Chalfont St Peter Garden Club Newsletter - July 2005
Chairman: Charles Flawn
Secretary: Linda Hills-Harrop
Garden Hut Manager Cliff Thayer
Tour Manager Keith Gould
Dear Member,
My thanks to Bryan Nicholson for so successfully
editoring the Newsletter while I was away. We are now well
into the summer with the English weather doing its normal
stuff! If you are planning to put some of your roses into
the Summer Show then now is the time to feed them with a
good fertiliser such as Q4, this will help to bring on the
second crop of blooms, if the weather allows!
Our apologies go to Mr P. Langstone for spelling his name
wrong in the May newsletter.
Summer Show on 20th August. Let’s hope we shall
all get the good growing weather we deserve! If you haven’t
entered before, do please consider the novices’ classes.
These are intended to give people experience without being
judged against seasoned exhibitors; following this, many
have gone on to become major exhibitors. Or if your garden
is modest, then why not try classes such as the cactus,
patio container, herb garden, or pot plant? There’s
something for everyone. Year by year, we seem to welcome
even more exhibitors in the domestic classes, possibly
because their skills can bear fruit even in the most
unhelpful weather!
Meetings This month’s meeting will be at 8pm on
Wednesday 20th in the Church Hall when Jolyon Lea will tell
us about ‘his pleasure from alpines’. Jolyon has a beautiful
alpine display in his garden in Little Chalfont, which is
open under the NGS so you may have visited in the past.
The Garden Hut will be open on Sunday from 10.00
am to 12 noon. Very important, you must show your Membership
card. There are a few Growbags available; these can also be
used for digging into beds or for top dressing (this is a
very cheap way of purchasing peat). Some of the tools
mentioned in last month’s letter are still available. We
have a new line of 10ltr.budget watering cans, which have
proved very popular. We also have a few 2.5pt. Haw’s
watering cans for use in the Greenhouse or Conservatory. All
fertilizers, both liquid and granular are available; and
remember the ChemPak specialized products.
Jane’s Garden
Gardens should be looking at their best now, borders filled
with colour, also with fruit and vegetables.
Picking soft fruit as it ripens, freeze any surplus or give
it away rather than leaving it to rot on the bushes. Pick
vegetables while they are young, tender and tasty. There is
still time to sow seeds; such as peas, beetroot and salads
for an autumn crop. As tomatoes set fruit and ripen they
could potentially succumb to a range of pests and diseases
or environmental factors, which may affect the crop. Watch
out for white fly, use sticky traps in the greenhouse or
spray with organic pesticide. Caterpillars leave large
irregular holes in leaves, destroy eggs and pick off
caterpillars. Blight (which seems much more common now) on
stems and leaves develop brown patches, fruit shrink and
rot, spray with Dithane 945 to prevent it taking hold.
‘Greenback’, too much sunshine/and or lack of potassium
causing area around stalk to remain green and hard, shade
from bright light and feed with a liquid feed. Blossom end
rot is caused by fruits being unable to access calcium in
the soil usually because of irregular watering. Irregular
watering also causes splitting of the fruits. Keep cutting
sweet peas to encourage new flowers. Dead head roses to a
bud in the leaf axil. Tidy up rock gardens by weeding and
trimming faded blooms refresh with a mulch of grit. Collect
seeds from earlier flowering perennials such as hellebores
once the seed heads have swollen. Divide spring flowering
perennials and iris once the flowers have faded. Continue
tying in climbers to their supports. Keep containers and
baskets well watered and fed. Sow wallflowers to ensure they
are ready to plant out with tulip bulbs in late autumn for
displays in spring.
Coach Outings - July’s outing is to ABBEY
HOUSE, MALMSBURY, WILTSHIRE (15-50 ea / 27th) Some of
you may have been last year, but I think it well worth
another visit, it being some eight weeks later and those
roses will all be out! For those going for the first time,
it’s a fabulous five acres, with a lovely river walk, an
abbey next door, and the old town also to explore. You can
picnic, or there are two pubs, and plenty of other places to
eat at. All coaches leave Church Hall / lane at 9am – and
exit venues at 5pm. Please make cheques out to CH.ST.PETER
GARDEN CLUB, and take to the HUT on Sundays or contact
K.GOULD, SL9 9LG. (01753-884012) All letters received will
be acknowledged by phone.
