Find out what the garden and propagation teams have been up to this week.
Weekly catch up with gardens & propagation
POSTED 26th April 2025
Garden Team
With the recent warm weather and light rain, weeds have started growing faster than usual, especially in the Gravel Garden. Even though we finished the winter cutback and weeding there in late February, we're already back at it. At this time of year, the challenge is spotting tiny seedlings and deciding whether they’re weeds or plants we actually want.
It's easy to overlook the fact that we've weeded the gravel as weeds are barely noticeable until you take a closer look, but it's an important task - if left too long, the ephemeral weeds will flower and seed, while taproot weeds become much harder to dig out.
At a glance, the seedlings of plants like Silene coronaria and Verbascum bombyciferum look very similar and can be a bit confusing.While the seedlings of these plants look very different when placed side by side, both having silvery foliage can make it hard to differentiate them until they develop more distinct characteristics.
When mature, Verbascum bombyciferum is tall plant with a tap root, large silver leaves, and a bright yellow flower spike. It produces a lot of seed, so we usually pull most of them out.
On the other hand, Silene coronaria forms clumps of silver leaves and has pink or white flowers. We allow it to self seed next to existing clumps.
We also spent a day over at Chattowood doing some spring maintenance, mostly weeding but a bit of cutting back here and there too.
Propagation Team
It's been a week of fickle weather, but with the warm and wet, our world over in propagation has burst into life. There's such a variety of plants all charging down with their roots and up with their shoots, and we can't wait to share them with you all over the coming weeks!
This week Sean has been flexing his muscles in his Crocodile Dundee hat by lifting Crinum x powelli and its 'Album' variant. They are huge! Sean expressed, it was to date the hardest plant he's had to dig up. These swamp lillies are bulbous and leafy, will thrive in containers or by warm walls in rich and fertile soil, and will reward you with great trumpet flowers in late summer!
Rob and Hollie have been busying themselves in our tunnels, releasing a broad range of plants which are now available for sale. Hollie, with her passion for shade loving plants, was exceptionally excited to send a selection of polygonatum and uvularia on their way, including: Polygonatum verticillatum, P. hirtum, P. x hybridum 'Striatum', Uvularia perfoliata, and Uvularia grandiflora var. pallida.
Rob has been focusing on cutting back those rooting plants which we wish to display a nice compact shape, but were starting to look like basketball players! A bit of encouragement with the snips should help them find that form.
Debs has been hard at work on the cuttings bench, starting off a plethora of different plants including two varieties of Veronicastrum virginicum (Album and Erica). The whole team has been going like the clappers, from Tina creating plant collections, Mel and Kathy (who could give Bill and Ben a run for their money as they've been up to their heads in pots), to Pete and Annie in the pack house securing your orders with care as they depart for their new homes.
A quick final word for Sol and Callum who have been with us the last few weeks, helping in both the packing department and on the stockbeds, whilst on a break from university. Their help has been wonderful, but for now it's goodbye whilst they complete their university exams. Best of luck, guys! We look forward to welcoming you back soon.
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