Gardening tips: plant sun-loving ceanothus

Then visit a new children’s garden at Kew and harden off bedding plants

Plant this Blue doesn’t come more dazzling than the Californian lilac (ceanothus). Spring-flowering members of this clan of sun-loving shrubs flourish when trained against a sheltered wall: try the evergreen C. ‘Concha’ or ‘Puget Blue’. The more compact ‘Skylark’ will do well in a mixed border.

Visit this A new garden designed for children opens today at Kew Gardens, London. The space covers the equivalent of 40 tennis courts and includes an aerial walkway around an ancient oak, splash pools fed by water pumps children can control, a giant log scramble and more than 100 mature trees.

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from Property | The Guardian http://bit.ly/2WKSDi9
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Scented pelargoniums – blooming perfect for patios

These delicate plants can smell of rose, coconut, cedar and more. One head gardener shares tips from her 25-year-old collection

On open days at Offham House in Lewes, East Sussex, the greenhouse is a sea of competing scents: mint, rose, citrus and spice. “Most of the time it smells perfectly lovely,” says head gardener Jo Crispin. “And on open days we encourage visitors to rub the leaves of the scented pelargoniums, to find their favourites so they can buy cuttings to take home. They are constantly brushing past them as they walk around, too.” Crushing and brushing releases the essential oils that are held in these plants’ leaves and allows clouds of scent to rise.

Scented pelargoniums (often known as scented geraniums) are distinct from bedding pelargoniums, their gaudier, bolder relatives, commonly seen flowering from hanging baskets and window boxes all summer long. The scented types are descended from species that use strong scent to see off grazing animals and draw in pollinating insects. Those descended from Pelargonium cordifolium give off a scent of apple; those from P. crispum smell citrussy; and there are species with cinnamon, coconut, hazelnut, ginger, camphor, balsam, peach, pineapple, myrrh and rose scents. All can be used to flavour food. Eighteenth‑century breeders crossed these plants and selected the most interesting and clearest scents that arose – hence the great number of varieties and scents now available.

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How to reuse old compost | Alys Fowler

If you can happily dig around in it, go ahead and recycle it for another planting

It’s time to attend to the pots in your life, particularly those that contain half-dead (or completely dead) remains.

It is entirely possible to reuse old compost: the books tell you not to, but they are assuming you have money to spare/a car/easy access to a garden centre. Certainly, if the plant died from disease or soil pests such as vine weevil, then the compost is best sent elsewhere. But if it just looks very tired, use it as mulch. Bang out the compost from around the roots and use this on top of other pots or plants in the garden. It’s not going to have a great nutrient content, but it will suppress a few weeds and lock in moisture.

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'A terrible shock': council hands flat owner £146,000 bill

Nurse faces losing his property after council demands gigantic sum for refurbishment of block

How would you feel if a council bill for £146,000 landed on your doormat?

This monster demand – for £146,257, to be precise – was sent to Lloyd Onuoha, a 62-year-old nurse, by Southwark council in London.

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Five top tips for taking the best photographs to sell or let a home Nottingham Estate Agents

Hennings Moir Estate Agents reveal how best to prepare a property to guarantee the all-important photographs Whether you are taking photographs of your home for a property website or a property brochure, it’s important to remember that these images could mean the difference between a potential buyer or tenant booking a viewing, or deciding against […]

The post Five top tips for taking the best photographs to sell or let a home appeared first on OnTheMarket.com blog.

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Let’s move to Hertford: if it’s cool enough for George Ezra…

A picturesque commuter town (with a fine collection of toothbrushes)

What’s going for it? Hertford is a gentle place of small pleasures, like its greatest son George Ezra. Everyone fancies a bit of George – even if it is just singing karaoke drunk at a ’Spoons on a Friday night. Likewise, only the harshest of hearts could savage Hertford. It might not be where you want your life to end up, but there are worse places. Its grand Saxon street pattern sprawled across the confluence of four rivers, its castle grounds and handsome centre of Georgian townhouses draped in creepers, and half-timbered salmon-pink cottages, speak of a time when Hertford was a big kahuna. Local lore even suggests this is the burial place of the Holy Grail, lurking somewhere in mysterious tunnels beneath the streets.

These days, though, Hertford is comfortable with a more sedate lot in life, a picturesque commuter town for those priced out of Edmonton. The museum has the largest collection of toothbrushes in the country (plucked from the Addis factory when it closed). Enjoying a pint on the riverside terrace at the Woolpack; small pleasures. That’s not to say Hertford can’t cut some rug when it wants to. Look at the 1970s theatre and arts centre, poised for reinvention by zippy architects Carmody Groarke, as avant garde as anything one could find in, ooh, St Albans.

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Let’s move to Hertford: if it’s cool enough for George Ezra…

A picturesque commuter town (with a fine collection of toothbrushes)

What’s going for it? Hertford is a gentle place of small pleasures, like its greatest son George Ezra. Everyone fancies a bit of George – even if it is just singing karaoke drunk at a ’Spoons on a Friday night. Likewise, only the harshest of hearts could savage Hertford. It might not be where you want your life to end up, but there are worse places. Its grand Saxon street pattern sprawled across the confluence of four rivers, its castle grounds and handsome centre of Georgian townhouses draped in creepers, and half-timbered salmon-pink cottages, speak of a time when Hertford was a big kahuna. Local lore even suggests this is the burial place of the Holy Grail, lurking somewhere in mysterious tunnels beneath the streets.

These days, though, Hertford is comfortable with a more sedate lot in life, a picturesque commuter town for those priced out of Edmonton. The museum has the largest collection of toothbrushes in the country (plucked from the Addis factory when it closed). Enjoying a pint on the riverside terrace at the Woolpack; small pleasures. That’s not to say Hertford can’t cut some rug when it wants to. Look at the 1970s theatre and arts centre, poised for reinvention by zippy architects Carmody Groarke, as avant garde as anything one could find in, ooh, St Albans.

Continue reading...

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