The february cutting garden: Quiet time

For me January and February in the cutting garden is quiet and I like it that way. It’s my most peaceful time of the year and while many people are wishing the months away, I’m secretly loving the fact that the garden is on hold for a bit. As someone who works in Horticulture, as well as having my own garden, I know that once March and April comes it will be manic. That is the busiest time at Higgledy as everyone starts wanting to get out in their gardens and sowing seed, so we will be busy sending out your orders. I also work at a perennial plant nursery (Bluebell Cottage Gardens) for 2-3 days a week and again that’s when it gets really busy. We send out perennials mail order, plus the nursery opens to the public in April and we have to have that ready and full of plants. At the same time propping and potting on stock, weeding and watering. So spring is our most hectic time. I absolutely love my job but it is full on from March to the end of September. Excitingly we are doing Chelsea Flower show this year as well as the usual Malvern and the new Badminton show so it’s a thrilling year ahead. So I need to make sure that my batteries are fully recharged and ready for the year ahead.

I also have my own garden which for my sins is not low maintenance, I love gardening after all. I have a cutting patch and grow most of it from seed. I’m always chasing my tail and have a million jobs to do and that’s when I really do want time to slow down. So actually I do relish this quieter time, when I get chance to read books, do jigsaws, watch TV and films and catch up with a few house projects. And just breathe.

 

But at the start of February I can start seeing the little changes in the garden and you start getting that little zing of excitement about the gardening year ahead. Despite the cold the snowdrops are delicately swaying in the breeze, the Hellebores are all glamour and beauty despite the grey and brown backdrop and there are green shoots everywhere as the bulbs start nudging themselves out of the soil. It’s a time for planning and plotting.

 

So I’ve also had the time to properly think about my garden and what I want to do in it this year. At the back end of last year we had quite a bit of work done in the garden, we had a couple of old concrete buildings with asbestos roofs and these have been taken down and removed and we have had a new garden room put in, plus some paving around it. We finally have a place to sit and look at the garden and I’m so excited for the summer. This has meant that we have some new borders that need planting and I want to reorganise some of the other borders. We have been in the house and garden for 7 years this year and I wanted to see what’s working and what needs moving and reassess some of the planting, especially in view of the fact that we have had some really dry summers some of the planting is not quite right and, as every gardener does, I have made a few mistakes with planting and some things need moving around. So I’ve been making lots of notes of what to move and have been preparing the soil in the new borders and once it gets a bit warmer then I’ll get out there and start the big move. I have got out in the garden when we have had the odd nice day, doing a bit of leaf clearing, tidying and some cutting back especially in the beds where I have quite a lot of spring flowering plants and bulbs so that they can poke their heads above the soil and get growing. I’ve also been mulching some borders. Some nice jobs for getting you warm on a cold day.

I’ve also been thinking about my cutting garden, what space I have got this year and what I want to grow. I have a number of raised beds which I grow my annuals in and in the summer there is a lot of juggling round of plants to utilise the space to its best. The autumn sown annuals will be first to go in and then the sweet peas. When the autumn sown annuals and biennials are going over I replace them with the half hardy later flowered annuals like Cosmos, Zinnia and Sunflowers so a bit of planning is needed. Though I’m the first to admit these plans often go out of the window in the rush to just get everything planted. But I’ve gone through my seed boxes and had a bit of a clear out, I know what I’m growing this year and have ordered my seeds. If you are feeling particularly geeky sort them into sowing order so you know what to sow first. If you have got seeds saved from previous years go through and have a sort out. Most seeds have a good shelf life and will last for a couple of years so keep any that will be OK, the only things I sow that I feel you really need to make sure is fresh seed is the Phlox ‘Creme Brulee’ and Orlaya grandiflora (and I save my own seed of this one so that I really know its fresh).

 

So I’ve been keeping an eye on my autumn sown annuals in the greenhouse over winter, a bit of watering but not too much and covering with fleece if there is a particularly hard prolonged frost. I have lost a few things from the cold spell earlier in the year. I’m going to give up autumn sowing of Calendula as they often succumb to the cold here and also Cynoglossum, both of these are quite fleshy seedlings and they just rot off. Plus Calendula is so quick to flower from a spring sowing so its not really needed. I’ve also repotted a few things like Cornflowers, Corncockle and Godetia to give them a fresh boost of feed. They are looking good. Orlaya grandiflora as always is bomb proof and despite its dainty looks shrugs any amount of frosts. They will sit tight now for a few more weeks. Soon be picking these again.

The Ranunculus is planted in their mini polytunnel and are growing away slowly, they can cope with cold but hate the wet. I planted them earlier this year, they were growing so well I planted them in late December but they seem to be thriving and I’m hoping that will mean they will flower a bit earlier but we will see. I can’t wait to see those blooms again.

But I have not sown anything yet this year and to be honest I’m not in a rush. March is when I really get started with seed sowing in earnest. However, there are a few things that I will be getting started in February. I have put some Larkspur in the fridge for a couple of weeks so I may sow them this weekend, I particularly love Larkspur ‘Imperials’. It’s a good idea to sow any perennials (see my last blog on sowing perennials from seed) so that they have a chance of flowering this year. So definitely Dahlia ‘Bishops Children’ and ‘Cactus’, I like using Gaura ‘The Bride’ in my containers so they will be sown this month. Other good ones to sow now are Knautia ‘Melton pastels’ with lovely airy scabious like flowers in shades of pinks and purples, Feverfew, a brilliant filler with big clusters of daisy flowers and Chrysanthemum ‘Crazy Daisy’ with its shaggy white flowers. I might direct sow some Daucus carota ‘Dara’ into a bed as they sometimes like a chill to help them germinate. Plus I missed sowing my favourite Sweet pea ‘Cupani’ in the autumn so I want to sow some of those. Sweet peas are excellent seed to sow now, see the sweet pea sowing guide blog for more information. More general seed sowing information can be found in the Higgledy seed sowing guide.

But other than that I think I’m going to wait until it gets a bit warmer and more importantly when the light levels start to rise. Despite the fact that we are definitely starting to see a difference in the sunrise and sunset times here, the days are still very short and it’s been especially grey here in the north west of England the last few weeks.  So if like me you have not done much in the garden yet don’t panic there is absolutely no urgency especially in terms of seed sowing. It makes complete sense really, think about the seed, would you want to be sat in cool damp soil with hardly any sun. The main seed sowing time is March and April and so plan now and get ordering your seeds so you can get started then.

Happy sowing and lets hope we get some sunshine soon!

Higgledy Anne

(I’m on Instagram anne_hinks if you fancy a follow)