Five minute hanging basket how-to
Hello friends!
Boiling hot sunny weather has meant that most of my gardening time has been taken up with watering and feeling disinclined to tackle anything that involves moving about too much. But I did manage to accomplish something I've been meaning to do for weeks - namely my hanging basket (or green chandelier as I prefer to call it). Details below and have a beautiful weekend all!
Monday
Boiling hot day. I move slowly about, pulling at the odd weed and fretting a bit about things that are wilting. Generally I don't water the garden itself. When I plant things, I'm quite careful to water thoroughly and deeply and regularly for the first few weeks. If, after that, the thing hasn't put down sufficient roots to survive a bit of heat, then I start to wonder whether it should be there in the first place. This is the case with a random pink hydrangea (which, by the way, I'm not actually that keen on). I water it deeply with a slow steady trickle from the hose over many hours and it revives, but I can feel in my bones that its days are numbered.
Tuesday
Boiling hot day. I spend all the spare time I have doing boring admin work, and working out a strategy to shade my glass box extension cheaply. It was an enormous mistake to believe the people who told us that because we were north facing we wouldn't need shading for this BOILING HOT LIVING SPACE. Add to this the fact that we were also persuaded to have glass beams (at vast expense) and you have a scenario where not only are we kicking ourselves that we made the mistake of not including some sort of shading when we built the thing, but putting any in is now a nightmare because there is nothing onto which one may attach a track or nail or hook of any sort. Instead I am resorting to planning something involving self adhesive velcro and plain black muslin. Oh. The. Glamour. No gardening.
Wednesday
Boiling hot day. I water the pots and the hydrangea and some of my anemone x hybrida which are showing signs of wilt, and I deadhead the roses which have all gone brown and crispy, and I watch as my lawn turns brown.
Thursday
Boiling hot day. I make a hanging basket, lining it with hessian which I had bought in an attempt to shade my BOILING HOT GLASS EXTENSION but in the end I couldn't use it for that because it was too heavy. This hessian is great for out-of-use hanging baskets whose inner bits have become damaged or rotted away. A simple, cheap solution always makes me a bit smug and happy. I have an extremely fulfilling five minutes making my hanging basket, into which I put several rather tatty specimens of Dichondra 'Silver Falls' that I find languishing in my local garden centre, and a random Osmunda regalis which was gifted to me by Butter Wakefield, who, by the way is our guest on episode 5 of The Virgin Gardener Podcast. It's an episode full of excellent tips and advice and LOADS of plant suggestions for every situation and I urge you to give it a listen if you have the time. You can find it here.
Friday
Boiling hot day. I go out for five minutes with my secateurs and start chopping at the lychnis coronaria, which is going over and of which I can now safely say there is TOO MUCH in the garden. This gives me the marvellous opportunity to experiment with chopping it, both to stop it self-seeding, and to rejuvenate it, and see if it comes back. I do three experiments; the first is to chop it right back to the base almost, chopping each stem just above new growth. It looks really awful as the leaves at ground level are a hideous, pale brown, and all flabby to boot. I give it a good water and turn to my next victim. This one I chop about a third from the top, again making sure that I cut each stem to just above a bit of new growth. This take longer than I'd like so I decide to chop a third in the same way, but this time without cutting individual stems. Instead I go in with my shears and just slash through it, again, about a third of the way down. Copious watering ensues and I'll share the results (if any) when they come. I also pull out lots of dusty old bits of forgemenot, which could easily stay where they are but which upset me with their greyness. This would be a great time (once watered) to mulch the border but I don't have any mulch, because my compost bin had an upset (and read a couple of newsletters back for details on this).
A hanging basket
There is one rule with this: GO BIG OR GO HOME
Small hanging baskets are just simply bad news. They look mean and silly, and they require a ridiculous amount of care in the form of watering. Don't go there.
My baskets (I have two) are 45cm diameter and I'd have bigger ones if I thought my tree could support the weight.
Support is a massive issue here. These things get heavy and whatever is holding them up obviously has to be fit for purpose. I hang mine on a branch close to the centre of my apple tree.
Plant wise - hanging baskets are traditionally filled to the brim with soft, sappy plants that you know are there only for the season (eg petunias) but I'm a lazy sort, and if I can plant something that'll last for more than that, then I'll do it. For years I had hanging baskets full of hellebores and trailing nepeta (both perennial/evergreen. You won't get the wow factor of a tumbling cascade but it's a very beautiful, minimal alternative and much less work overall.
You need:
A hanging basket with lining. If you don't have a lining then fashion one with hessian (very cheap from fabric shops) and a plastic bag.
Multi-purpose compost
water-retaining granules
Plants - up to you but remember that you'll be planting rather more closely because you want volume, and fast.
Method:
Here's a quick tutorial on how to line your basket:
First, roughly cut a piece of hessian to fit the inside of the basket
Then roughly cut a pice of old plastic to fit inside the hessian.
Chop several small holes into this plastic
...and add some drainage (old polystyrene packaging is great here as it is weightless.
Stand the whole thing on an empty flower pot to keep it from rolling around.
Fill with compost that you've mixed with water-retaining granules (read the instructions on the packet). The extra effort involved in this step is worth it...your basket will stay moist for much longer.
Water and wait, because the granules will expand. And if you've done the hessian/plastic thing, then trim it now, tucking the hessian inwards over the ugly plastic to hide it.
After about 30 mins plant your plants, tucking them in at an angle, around the edge. Don't worry too much about the middle...you won't see it.
Water, leave to drain and hang.
Hope you all have a cool weekend my wonderful email people. Do hit reply and ask (or tell) me anything.. I love our chats
All the good things as always
x Laetitia
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