieties Advice from the experts Alan shows how to ensure success with seed sowing Monty shares his love of gardening with dogs Joe’s pots for instant colour to see you through autumn PLUS Ideas for city gardens • Winter greenhouse veg • 50 ways to improve your plot and more...…

Container display (prices may vary) 1 25cm terracotta pot x 1 (£4 for a plain pot) 2 Fuchsia ‘Tom Thumb’ x 1 in a 12cm pot (£5.99) 3 Salvia greggii ‘Lipstick’ x 1 in a 12cm pot (£4.99) 4 Heuchera ‘Kira Green Tea’ x 1 in a 1l pot (£6.99) 5 Calluna vulgaris ‘Trio Girls’ x 1 in a 12cm pot (£2.99) As summer begins to wind down, plant a pot full of zingy colour to boost the display on your patio. Hot pink and lime may seem like unlikely partners, but they work really well together to create a look full of contrast and drama. Our plants are quite traditional for this time of year, but the way they are combined into one container creates a modern feel. They’re…

“Learning horticulture is like fly-fishing in a barn” I’m all for education. I undertook an Open University degree in my 30s and worked my way through the RHS Diploma in my 40s. The Diploma gave me valuable understanding and connected together the strands of knowledge I had gleaned in my years as an amateur gardener. But without day-to-day immersion in the subject, learning horticulture from even the best of teachers is rather like having fly-fishing lessons in a barn. You learn how to cast the line, but only if it isn’t windy, or wet. And as for what to do with a writhing, slippery fish… Six of us started the Level 2 Horticulture course at Reaseheath College in 2005, all at much the same level of ignorance. For that first…

• BBC Gardeners’ World Live winner The Best New Plant Introduction at BBC Gardeners’ World Live 2016 Awards was Streptocarpus ‘Titania’, selected by Chair of the judging panel Jim Buttress. This free-flowering plant has cream and magenta flowers from March until November. ‘Titania’ will be available as mail-order plug plants from Dibleys Nurseries at £4 for a jumbo plug. Dibleys, 01978 790677, dibleys.com • Rewards continue Dobbies, the UK’s second largest garden retailer chain, has been sold by Tesco. But a Dobbies spokesperson said its loyalty scheme will continue for its existing customers at its 34 garden centres in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as will the lifetime guarantee on all hardy plants and free hot drinks for members. • Will Brexit change UK gardening? We may see some price…

“A good garden is more than just a colourful collection of plants” You know the feeling – come autumn your garden starts to look tired and the will to keep it in tip-top condition evaporates. Well, it’s understandable; the nights are drawing in, the weather is getting chilly and the atmosphere on damp and dismal autumn days can be oppressive. It’s tempting to call it a day and consider that the game is over for another year. But stay your hand! All is not lost; your garden can still give you pleasure right the way through the year with a little careful planning and planting. And it need not be nearly so complicated – or costly – as you thought. The trouble is that most gardeners feel the sap rising…

Bulbs are one of the easiest ways to give your garden a colour boost. No matter what size your space – or how full it may be – there’s room for a few bulbs, whether squeezed in between other plants or in a pot. To help you put on a dazzling show next spring and beyond, we’ve put together stylish combinations of bulbs with complementary plants. There are combinations for borders and containers, for sun and shade. If you can’t find the exact varieties we’ve used, look for similar colours and let your imagination run wild. Now’s the perfect time to start buying and planting your bulbs (wait until it’s colder before putting in tulips), to guarantee your garden looks glorious next spring. Classic dainty mini-daffodil • Narcissus ‘Jack Snipe’…

LATE-SUMMER PRUNING • Cut back soft growth tips of spring-flowering shrubs and fruit bushes, such as this apple, to just above a bud to promote the development of side buds and flowers next season. As deciduous woody plants stop growing and get ready to drop their leaves over the coming weeks, put in some useful time with the secateurs to trim out unwanted growth. You need to be restrained – this is not the moment for major pruning or drastic reshaping – but the odd nip and tuck can be really beneficial this month while the foliage is still present and the overall shape of the plant can be viewed. September is also the month to finish off pruning out the tips of the current season’s growth to encourage the…

Plant out biennials LATE SPRING and early summer can be given a boost of extra colour with wallflowers, sweet williams and foxgloves. These are all biennials, germinating in the first summer, overwintering, then flowering the next summer, after which they will set seed and die. You may have raised your own plants from seed, but if not they are available to buy from garden centres and mail-order nurseries. Plant them now in their final positions so they can get established while the soil is still warm. DISCOVER a world of information about planting at gardeners world.com/planting STEP BY STEP Divide lady’s mantle plants LIKE other spring- and summer-flowering perennials, alchemilla can be divided now to rejuvenate old clumps and make new plants. 1 Cut through the roots around the edge…

Invigorate your herb garden HERB GARDENS often become overrun by zealous growers. Near the end of the season, and while the ground is still warm, the most vigorous herbaceous plants can be trimmed back, lifted and then divided to rejuvenate them and control their spread. Marjoram, chives, creeping thyme, lemon balm and any of the mints can be divided now. Leave fleshy rooted herbs such as lovage until they shoot next spring, as the cut roots are vulnerable to rotting over winter. Newly planted divisions will sulk for a couple of weeks then perk up, root out and put on some growth before going dormant for the winter. Water initially after planting and again in the first few weeks if the weather is dry. Keep the area free from weeds,…

“The joy of gardening in the UK is the anticipation of things to come – whether it’s asparagus in April and May, or swedes in October and November” Recently I was bemoaning the fact that this summer seems to have romped by more speedily than ever before. “Well, it would for you, wouldn’t it?” replied my companion – a man in his twenties. “What do you mean?” I asked. “When you’re six or seven,” he said, “a year is a sixth or a seventh of your life – a long period. When you’re in your sixties, it’s a sixtieth of your life. It stands to reason that a sixtieth flies by faster than a sixth.” Reluctantly I had to acknowledge this inescapable fact, but it didn’t make me feel any…