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Please Book me (… ) seats for Abbey House Gardens
(27th July) @ £15.50 ea (£…… ..)
Name……………………………………………
Address………………………………………………………………………………………..Phone No.………………………
Hampton Court Palace Flower Show. Is on from the 5th
to 10th July
Local Events. Chiltern Open Air Museum – Bodgers
Holiday Club for children from 5 to 10 years to experience
the special formula of fun and learning. on 16th to 19th
August 2004 this must be prebooked ring 01494-793017
The Stoke Poges, Wexham and Fulmer Horticultural
Society Show is on Saturday 30th July 2005 in the grounds of
the Teikyo School Fulmer.for entries ring 01753-643599.
The Chilterns Show celebrating the best from the
Chilterns on the A413 at Great Missenden on 16 & 17
July.2005.
Plant and garden Fair. At Chenies Manor on Sunday
18th July.
Open Gardens open times 2 to 6pm approx
10th Sun. Weir Lodge Chesham 793504
12th Tues Hillcrest Marlow. 01628 483063
14th Thur Gipsy Ho. Gt. Missenden 864912
Plant Specialist Gt. Missenden 866681
17th Sun White Ho. Denham Village
24th Sun Whitewalls Marlow 01628 482573
4th August. Homelands, Ellesborough 01296 622306
Garden to visit If you missed the March meeting with
its very short AGM, you will not have heard the excellent
talk given by Kathy Brown on ‘Cottage Gardening’, her talk
was crammed with tips on how to improve any garden, I came
away with some excellent ideas that I shall put into
practice this summer. If you wish to visit her garden near
Bedford see her website
www.kathybrowngarden.homestead.com or tel:01234-822064.
Harebell Hunt ‘bats in the belfry’ is the other
name for nettle-leafed bellflower. There is also the
clustered bellflower, which is vivid violet; the giant
bellflower can tower five feet over hedges; and the
common-or-garden harebell. Are these common as well as
garden? The charity Plantlife wants to know. To join in the
Harebell Hunt contact 01722-342755 or go to
www.plantlife.org.uk
Moth night July 9th is National Moth Night, when moth
enthusiasts stay up and record the species that come to
their lights, saucers of sugar syrup or wine. It is also
Moth Day as many fly by day as well. See
www.nationalmothnight.info for more information.
Camellias Established camellias survive extremely
dry conditions. “We grow them in deep shade, some only 3
feet from mature oaks, and never water – even in severe
droughts – yet they produce lots of flowers. Camellias
tolerate less acidic soil than rhododendrons, but if you
don’t have the right conditions, fill a container with
ericaceous compost and keep it away from the damaging
morning sun”. So writes Peter Chappell, owner of Spinners
Garden, near Lymington, Hants. 01590-673347. A lovely garden
to visit.
New Lavatera Lavatera x clementii ‘Baby Barnsley’
is the more compact, bushier relative of the well-known
‘Barnsley’. The flowers appear in late June and continue
until end October; the blooms are white with pink-centres.
Height and spread 110cm x 90cm. Available from garden
centres at £8-£9 per 3 litre pot.
Chelsea Blue One of this years Chelsea highlights
is the bold double flowered Clematis ‘Franziska Marie’.
Flowers in May/June and again in late summer giving a double
helping of double blooms. Height 2 mtr.
Priced at £12 to £13 per 3-litre pot. You will find it at
B&Q, Homebase, Wyevale and others.
Garden Centre Contacts
B&Q 0845-222-1000; Dobbies 0131-663-6778; Hillier
01794-368733; Homebase 0845-077-8888;
Klondyke/Strikes 0800-204080; Notcutts 01394-383344; Squires
020-8977-9988; Wyevale 0800-413213.
Van Hage 01494-764545. |
