Welcome to my first gardening column for the Blue Mountains Gazette, in these socially challenging times. I do trust that an inclusion of a gardening column might bring some light relief.
Seeing seed germinate, and grow into seedlings, is one of the joys of growing your own vegetables.
My column will take a look how to enhance our cold climate (Blue Mountain) gardens.
I suspect everyone is staying at home much more, so why not make it a project to grow your own vegetables and flowers from seed. Seeing seed germinate, and grow into seedlings, is one of the joys of growing your own vegetables.
Winter is an ideal time for soil preparation for the vegetable garden. Over the next few columns I will elaborate on soil preparation, and will be discussing good composting techniques
Let's begin with pruning roses.
You will get the best results by waiting until late July or early August. It is best to shorten current growth by cutting one third off.
Ideally after pruning, roses should be left with five or more long stems to grow and flower.
I always advocate cutting to an "outward facing bud". You should also clear out all dead, old, weak and diseased wood.
Your climbing and standard roses will also need pruning the same way with the removal of dead, weak growth, leaving five to eight major growing and flowering branches. These form the roses' structure for future growth.
This is also the time to buy roses. The garden centres now have a great selection of hybrid teas and floribundas
You will notice roses are winter pruned for sale at approximately 25cms. Make sure they have a sturdy stem, with a bag securely wrapped around their roots.
Contact Robin Johnson on 0473 127 340. He is happy to discuss fruit trees and rose pruning