The Growing Edge – November 2015

This Month's Featured Trees

This month's featured trees are both trees that can be used for their decorative ornamental foliage in the garden. They are both medium sized trees that have decent growth rates and are something a little out of the ordinary.

Carpinus betulus fastigiata
Upright Hornbeam
This is a beautifully formed, upright, dense tree. It is usually used as screening or hedging plant but can be a feature tree in gardens or avenues where space is limited.
The Upright Hornbeam has a mature height of 10 metres with a width of 6 metres.
The Upright Hornbeam is narrow when young, becoming vase shaped to oval with maturity.
It's foliage is mid-green in summer and the autumn colour is golden-yellow to yellowish-green.

It has a wide range of tolerances including air pollution, low levels of drought and part shade. The Upright Hornbeam prefers well drained, moist soil and full sun.

Fraxinus americana
Autumn Applause 

A superior form of White Ash, the Autumn Applause is ideal where a dense, symmetrical tree with good autumn foliage colour is required. This is a superb, easily maintained specimen or shade tree with pinnate leaves that are slightly pendulous imparting a lovely drooping effect.
It has a mature height of 8 -11 metres and width of 8 metres.
The Autumn Applause has a moderate growth rate and a broadly oval form.
The Autumn Applause has dark green on the upper surfaces, paler on the undersides during summer while it's Autumn colour varies from brilliant purplish-reds to light mahogany. The leaves can turn very dark before the autumn colour.
The Autumn Applause is tolerant of a range of soil types, but prefers a moist, well drained soil.

Mulch – Different types and their uses

Mulching is an important part of any garden, whether it is new or well established. Mulching helps to suppress weeds, maintain soil temperature and in many cases can provide additional nutrients to the plants and benefit soil structure.

The main varieties are:
Leaf Mulch / Leaf Mould
Dropped leaves that have been allowed to rot. Adds to soil structure and ideal for vegetable gardens
Pea Straw
High in minerals, trace elements and nitrogen. Great for plants that are heavy feeder but a pain to use in windy areas
Bark and wood chips
Breaks down slowly and is easy to apply. Ideal for established beds or around trees
Landscape Fabric
Allows water penetration but does not benefit the soil. Ideal for areas where clean plants are required eg. strawberries
Compost
Well rotted organic matter that provides many benefits to the soil. Makes for great water retention which means you need to water less
Newspaper
Very effective for water retention and weed suppression. Newspaper is very easy to apply but needs to be weighed down by an additional type of mulch such as bark chips.

Pebbles / Rock

Very easy to apply and helps keep the ground warm in winter and cool in summer. Does not degrade like other mulches but does have a tendency to slowly sink into the soil making later cultivation difficult

What's Been Happening On The Farm
Winter is well and truly over and we have all been busy out in the nursery potting up stock to take advantage of the full growing season. A major component of this is potting up our field grown stock so that the super advanced trees are available to our customers all year round. The nursery is now spotted with large trees in 150L bags ready to go into a garden and provide some instant shade.

What's Looking Great

The Golden Robinias have busted out in bright buttery foliage and are starting the get white racemes of pea-like flowers along their branches which will provide a subtle but effective floral display over the next couple of months

The Cottages

Spring is a wonderful time to come out to the country to see some native flowers and wildlife in the nature reserves and parklands. This month we are offering a third night for free when two nights are booked in one of our cottages.