Autumn in The Garden House

Posted:15 September 2016

Aside from all the nagging must-do’s in your garden – planting spring cabbages, pruning rambling roses, deadheading dahlias and the like! – there are lots of upcoming Garden House activities to get you into the Autumn gardening spirit.

 

On Friday 23 September, expert Charles Dowding joins us for an afternoon talk entitled Charles Dowding’s ‘No Dig’ Methods when Charles will tell us how to manage our gardens by doing less weeding, less watering and still getting great harvests by adopting a ‘no dig’ approach.

Charles created his first ‘no dig’ garden 34 years ago – four acres of famously productive, weed free and early cropping plantings. He was invited to appear on Gardeners World in 1988 talking with Geoff Hamilton about his innovative methods. Interestingly Geoff barely mentioned ‘no dig’ thinking, concentrating more on Charles’ organic ideas. In the 1980s, organic gardening and farming were still ‘new’ and seemed revolutionary, more as an avoidance of synthetic chemicals than about healthy soil. For Charles, both organic and no dig are natural approaches – now with more interest in soil and soil life, ‘no dig’ has been propelled to a more prominent place in gardening.

Our 8-session Plantsmanship Course starts 22 September and we’ve designed this course for all plant enthusiasts, keen gardeners and professional horticulturalists  to improve your plant knowledge, to look more closely at plants, how they grow and where they thrive.

As with all Garden House course and workshops we aim to create a relaxed and friendly atmosphere with plenty of time for questions and answers and for students to develop their own interests.

 

Are you a Dahlia fan? In which case join us on 24 September for our Garden House Visit to Dahlia Specialists Withypitts Nursery in Turners Hill, West Sussex – specialists in growing and showing top quality, specimen Dahlias.

We will be shown around by Richard Ramsey, Member of the National Dahlia Society, and who says of himself: “Dahlias are in the blood!” The blooms should be at their best in September, and Richard has promised to tell us about the different types of this spectacular and popular flowering plant, their care and propagation.

For more info and to see all our other events check out our DIARY.  As well as the above,  kicking off in September, we have: A Celebration of the Seasons; 6-session Design Your Own Garden Course and our 8-session Gardening From Scratch Course   and many more!