Trellis allows you to grow climbing plants which are a great feature in any garden big or small. They can add depth and cover old fencing or help to create different areas within your garden. They also provide privacy which can be highly beneficial especially in built up areas.

How to

The best way to grow climbing plants is to use trellis. This can either be attached to a wall or fence panel and provides your plants with a solids secure structure to climb around. Buying planters with trellis are another great way of adding height to your garden. Planters with trellis give you far more freedom to choose where you want to grow your climbing plants as the trellis does not have to be secured to an existing structure.

• Start training your plants to grow up and around trellis when they are small. Attach string around the plant and the trellis to ensure they remain close at the onset.

• If you plan to grow vegetables with trellis, the trellis will give you easier access to the fruits of your labour as well as reducing the amount of rotten fruit or vegetables as the plant has less contact with the soil. More air can circulate around your vegetable when grown in this manner which will result in healthier fruits and better veggies!

Trellis essentials

• Do not put trellis up in a windy area of your garden, try to find a sheltered spot.

• You will need to spend time initially training your plats to climb

• If you are planning to grow heavy fruit and vegetables on trellis you will need to check that they are being fully supported on a regular basis.

• More watering is required for climbing plants as this growth technique enables quicker water absorption.

Jacks top climbing plant for 2010
Lophospermum – Begin by planting seeds in 7.5-10cm pots under cover in pots and plant out in late May. I would advise using a planter with trellis which will allows the new shoots to twine around the structure and grow vertically. Throughout summer you will be rewarded with trumpet shaped flowers.

Check out my range of trellis online at Jacks Garden Store.

Good luck

Gardener Jack!

Recently the media has been full of stories about our carbon footprint. We all need to work together in reducing each one in order to reduce the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

What is your carbon footprint?
Essentially a carbon footprint is the measurement of all of our activities which have an impact on the environment. It measures the amount of greenhouse gases produced throughout our day to day lives when we burn fossil fuels for heating, electricity and transportation.It is measured in units of tonnes (or kg) of carbon dioxide equivalent.

There are two parts to your carbon foot print:
The primary footprint – which measures our direct emissions of CO2 produced by our energy consumption and transportation choices. All of these areas by which we use fossil fuel are area’s that we have direct control over.

The secondary footprint – This measures our indirect CO2 emissions created via the things that we buy, their manufacture and eventual breakdown. Many sites now offer carbon footprint calculators where by you can view your own footprint. Here you will see that in essence the more that you buy the larger your footprint and negative effect on the environment.

There are many ways in which you can reduce your carbon footprint and help the environment. Your garden can help hold the key to your success.

• Planting trees – Trees not only absorb CO2 but also provide fantastic shelter and food for local wildlife.

• Composting – Installing a composter in your garden and filling it with your food and garden waste will reduce the amount of waste going into landfill and also the journeys taken buy the refuse collectors in order to get it there. It will also provide you with organic rich nutrients for your garden. Jack’s garden store offers a wonderful range of composters and wormeries which will enable you to get started immediately.

• Growing your own fruit and veg – Think of all of the food miles saved if every fruit and vegetable you needed was at the bottom of your garden. Even the smallest of gardens can have pots and planters filled with yummy seasonal delights that should keep you going all year round.Visit my range of herb and vegetable starter kits to get you off to a great start. If space or time is an issue and you feel unable to grow all of your own vegetables try using a local farm shop or market instead of the supermarket to buy your vegetables which will help keep the food miles down. Also buy only seasonal fruit and vegetables.

• Washing Line - Invest in a washing line! Each time you turn on your tumble drier CO2 emissions are being pumped out of your home.

• Swing and climbing frame – Think of the hours of emission free fun your children can have using play equipment in your back garden.Creating more activities to do at home will help you spend less time in the car travelling to the park or to other events such as bowling or the cinema. Save events such as these for special occasions. Getting you children to play outdoors instead of sat at a computer console will not only be beneficial to the environment but also to your children’s well being as it will enable them to get the exercise that so many children are now lacking.

• Recycle – Recycling reduces the amount of waste that goes into our landfill sites. Although recycling bins can often seem rather unsightly,there are now a wide range of recycling bin stores available to keep your garden looking neat and tidy whilst you do your bit for the environment.

• Water barrel – Collect rain water and use this to water your garden.

Good luck

Gardener Jack!

A cold frame is a fantastic low cost item that enables you to keep less hardy plants alive during the cold winter months. They are often referred to as the halfway house between your greenhouse and garden.

