Don't let ivy drive you up a wall

While ivy is the bane of many estate agents, kept under tight control ivy can be a real asset to a garden. It is one of the few evergreen climbers that is self supporting. None is as hardy as ivy.

Now is the time of year to give it a bold haircut because you want to do a hard prune before it starts growing again. If you want your ivy to grow to cover more wall, we recommend you take it hard back to the wall until the only lightest cover remains. This removes the shoots that flower rather than cling. Doing this ensures that all the plant's energies are pushed back into the main stems instead of the extremities and you get fast lush growth.

Ivy needs regular tending to however and can be quite demanding. Untangling it from gutters, roofs, walls and fences can be a real chore, as can pulling up shoots that are rooting along the ground.

Give The Hampstead Gardener a call if you've had enough of trying to keep it at bay by yourself. We have the experience and equipment to easily tame it for you and ensure it's in good shape year round.

Walking on frosted grass

Unfortunately we're not like Annie Lennox, so we try to avoiding walking on broken glass. Likewise, we also try to avoid walking on frozen grass!

Contrary to popular belief, frost doesn't damage grass; walking on it does. Normally when you walk across a lawn, the individual blades of grass are elastic and bounce back without damage. Walking on frozen grass causes the grass leaves to break. When this happens the leaf cells rupture and seriously damage the leaves, resulting in tell-tale blackened foot prints for a few weeks.

If you can't keep off frosted grass, maybe consider putting in a hard path instead?

Time to check and prune pleached trees

Many of our clients have pleached trees, also called espaliered trees. It's that time of year where we start checking and retying tree ties in our clients' gardens. This is an almost impossible job to do when leaves are on the trees so now is the ideal time of year to get out on the ladder and ensure all tree ties are both still in place and also not too tight. If a tie has broken, the tree can be subject to wind damage. On the other hand, if a tree has grown substantially since the ties were last done, the ties could be too tight and be strangling the plant. We try not to use wire when tying in the tree, but use either natural string or plastic clips as they are less prone to cutting into the bark of the tree.

Tips for Tying Trees:
1. Don't use wire.
2. Leave room for a small amount of movement and, of course, plant growth. After all, the tighter you tie, the more frequently you'll have to check and retie. Also if you tie too tight, the tree won't develop it's own natural strength to be able to sustain winds and environment on it's own.
3. Remember staking and tying trees is not about supporting the plant everyday, but ensuring it's stable from unexpected knocks and strong winds.
4. Use spacers to ensure stake doesn't rub the stem
5. Remember that high quality pleached trees will need pruning, tying in and maintenance at least twice during a single growing season.
6. After bad weather, check for abrasions and snapped ties.


Photo credit: Shutterstock

Up the Apple and Pears

With winter pruning season in high gear, it's important to remember to prune back your fruit trees -- particularly apple and pear trees. Forget that UK Boy Band, what you want to remember is to tackle the 3Ds first: Removing any Dead, Damaged or Diseased wood. Once you are sure you have only healthy stems left you then want to move to C, and prune in such a way that you remove any crossing or rubbing branches (which will eventually lead to damaged or diseased wood). This lets light and air in which further reduces disease and helps to ripen the fruit that grows next year.

Insulate your pots and water pipes

While we've had a mild winter so far, it's always good to be on the safe side and protect your plants, containers and water spigots before a harsh cold sets in. In London, weather forecasters are saying a bit of a cold spell is headed our way in the next week, bringing with it normal temperatures for the first time this season. When the cold starts setting in, at The Hampstead Gardener we recommend moving containers closer to the house and wrapping your pots, containers and spigots with bubble wrap or hessian bags. You can also use a strip of old carpet, hessian side out to protect both pots and roots from severe cold.

The concern is not the hardiness of the plant, but rather that plants are more vulnerable to damage in cold and frosty weather because their roots are not insulated below ground.

Here Comes the Rain Again

All this rain we've been having is causing havoc with a number of lawns and The Hampstead Gardener looks after. Lawn that was a lush thick green carpet a few weeks ago has turned to a soggy brown sponge. Turf will survive these conditions just fine, assuming it's not walked on. The ground is totally saturated in places at the moment so any traffic is going to churn it up and turn it into a muddy compacted mess.

A lot of time and effort will have gone into making sure the ground is level before laying new turf. This can come undone by walking on it when it's waterlogged.  One of the best ways to prevent this from happening is to aerate the lawn and to ensure that your lawn has good drainage before the winter starts. It's past the point for preventative measures at this point in the season, however.

Putting boards down minimises damage
Photo: sissinghurstcastle.wordpress.com

When we absolutely have to work in a wet area we put large plank boards on the ground to reduce the load. It prevents compacting and breaking down the turf when we are working from the edge of a lawn and saves compacting the soil if we're working within the border itself.

