SOME FAVOURITE SMALL PLANTS (THAT AREN’T WATER GUZZLERS). by Lyn Edwards Epimedium One of my favourite groups of small plants for shady areas with low water needs over summer is the Epimedium family – the Bishop’s Mitre plant. This is a plant for all seasons, starting in spring the new leaf stems resembling shepherd’s…
GROWING HEALTHY ROSES By Merylyn Condon On garden radio there are often calls asking for home recipes for controlling pests and disease as an alternative to using chemicals. One thing has become very clear, and that is that many people shun commercial pesticides, fungicides and the like. In writing an article for the…
ROSES -Other Types English (David Austin) roses English rose, Mary Rose Pink Mary Rose Rose pink flowers with a loose-petalled old rose form. Radio Times Fresh pink flowers in trusses. Shropshire Lass A large plant to 3m with pale flesh pink flowers fading to white. The Countryman Clear rose pink flowers with narrow…
ROSE – Floribunda Roses Cluster roses Cluster roses (or Floribunda roses as they used to be known) provide some of the most colourful, healthy and reliable roses for garden display and indoor decoration. Almost all cultivars are recurrent and will repeat flower in around forty five days if trimmed back as each flowering is finished.…
ROSES – Large-Flowered or Hybrid Tea Roses Recommended roses for Canberra. Members of the Society maintain a rose garden in the grounds of the Xeriscape Garden, Weston adjacent to the CIT School of Horticulture. This is open to visitors at weekends from spring through to the end of April. There you will see many…
OSMANTHUS by Merylyn Condon Commonly known as the Sweet Olive and originating in Asia (Himalayas, China and Japan), osmanthus produces clusters of tiny tubular flowers with a delightful fragrance. Osmanthus is to the Chinese what wattle is to an Aussie and is the focus of many a Chinese festival. In China, it is used to…
MAGNOLIAS By Lyn Edwards The deciduous Magnolias originating mainly from temperate areas of South East Asia and a few from North America create a wonderful spectacle with their late winter-early spring flowering on bare branches on large shrubs and small trees. These are survivors of the dinosaur age with tepals rather than petals and…
LIQUID OR FOLIAR FEEDING By John Woodfield Foliar feeding has become a popular and easy method to help look after our plants. It may help to know how and why this method developed, though you may be interested to know that it’s not new. Research on foliar feeding dates back to the late 1880’s. …
HYDRANGEA BY JOHN LE MESURIER Hydrangea macrophylla A very useful and versatile family of shrubs and a couple of climbers, it is mainly deciduous in this climate. Height can vary from 50 cm in dwarf cultivars to the tall self-clinging climbers which once established can cover several metres. Flowering can take place from late October…
DAPHNE By Merylyn Condon The daphne family (Thymelaeaceae) comprises about 50 species of evergreen and deciduous shrubs originating in Europe and North Africa to temperate and subtropical Asia, though in Australia we don’t see too many of these. Other plants…