By definition a cold frame is an unheated garden box that acts like a mini greenhouse. This small timber/metal or plastic structure with glass panelling provides protection for tender plants, cuttings and seedlings against wind, rain and freezing ground and air temperatures.

Choosing the right cold frame

Location

• You need to decide where you are going to put your cold frame and what are you planning to put inside of it. Your cold frame needs to be placed in a sunny spot that has space for you to work, kneel down and move around. A shady spot won’t give your plants enough light to stay warm so choose a spot that will receive lots of sunshine. Anywhere south facing is ideal. Putting your cold frame next to a building will add extra warmth and shelter.

• Ensure the location has good drainage.

• You can purchase cold frames in different lengths and heights so think carefully about what you are planning to grow inside and how high these plants will become.

Materials

Cold frames are available with either glass or plastic windows on the roof. Studies have found that glass retains heat far better that plastic however a twin-walled polycarbonate roof offers exceptional insulation and is becoming a very popular choice. If you have a small budget a plastic roofed frame will be cheaper than its glass alternative and also offers a far safer option which is beneficial if you have small children.

You will find a great variety in the materials used for the overall body of many cold frames. The majority are made completely of glass or plastic panels. These designs allow maximum sunlight into the cold frame. Other types available include aluminium or wooden frames.

Aluminium cold frames are reasonably priced and are lightweight which makes them easy to transport around your garden. They do not offer as much insulation as a wooden cold frame.

Wooden cold frames are a great choice as they offer great insulation and are extremely durable. If you are looking for a quality cold frame opt for one made from oak, however do bear in mind that they are the most expensive.

The Roof or ‘light’ design.

Cold frames come with either hinged or sliding lids. The lid provides light and can be moved to allow ventilation and access. A sliding lid will need extra clearance space around it.

Using your cold frame

Once you have bought your frame you can now use it to harden off seedlings that have started life indoors. You can also start annual seedlings off inside your cold frame to give them a head start on growing before the earth outside is ready to be planted in.

Problems to be aware of:

Hot weather
You must open the lid on hot days to prevent your plants overheating and dying.

Cold Weather
During extreme cold weather you must cover the cold frame with blankets or other forms of insulation to prevent your young plants from freezing. When the sun does return unwrap the cold frame to allow the sun’s rays to heat the frame once more.

In summary a cold frame offers a great way of enabling you to grow plants all year round. It offers the perfect alternative to a greenhouse if you have a small budget or garden. It is the perfect halfway house from the greenhouse to the garden for many young plants.

Jacks top tips for using a cold frame:

1 – Do your research; find out what plants and vegetables are happy to grow in colder climates.

2 – Lengthen the time your plants will grow by warming up your soil. Lighter soil warms up faster than denser heavier soil. You can add organic matter to your soil to lighten it.

3 – Cool your plants in the summer. The summer heat can be too intense for some plants and often results in drying certain species. You can help to combat this problem by adding mulch on to the soil to cool the bed and help it to retain moisture. Alternatively provide the plants with shade.

Good Luck

Gardener Jack

For decades gardens all over Britain have been filled with glass greenhouses and cold frames within which an abundance of plants at various stages of development have flourished. Now it seems us Brit’s have been missing a trick, many gardeners across Europe, especially in Germany have been switching from glass in their greenhouses and cold frames to polycarbonate instead.

Polycarbonate greenhouses are cheaper, are easy to assemble and have recently had a face-lift in design making them an attractive alternative to the glass greenhouse. With so many young people on tight budgets now attempting to grow their own, a cheaper polycarbonate greenhouse will allow these folk to enjoy their own produce all year round!

The Polycarbonate greenhouses of the past as you may remember did have their drawbacks however scientists have developed new coatings and processes enabling this product to become a strong competitor against glass.  One key advantage over glass is the fact that polycarbonate is pretty unbreakable. Having tougher windows on both your greenhouse and cold frame will save you money and bring you piece of mind especially if you have young children/grandchildren running around in your garden playing ball games.

In terms of insulation, the higher the value of R the better the substance is at insulating your plants. Outdoor gardening glass which is generally 3mm thick can be measured as having a value of 0.93, if you compare this with 4mm twin wall polycarbonate which is most popular in Germany this has a value of 1.42. This shows the Polycarbonate is much more efficient when it comes to insulating your greenhouse and retaining the heat radiated from the ground at night time.