The fact is that the best advice is to not step on a lawn at all for a number of weeks. For many people, however, this is not an option...especially people with dogs. In that case, you may want to consider installing a row of stepping stones or lay a mulch or gravel path down instead. Otherwise, you'll want to wait until spring when the ground dries out and you can address any drainage issues and reseed/returf...but until then make sure you take you shoes off before you step inside!

Photo: Shutterstock

Happy 2018! 10 Things to do in the garden this January

Happy New Year! We can't believe 2018 is here already, but we starting the new year with a long list of things to do in our clients'  gardens already.

Top things to do in your garden in January:
1. Spread mulch/organic matter
2. Prune trees and overgrown shrubs to shape
3. Water container plants
4. Get your lawn mower serviced
5. Check tree ties and stakes
6. Keep an eye on ponds freezing over
7. Make sure there's enough bird food out
8. Prune Whisteria
9. Improve drainage in your lawn by forking it
10. Order summer flowering bulbs

The Hampstead Gardener: Tues Tip: Christmas Tree Removal Tips

With Christmas behind us, we'll soon be helping clients get rid of their Christmas trees and taking down garden lights and other decorations. The best way to avoid a mess removing your tree from your house is to place a large tarp under the tree before you start removing decorations. After all the ornaments and tree stand has been removed, pull the tarp up around the tree and carry it outside. If some needles escape and scatter inside, it's better to sweep them up as needles can clog vacuum cleaners.

The Hampstead Gardener: Care for hardy herbaceous plants

Following on from some of the work Autumn work, Dec/Jan is a good time to continue to tidy flower beds and borders, digging between plants, turning the soil and cutting back invasive roots of trees and hedges. At The Hampstead Gardener, we're also identifying worn turf and grass near beds and borders, digging over areas to be seeded in the spring and noting places where we need to spread fresh gravel for future visits. Where branches and trees have grown over and are shading beds too much, they can be cut back and pruned, giving the flower beds more light now that the sun is starting to get higher in the sky again.

The Hampstead Gardener : Spade/Shovel Care and Maintenance

Servicing and storing your garden tools is an important part of ensuring they stay in good condition and last for years to come. Regular cleaning and oiling will prevent rust, keep them sharper and help the handles stay solid and strong. Wet and heavy soil left on a spade will lead to rust. When the blade is rusty and not smooth, more moisture and soil sticks to the blade, making digging even more difficult. Ideally you should clean your tools after each use, but even at The Hampstead Gardner we sometimes don't get around to doing this all the time. This makes a comprehensive tool maintenance in December even more important.

To clean a spade: 

1. Safety first! Wear gloves, goggles and dust mask when working on tools.
2. Remove any dry soil with a stiff wire brush
3. Give your blade and handle a good scrubbing with water to remove any remaining mud and grit. Dry with old towels and leave them to dry overnight to avoid trapping in any moisture.
4. Sand wood handle to remove any splinters or chips in the finish.
5. Use a metal file to lightly sharpen the edge of the blade. The key is to give it a nice clean edge.  Beware not to grind away too much of the metal.
6. Lubricate the blade with vegetable oil rubbing the oil into the blade in a circular motion and whipping off any excess oil. The oil will prevent rust
7. Add several coats of Danish oil to wooden handles, making sure to let previous coats fully dry before applying next coat. If your handle is metal, brush off as much rust as possible and paint 2 coats of hammered enamel paint.
8. Hang up your tools rather than standing them on their edges.

The Hampstead Gardener tip: Turning over a new leaf

December is the time of year when there's little sunshine and rain and gales are common. Cold spells start to creep in which makes garden work difficult in December. But it's important to care for your garden this month to make sure it looks its best over the course of 2016.

Therefore every effort should be made to clean and tidy up plots and prepare the ground for the weather to come. At The Hampstead Gardner, we're breaking out the pitchforks, limbering up our backs and turning over the soil at our clients' houses. Winter digging alleviates soil compaction and allows the frost to break up the soil, improving soil structure. Make sure your garden soil has the best chance of storing up the most nutrients by turning over your soil in the coming weeks.

Photo credit: Shutterstock

The Hampstead Gardener: Key jobs for December

Top 10 jobs for December:

1. Dig up heavy, compact ground
2. Add organic material to your fruit and veg patches
3. Prune and cut back acres, birch and vines. Vines can be pruned back to 2 buds of last year's growth.
4. Take root cuttings of perennials like phlox and oriental poppies
5. Put a rubber ball in ponds and fountains to ensure an air hole for fish
6. wrap water pipes or turn off water supply entirely if possible to prevent pipe freezing
7. Service and maintain your equipment
8. Repair fences, pergolas and trellises, replacing any loose posts that can blow over in stiff winter winds
9. Use a lawn rake to rake up any leaves or grass cuttings that have accumulated on the lawn. Be careful to keep off the grass when it's wet.
10. Clear and clean gutters