Joanna Cruddas writes:

“Hotting up” for Chelsea Flower Show feels the most inappropriate phrase! I can’t imagine how the exhibitors cope with the wet, cold and overall uncertainty of weather. Down at the plot, I am approaching crisis point. It’s practically bare, except for weeds, while window ledges at home are crammed with seedlings getting leggier by the day.

I suppose I am more aware of the weather because I escaped for a week of warmth and blue skies in southern Albania. I’m not one who regularly tours ancient sites, but I’ve had a yearning to go to Albania ever since being stunned by the beauty of northern Greece. One of the bonuses of clambering over archaeological sites is that they tend to be havens for wild flowers, and although I suspect the best flora is in the north, the South certainly gave us a show.

At Apollonia we looked down over plains of asphodels. I’d never seen them in such quantity.

a stray Asphodelus microcarpus

plains of asphodels

On the way to the World Heritage Site, Butrint we stopped briefly at Porto Palermo. Here the euphorbia trees formed clouds of yellow-green, luminous against the sea below. Sage grew in abundance under the euphorbia and we learned that it is exported to the United States and Turkey for medicinal purposes.

A fellow traveller spotted the poisonous squirting cucumber enjoying the shelter of the fort. It was still in flower so I couldn’t put its poisonous fruit-squirting reputation to the test.

Tree Spurge or Euphorbia dendroides

Sage covers the area around Palermo

Squirting cucumber (Ecballium elaterium) in flower.

The road below Antigone was lined with Judas trees in full flower. As we approached the ancient city ruins we noticed the hills were scattered with clumps of wild hellebores. But here I also spotted a less welcome sight; a tangle of pine processionary caterpillars on the grass.

We’d noticed their white silky nests dotted around the branch tips of pine trees on the way up. They are doing untold and, to date I believe, unstoppable damage to pine trees.

Judas trees (Cercis siliquastrum)

Hellebore

Pine processionary caterpillars (Thaumetopoea pityocampa)

Albania boasts 32 species of campanula. I saw just one!

It was probably too early to see the Albanian lily in flower, but at least I found it represented on the walls of the 19th century Et’hembey Mosque in Tirana.

I didn’t see any allotments, although we passed gardens growing vegetables. On our last morning we went to the market. The leeks were comparable only to our ‘exhibition’ leeks in length. All the veg looked just out of the ground. A trick I learned was to keep spraying the carrots. It makes them shiny and irrestistible!

I already can’t wait to see more of Albania. A good guide is the making of a trip such as ours and Tony, our guide, was brilliant. I also discovered a website which helps us plan our holidays by theme. The possibilities for flora and gardening holidays look promising!

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook by Joanna Cruddas with photographs by Edwina Sassoon is published by Frances Lincoln at £12.99

Joanna Cruddas writes:

When I was young, tooth cleaning consisted of half-filling a small plastic beaker with water, dunking the toothbrush, squeezing on toothpaste, brushing, washing out mouth with a gulp of the water, then giving the brush a swirl in the remains of the water and pouring down the drain the very little left in the mug.

Readers of a certain generation will recognise this ritual. The point of the lengthy description is that there was no question of leaving the tap running and letting several litres of water drain away. Less than quarter of a pint was used.

In drought-ridden Western Australia, I have known my sister shower with a bucket beside her to catch surplus water. My niece has house rules limiting the minutes you spend in the shower.

It all helps and the reason it’s this column’s obsession is partly because my wake up call was visiting a garden on the outskirts of London to find the lake only about half-full. And it’s only April. Also because I then visited the Inner Temple Gardens. Here, they most certainly know how to place and plant pots in a way that gives this big square, surrounded by fine and historic buildings, colourful focus points.

Pots make walking up steps a delight

Gunnera and iris in a partly filled pond

Dark tulips under-planted with pale daffodils fill a huge window box

On a more modest scale, I under-plant pink tulips with grape hyacinths for my dining room window ledge. The tulips tend to come later, but the grape hyacinths have a longer flowering period so they work well together.