One area that glass wins in is the amount of light that gets through to your plants. 3mm glass allows 97-98% of light to reach your plants where as single-skin polycarbonate allows 94-96%, that may not seem too big a difference, however if you are planning to use 4mm polycarbonate because of its insulating qualities the amount of light your plants will receive falls to 80-84% which is a significant decrease. However for you boffins out there this is not as bad as it sounds, with twin walled polycarbonate light is scattered when it passes through the wall making it more diffuse which allows the light to reach areas that glass would not allow and this in itself will benefit your young foliage.

As I mentioned earlier polycarbonate is tougher than glass and less likely to break, however surprisingly it is also far lighter meaning that when used in your greenhouse roof it requires far less timber to support it which in turn allows more light penetration into your greenhouse and reduces draughts.

To summarise, polycarbonate greenhouses and cold frames are a fantastic alternative to glass greenhouses. With better light distribution, insulation and reduced cost they will become a front runner in the greenhouse and cold frame market in years to come. Although the design of these outdoor structures has come on a great deal, the glass greenhouse is still far more pleasing on the eye.

Happy Gardening!

Gardener Jack

Now that the lawn mower is safely stored away for winter you still have a few mild weekends ahead to spend time preparing your vegetable boxes before it gets too cold to potter outside. Putting in the hours now will allow you to produce brilliant home grown vegetables in the months to come.
Start by sowing modules of seeds in a cold frame or greenhouse which can be planted as mini plants in a month or so time.  A cold frame is a fantastic item that protects your plants and seedlings from cold weather and frost. If you do not have either a cold frame or green house you can sow your vegetable seeds instantly outside as long as you cover them with fleece or perforated polythene. Remember to protect your young plants from pesky bugs within the garden that will try to eat your vegetables before you can! Most slugs and snails will be hibernating at this time of year but some will still be around.

Top veggies to grow in the winter months:

• Broad Beans
  Autumn is a fantastic time to sow broad beans for one it prevents nutrients leaching through fallow soil which would cause the structure of your growing beans to deteriorate.  Numerous other benefits of sowing in the autumn instead of the spring include your crops being ready to eat a month early than spring crop and also they do not suffer from black fly.To ensure that your crops don’t suffer if they grow to tall in the winter and suffer from exposure to winds use canes or sticks and string to secure your plants. Super Aquadulce and Aquadulce Claudia are excellent varieties to plant now.

• Asparagus
  A common myth with Asparagus is that it is a hard crop to grow; this however is not the case as long as you keep your asparagus bed weed free. Asparagus can be planted out and grown during the autumn but do bear in mind it takes two years for this crop to be ready.

• Peas
  A great vegetable that is enjoyed so much more during the winter months! Start sowing the seeds towards the end of October. If you do sow your seeds directly into the ground plant them closely at about one inch apart. Plant in groups of three lines all 12 inches apart which will form thick rows.  To speed up germination put your pea seeds on to a wet kitchen towel and sow when the roots start to develop.
  Remember with this plant it’s not only the peas that you can enjoy….. pea shoots can be added into stir fry’s or salads and are absolutely delicious.

• Garlic
  Quite possibly the easiest autumn vegetable to grow! Firstly plant each individual clove 2.5 inches deep in light soil and a lot closer  to the surface if the soil is heavy (Regardless of your earths density the clove should always be at least one inch below the surface).

• Onions
  Be it red, white, yellow, spring onions or shallots, whichever your preference all can be grown at this time of the year. Electric is a good red set, Radar for yellow and Shakespeare for white. For Shallots try Jermor these can be planted now at the end of autumn or alternatively wait until December or January. Onions are a great crop to grow all year round as they store and preserve so well.

• Lettuce
  Really hardy varieties such as Meraviglia d’Inverno San Martino can be grown during late autumn. Sow your seeds under fleece or a perforated polythene sheet. Once established you will be able to pick leaves through the winter. Winter Gem is also a good variety that can be sown in a cold frame right through the winter until January.

• Spinach
  Riccio d’Asti and Merlo Nero are two varieties that can be sown until the end of October. One great advantage of sowing spinach in the autumn is that it reduces the chance of it bolting.

• Sugar snap peas
  Not commonly thought of for planting at this time of the year. Snow Pea Gigante Svizzero are a variety that will produce a small crop early next year if sown now.

• Spring Cabbage
  Plant each one 12 inches apart and earth up the soil around the stems after they have began to establish themselves in order to help protect them against the cold. In really cold or icy conditions fleece or cloches can help. Thin early plants for spring greens and then leave the rest to heart up.

Check out Jacks garden store for great greenhouses, vegetable boxes and cold frames to grow your winter veg!

Good luck

Gardener Jack