Weeding the Web

Instant conversion - measuring the difference

If you have occasional problems converting from imperial to metric or vice versa, whether spacing your veggies or diluting your tomato feed, then Online Conversion is a useful website.

It instantly converts just about any units you can think of: weight, length or volume, area, speed, angles, power, even clothing sizes and time zones.

And it does the honours with Fahrenheit and Centigrade—useful for germination temperatures, or just to wow ourselves with the heat in the greenhouse during this boiling weather.

100 degrees F sounds so much hotter than 37 degrees C!

Recycling Garden Tools is Good for the Heart

Do you love your old mower? I mean, really love it? So much so that you can’t part with it, despite the new, better one in the shed?

In what is surely a tongue-in-cheek press release, Recycle Now quotes psychologist Linda Blair in explaining why at least 40% of us find difficulty in relinquishing plug-in goods we no longer use.

“We value our electrical items because they make life easier and because so many of them connect us to the wider social world, either practically or because of the memories associated with them.

“Even when we no longer use them, we may be reluctant to let them go for a mixture of rational and sentimental reasons. A key factor is the sense of connection, control and safety these items give us. The attachment is similar to an infant needing a teddy or comfort blanket.

“This explains why we can end up having tantrums when the item breaks down and why some of them end up accompanying us everywhere - having their place at meals and by the bed for example."

Oh, bless.

Bonfires and petrol : a fiery combination

It’s not bonfire season at the moment but, having found this clip, I couldn’t sit on it till autumn. Next time you’re tempted to light the bonfire with petrol, I'll bet this leaps to mind. As the comment on Boomclips says, I suppose he was lucky he didn’t get his head blown off!

Stupid videos

The Hampstead Flower Show Now On – it's Smart as Paint

With Chelsea Flower Show over for another year, the Catto Gallery in North London has leapt into the breach. The Hampstead Flower Show is a bit like Chelsea,they say, “but with no hay fever, free admission and fewer bees”. In other words, it’s an exhibition of garden art.

The Catto is an active gallery, exhibitions-wise, with a large stable of artists. One of my favourites is David Gerstein, who produces brightly coloured creations in cut out steel, mostly handpainted, though some of the smaller pieces are wooden or coloured by silk-screen printing. All are exuberant, joyful works, often created in three layers to create movement and depth. I defy you not to smile when you see them. And they make great garden art because the metal ones are weather-proof. I can just see the flowers pictured against a white-painted wall on the patio.

Totally different is Alan Parry’s work. Parry is new to the Catto Gallery but has had very successful shows at the Montpellier Gallery, Stratford-upon-Avon, nearer to his Worcestershire home. I think he’s the highlight of this exhibition.

Will standard roses become standard again?

I predict a new trend. And I sense a growing interest. For some time I’ve been wondering what happened to standard roses.

Watching The Long Arm recently — the last film from Ealing Studios, a police procedural starring Jack Hawkins — I felt a jolt of recognition as he turned into his front garden and passed standard roses guarding the path. The film was released in 1956 and these roses were a “standard” for front gardens for many years. Indeed, I can just remember them from my childhood.

Why did they fall out of favour? Well, all things do, if only because a new generation of gardeners and designers have to justify their existence by eschewing the established and bringing in the new. And while roses of any sort are poorly suited to the ultra-low maintenance deserts that make up so many front gardens, these also require staking. But I'm not alone in thinking they deserve more attention.

Last chance for Leonardslee

The sound of clanging garden gates seems to be reverberating around Britain. Chesters Walled Garden is now closed for good, and from the end of this month, Leonardslee in West Sussex will be closed, according to the press releases, “for the foreseeable future”.

News broke in February that the Grade I listed garden had been bought by a businessman from Eastern Europe (more detail at The Telegraph). This is a terribly sad loss. Just how sad was brought home to me when I visited last week.

At this time of year, the gardens are ablaze with rhododendrons and azaleas, brought from all over the world. Huge R. loderi, first bred at Leonardslee by Sir Edmund Loder in 1900, tower over little woodland paths and the air is thick with a jasmine scent. Soon the only opportunity to catch a glimpse of these historic gardens will be to watch the feverishly intense Powell and Pressburger film, Black Narcissus.

Damson pruning brings forth new shoots

Last month, I did some very heavy (and seasonally inappropriate) pruning to my damson trees, in order to fit in a garden office (more about that later – this is much more important). I was distinctly worried that I’d finish them off by hacking off major parts of their anatomy.

But now, only six weeks later, look! Shoots are appearing, not just from near the cuts, but all over the trunks.

It’s quite a relief. These trees are over thirty years old but still manage to burgeon forth like a teenager. And a bonus will be that, unlike the previous branches which stretched sideways in a desperate attempt to gain light, these are now bathed in sunshine and growing the way they’re meant to – straight up.

Fingers crossed: we have rejuvenated trees!