Carefully placed pots can give a garden, or a balcony, or a window-ledge finish. I love to have lots on my balcony, but they are thirsty. So, if I’m drawing off water while it runs hot, I do try to save it; any left over in the kettle goes straight into the watering can.

Abandoned glasses of water, remains in the teapot, coffee dregs – they all get saved, and as a result I don’t often fill the watering can from the tap.

Under-planting is a skill I’m learning rather late. There’s a plum tree in the centre of my flower plot. I planted a selection of daffodils in a circle around the trunk and then sowed a ring of grass for them to grow through. Now in its second spring, it’s an established success.

Around the same time, I popped in one small bugle plant (Ajuga reptans ‘atropurpurea’ ) which I’d bought from the side of the road for 35p. It’s spreading as ground cover and I’m training it into an outer ring to complete the ‘cottage/woodland’ effect, having also sprinkled in forget-me-not seeds for contrasting blue.

Bees love Ajuga and it seems to last for ages in a vase with the blue getting more translucent.

The Inner Temple goes for bold with a bigger splash of red and orange tulips growing out of a bed of forget-me-nots.

Sometimes one just strikes lucky. Back at the plots, a friend’s euphorbia has established itself into a magnificent cloud of lime green. A few weeks ago, the neighbouring plotholder erected a hut and, as though to show off the euphorbia, stained it a reddy brown. Is this companion building?

The Inner Temple Gardens were open in support of the National Gardens Scheme and will be open again for the London Open Squares Weekend on Sunday, June 10th. Both these schemes give us the opportunity to visit gardens – large or small – that aren’t usually open, or we’ve never got round to seeing. It’s all the more fun if you can learn something of the garden’s history, as I did, from Hilary Hale’s fascinating small book, A History of the Inner Temple Garden from the 12th to the 21st Century.

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook by Joanna Cruddas with photographs by Edwina Sassoon is published by Frances Lincoln at £12.99

Joanna Cruddas writes:

It is, of course, largely luck. Especially with flowers. But if you come away from the Fulham Horticultural Show with four 1st prizes and a special mention from the RHS judge, it is a big moment. I went down to the plot early on Saturday morning and there, standing out loud and clear was a perfect all yellow trumpet daffodil.

Trumpet daffodil, all yellow, one bloom: Winner!

I love spring flowers and was able to pick wallflowers for scent and depth of colour, dwarf daffodils, primroses, grape hyacinths, euphorbia sprigs for greenery, polyanthus, cowslips – that have arrived in abundance on my plot – to make my spring posy.

Vase of flowers, mixed: Winner!

The anemones, that failed last year, sprang into action for the Show. By the time they’d been in water for a couple of hours, and the judging started, they showed off to their best. And I was told they rather won the judge’s heart. My heart swelled with pride!

Vase of flowers, one kind: Winner!

Actually, for originality, I thought the cyclamen entry was stunning and the judge gave it a special commendation.

My anemones clearly won by a hair’s breadth!

‘Rip Van Winkle’ is one of my favourite dwarf daffodils, even though its head is really too heavy for its stem and usually drops forward. The morning of the show, I found one with a simpler, lighter head, or perhaps not fully out. Pretty as a picture.

One flowering bulb: Winner!

My absolute favourites are the white daffodils which I bought in Cornwall two years ago, but they flower later and on the day of the show were still in tight bud. Their scent fills a room.

Back to work. This is the time of year when plotholders go into the construction business. And very essential it is, too. While I was working elsewhere, my sister had a severe ‘string moment’. The peonies and broadbeans are now safe from summer gales.

A magnificent wigwam has popped up on a neighbouring plot.

C, being an artist, makes hers out of red hazel, letting the different bends in the wood form its shape and leaving the fine sapling ends free to sway high up in the breeze.

They’ll both be safe houses for climbing beans.

C’s taken ‘companion planting’ to a new level. Because we are not allowed to grow trees on our plots, her nectarine is contained. To monitor when to water, she is growing a foxglove with it.

If the foxglove leaves droop, she waters. Much as I love the fruit, I’ve never studied the flowers before. They are exquisite and worth growing just for the blossom.

