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It's always been my ritual, in the first week of March, to start the long-awaited pruning of overwintered herb shrubs and trees. However, a word of warning for those who live in the north - the long range forecast is for another cold snap, possibly

miserable plants - I'm still unsure on occasion, especially with very early symptoms. The only thing to do when blight has affected your potato crop is to chop the haulms down to the ground and burn them so the spores don't overwinter, reducing the chances

urge to grow and flower profusely.My idea back in the autumn was to plant it with a few salad leaves such as mustardand rocket that might overwinter and give us some early, spicy leaves to make a few winter salads, as well as some parsleyto keep us

on the surface of the compost and cover with perlite, the white granular material that can be purchased at most garden centres. Then put the seed tray or module tray in a propagator or on a heated mat at 16°C. The seeds will germinate in about 20 days, depending

I'm sure I'm tempting fate here, so this is a somewhat whispered blog... but my hollyhocks don't have rust.I planted my hollyhocks about eight or ten years ago; some are now nearly as tall as me, but most of them are just half my height. As yet

distraction. Last autumn I stopped watering my begonias and left the plants to die down on their own, thinking their tubers could safely overwinter in pots of dry compost. How wrong I was. I've just tipped some out to replant into fresh compost but discovered

to the inclement summer. Also the general web consensus seems to be that over-wintering types don't keep as well as the spring planted varieties. Oh well, it seems I still have a lot to learn!

anything from 6-12 weeks for the spawn to develop into a tadpole and then into a frog. Interestingly, when we returned to check that the spawn had settled in, other frogs had laid their eggs near by. This is a very good sign as it means that the transposed

down gradually by reducing watering in autumn, then overwinter their tubers to replant next spring.Calla lilies have a tongue-twister of a botanical name: Zantedeschia. They grow from dormant tubers (well I think that's what they are). They need a good