Slow Life Blog from the Lake District
  • Home
  • About Me
  • Contact Me

Filling the Borders with Self-Sown Plants

8/5/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
I make it a rule not to do any weeding in my garden (except where we are growing vegetables or planting seeds) until the middle of May. My motive here isn’t just laziness (although that plays a part) but because I want to see what has self-seeded. If you get out the hoe too early you run the risk of destroying the good along with the bad and that can be an expensive mistake.
As an example, I got an email today from Crocus telling me that they are offering Verbena Bonariensis plants for £8 each. Now it happens that a clump of about thirty of these plants has self-seeded in my borders, so I’ve saved £240 right off, plus all the hastle of planting them out.
​
My borders are full of other self-sown plants. They include the magnificent Angelica (pictured here), Crambe cordifolia and the tree spinach (Chenopodium gigantic), which grows to five feet in height and, very helpfully marks itself out as a young seedling by having a splash of purple on the tops of the leaves. Tree spinach also transplants very easily, which is helpful if you want to create a clump, which can look very impressive. All these plants self-sow freely, so once you’ve bought one packet of seed, that’s all you’ll need in a lifetime.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.


    ​About Slow Life

    The idea of Slow Life is to take the principles of Slow Food, which are “good, clean and fair”, and extend them to life in general.

    Here in the Lake District, the air is clean, the pace is slow and the atmosphere is calm. If we don’t grow food ourselves, we can buy it in friendly small shops, where you know the quality is going to be the best.

    This blog is a celebration of the Slow Life, with forays into the world of design, music, the arts, gardens, and my particular weakness, Japan.

    Archives

    September 2024
    June 2017
    December 2016
    August 2015
    May 2015
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    January 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009

    RSS Feed

Home   |   About Me   |   Contact Me

Jonathan Denby's Slow Life blog from the Lake District

© Copyright Slow Life 2024. All rights reserved   |   cookie policy    |   Site by Treble3
  • Home
  • About Me
  • Contact Me