National Gardening Week runs from April 16-22, 2012. Click on the link and check out the activities.

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook by Joanna Cruddas with photographs by Edwina Sassoon is published by Frances Lincoln at £12.99

Joanna Cruddas writes:

“Words, Words, Words,” cried out an exasperated Eliza Doolittle, and the other morning I particularly felt for her struggle with diction as I was reminded how we love to show off our knowledge…or worse, superiority.

Pruning a friend’s rose in central London, a gentleman strolled past and advised where I should cut. We got chatting. “Lovely charm of goldfinches in our garden this morning,” he said. London seems crowded with goldfinches this spring (up from 20 to10 in the British Trust for Ornithology Garden BirdWatch league table), and what a charming crowd they make. But how we love to use this word to show we ‘know’ the collective description for such a delightful little bird. On down to the plot to find my sister admiring her purple sprouting broccoli.

“I’m just going to cut out the king,” she announced, and spared me having to admit ignorance by adding “so the spears shoot out at the sides.” I sat down on the bench and started reading a column about petals and sepals only to discover the collective word for them is tepal. I long to show off my newly expanded vocabulary, but it hasn’t yet slipped easily into conversation.

On the other hand, my sister can justifiably be proud of our broccoli. It is magnificent and delicious for the simple reason that she nurses it from seedling to maturity and is punctilious about netting it.

The central ‘king’ of purple sprouting broccoli, ready to be cut out

6 days later broccoli spears are shooting out and ready for cutting

Un-netted broccoli eaten to bits, probably by pigeons

The bad news discovered by the BTO Garden BirdWatch survey is the loss of wrens. One-in-three gardens appears to have lost them. The good news is that they have not disappeared from our allotments. C is currently housing a wren nest in her nesting box.

We are under strict behavioural instructions when nearby. For she knows that wrens are smart. They build a choice of nests before deciding on which is most suitable for a confinement. Having been host to a blackbird nest, I know the pitfalls of this human/bird co-existence. It’s a one-way journey of nerves and consideration and is still prone to ending in tears. Nevertheless, we would love wrens to hatch in C’s shelter.

As for summer preparations: the sweet peas became all leggy and I have just pinched out the top shoots, hoping they will now strengthen and shoot outwards.

leggy sweet peas

pinched out sweet peas

The broad beans have recovered from the rigours of winter and will soon be ready for stringing and staking to protect them from falling over in the wind.

The primroses, which started life at the plot as one solid lump bound in clay, are now forming part of my plot edging.

I keep finding diminutive self-seeded plants and am gradually creating quite a primrose border with them.

One of the delights of my side plot at this time of year is the Leopard’s Bain (doronicum orientale). It arrived of its own accord, so far as I know, and just does its own thing, bursting into a mass of bright yellow daisy-like flowers throughout the spring and then dying down for the rest of the year. No bother.

Leopard’s Bain beginning to flower in early March

There was a time during the winter when I wondered if there’d ever be colour again on the plot. Well…all is well. The rhubarb is just ready for pulling; the purple sprouting ready for cutting; and muscari, narcissi, anemones, heartsease, primroses, and violets abound.

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook by Joanna Cruddas with photographs by Edwina Sassoon is published by Frances Lincoln at £12.99

Joanna Cruddas writes:

There’s a theory that a pear is only perfect for 20 minutes and I can believe it. Hard one minute, soft and woolly the next.

I reckon the same applies to camellias. For that exquisite time when they are in full flower, they radiate a serenity and purity like no other flower I can think of. Then it’s over and they drop to lie bruised and limp on the ground.

I caught that perfect moment at the Chiswick House Camellia Festival, where the camellias have just started to flower in the elegant conservatory that dates back to 1813. Covered in bud and flowers, many of the camellias are believed to be from the original planting in 1828.

Buds of Camellia japonica ‘Woodsii’

Camellia japonica ‘Parksii’

Camellia japonica ‘Incarnata’

Camellia japonica ‘Elegans’

Chiswick House is full of treats. The conservatory looks over the formal Italian garden, which was being planted out by conscientious volunteers when I visited.

My particular interest is the restored walled garden, now a community kitchen garden. I peeped through these tempting gates to notice a novel way of storing watering cans and dream of a visit on another occasion.

It was time for a “little something” and, guess what, the café was offering camellia-themed cupcakes – an indulgence I highly recommend.

The Chiswick House Camellia Festival runs until 18th March 2012

Just over the river from Chiswick House, are the Royal Botanic Gardens of Kew. Their “Tropical Extravaganza” is just that. Here’s a taster:

Phalaenopsis ‘Las Palmas’

Orchidaceae ‘Paphiopedilum’

Kew Gardens’ Tropical Extravaganza runs until 4th March 2012

I cannot leave Kew without mentioning the Reader’s Digest Crocus Carpet. In the spring of 1987 to celebrate their 50th anniversary, Reader’s Digest planted 1.6 million crocuses. It remains an annual must-see.

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook by Joanna Cruddas with photographs by Edwina Sassoon is published by Frances Lincoln at £12.99



Joanna Cruddas writes:

Some of you may remember that last February I found in the kitchen a shooting garlic bulb I had been meaning to plant for several months.  I quickly split the cloves and, with the help of a dibber, popped them in the ground.  The result was pretty satisfying; a small but perfectly formed bunch.

I’ve read that you should plant garlic on the shortest day of the year (as though one has time just before Christmas) and lift them on the longest day – after which they won’t grow a millimetre.  So this is my aim.

When I was last at the plot, I was given a black radish as an early Christmas present. This turns out to be more apt than it may sound.  I now discover December 23^rd is ‘Noche de Rábanos’ (Radish Night) in Mexico, if not where I live in south-west London.  I’m wondering if, having planted the garlic on the 21^st, I can manage to cook up something exotic for the 23^rd.  At the moment my gift looks more like our old friend Ratty RIP, than the beginnings of a spicey evening.

The annual holly door ring event took place a couple of weeks ago.  Courtesy of our friend, Diana, we sit round a table, clutching a wire clothes hanger.  Two hours later, it has become circular, been bound with tape, smothered with ‘fruits of the forest’ supplied by Diana and…hey presto, we go home with decorations for our doors. This year, Ellen went for silver, which looked beautiful against her wooden door.   For me, there’s nothing like gold, and it matches my brass door knob.

Edwina sent me a picture of her answer to a wreath, which includes unripened figs from her garden and brussel sprouts!

© Edwina Sassoon

Some people aim high with their Christmas decorations

© Edwina Sassoon

Reindeer made by Deborah Prosser http://www.penpot.co.uk/

I’ve aimed economical.  Last year’s tree, which I’ve been nurturing all year at the allotment, got bagged up and brought home.  I’d watered it regularly, but trimmed the roots and kept it pot bound in an attempt to keep it small.  (It has grown several inches, but still squeezes into the flat).   If I try and keep it for another year, I shall pinch out the bud shoots as they appear and aim to arrest it that way.  It’s a wonderful shape and has become a friend, as have my decorations.  My trees have never been smart or themed – tartan one year, silver the next.  I like Christmas trees to be about sentiment and memories.  My oldest decoration is the tinsel, which came from my parents’ days in Hong Kong in the early ‘50s; one of my favourite decorations was made for me by an American colleague. We worked closely together for 25 years but were separated by the Atlantic. We met just once. Some time ago she sent me this embroidered felt cushion. It always goes up.

Additions to the tree this year are the jacaranda seed pods from Tunis, http://www.readersdigest.co.uk/blog1/rdgardening/2011/11/walking-away-from-the-problem now sprayed gold and dotted about the tree.

Also the variegated remains of the cape gooseberry lanterns from the plot.  They’ve also benefited from a gold makeover.

As an added bonus, my tree has acquired an aura with mysterious shadows that change with the light.

Happy Christmas, everyone!.

The Three-Year Allotment Notebook by Joanna Cruddas with photographs by Edwina Sassoon is published by Frances Lincoln at £12.99