Meetings are held in St George's Hall, Gloucester Road, Sparrows Green. - unless otherwise stated
Tea coffee and chatter are available from 19:00 - 19:30 and formal business begins at 19:30
Membership costs only £6 a year

Chairman:  Jean Lavender 782 962
Secretary: Eileen Ramm 785 898
Treasurer: M Wisden 782673

WADHURST GARDENING ASSOCIATION  - SPRING SHOW 2 APRIL 2012

Report on -- AMBER: A WINDOW ON THE PAST

Our November speaker was John Cooper, a geologist at the Booth Museum in Brighton, who gave us a fascinating insight into amber.
When a tree like pine is injured, it will produce a resin to heal itself. I expect most of us have experienced this particularly this time of year on buying a real Christmas tree and grabbing its base. Amber is formed when this liquid resin has fallen to the ground and then been covered over so that light and air are excluded. It takes millions of years, but the resin hardens into amber. Small insects might have got trapped in it - the larger ones generally got away.
There is no colour to amber, except when it is dug up and then exposed to light and air and it generally darkens to yellowy orange, and in fact will go reddish with time.
It is easy to fake amber with modern resins, but if you have some and are curious then you could take a heated needle (on a bit that won't be seen) and stick it in - it should smell of pine.
Wish I had some to experiment with - sadly, I have not! Eileen

REPORT OF SPRING SHOW 2 April 2012

This year’s Spring Show for Wadhurst Gardening Association members was held as usual in the Primary School.  Members had filled the hall with a wealth of colourful and scented blooms from which, our judge Mr David Pilbeam, was hard-pressed to select the winning entries.  The drought does not seem to have affected the spring bulbs and the lack of wind and rain meant that the blooms were of very high quality.The overall standard was high and with the number of entries up competition was keen.  This year in place of a flower arrangement members were asked to produce a mosaic of flowers.  The resulting entries were exquisite arrangements of tiny flower heads and the winning entry incorporated the words ‘Happy Easter’ spelt out in flowers. Our worthy cup winners were Kathy Cooper (Blackman Coronation Cup), Rhonda Oldershaw (The Rev. Emery Cup) and Jean Lavender (Clowes Pritchard Cup).

Mar 2012 Meeting

We were educated and entertained by our own Ken Turner this month on the problems and delights of growing in containers.  With the hosepipe ban in mind, he reminded us of lessons learned from the 2006 drought.  Here are a few bites from his talk:  Clay pots are porous so need more watering than plastic ones.  There is a solution - put bubble wrap around the inside edges of the pot before planting it up.  This will reduce evaporation and also insulate over the winter, if you leave them out.  But you must protect your pots over the winter if you keep them outside by covering with straw or fleece, etc - if your compost freezes hard, as it might have done this past winter, then the plant is lost.  Wooden pots have that natural look and are better at insulating.  Pots made in Mediterranean countries are more frost resistant as the clay itself is less porous.  Compost alone is not enough for your pots, you need good loam (garden soil) and your pots need feeding especially during the growing season.  He recommends Vitax Q4. 

When watering, ensure the water gets to the roots and does not run off the top.  To achieve this you could insert a small piece of hosepipe with holes put in that goes right to the bottom of the plant - but leave enough out of the top to water it from.  Or a plastic bottle cut in half and inverted towards the roots also works. 

For hanging baskets, a reservoir at the bottom (be it a small tea plate or a built-in reservoir pot) which prevents the plants from totally drying out is good.  There are lots of types of liners to use - cocoa matting or coir is a good alternative to plain moss and you can put your holes in for side planting.  Good plants for flowers all summer are Petunia 'Pink Ice' or Pelargonium 'Silke' - these produce masses of single flowers (better for bees than double) and no tedious dead-heading is needed.  Begonias, nasturtiums and calibrachoa are also good.  The old Busy Lizzie is out due to European mildew.   Think about growing veg in pots  - the flowers are good and so is the eating - tumbling tomatoes or climbing courgettes or dwarf runner beans are good.  Feed them well, once a week during the summer, and they in turn will feed you!

Feb 2012 Meeting

He arrived in a pair of jeans with a pile of sticks and some cutters.  John Waller -  'The Woodman' - was how he described himself.  I love the woods, and anything made of wood, so that got my interest right up.  With his practiced skill of working with willow, and a very deft touch, he wove more than  magic in the centre of the hall.  Out of a pile of willow grew a sturdy and beautifully crafted obelisk.  He explained, as he created, that he worked at Bore Place in Chiddingstone and was 'doing his thing to complement other projects' out there.  Bore Place is a fascinating organic farm and study centre with lots going on - look it up.   The woodlands at Boar Place need to pay for themselves, and his bit was to grow and cut willow, demonstrate the art of weaving it, and sell the product.  Willow can grow up to 10 feet in one year - he says in summer you can hear it growing!  A fascinating talk.  Next month we have another in the form of our own Ken Turner, showing us how to get the best out of window boxes and containers.  Come and join us - Monday 12th March at 7.30 at St. George's Hall.  Open to all interested in gardening

SUMMER SHOW                                                              FISH AND CHIPS

JUNE MEETING

'Medicinal Plants' - a talk given to the Wadhurst Gardening Association by Caroline Jackson

Piles of green branches, plants and leaves of every type and size,  on tables at the front of the Hall.    Static and lifeless.  Yet one by one, with the addition of the remarkable horticultural knowledge of Caroline Jackson, this pile of greenery came alive in its relevance to our everyday lives.  No slides, no reading from notes, no diagrams or assistance.   Bits of greenery were passed around, and with the aids of touch and smell the power of the plants was revealed.  The good ones, the bad ones, and the downright ugly ones.  I was amazed by Caroline, but equally amazed at the knowledge our members had.  They  KNEW STUFF, a great deal of stuff, about that plant, what it was called, what we used it for today, what it was used for down the ages.  Plants are our tools and have been since time began.  There were no bottles of aspirin to reach for for pain relief, but there WAS the willow tree.  There were no bottles of Dettol to reach for in a crisis, but there was thyme, sage and lavender to use as antibacterials.  Likewise, if you were minded to poison your foe, the right plants would oblige!  It's all out there, quite a lot of it in our own back gardens.  Never underestimate the power of the plants.  Thank you, Caroline Jackson, for educating and entertaining us that evening

MAY MEETING

Last Monday 9th May Dr. Peter Brandham, botanist from Kew Gardens, came to speak to us.  I saw him waiting in the wings to start, with a pile of slides at the ready and thought 'Oh NO!  Another 50 slides coming up!   (I have a very low boredom threshold).  But after the first ten, I forgot I was sitting in St. George's Hall.  Instead, I was with him and his team on a 50-mile trek thru northeast South America in search of new species of plants.  Fancy being abandoned after an arduous boat trip in the middle of a steaming hot rainforest, totally uninhabitated.  No mobile phone masts, no emergency services, no 'One-Stop's' if you run out of food or have an accident?  And what about your hair in all this humidity??? They had to hack a path thru to a mountainous area they suspected had unknown varieties of ferns, pineapples, orchids, pitcher plants and sundews.  They found them, and brought them back to their base camp, but then had a harrowing few days waiting for the small boat to show up and bring them back to civilisation - the boat was late, would it ever turn up, would they just die there?  Of course they made it, otherwise no appearance last Monday!  The new plants are back at Kew, most of them growing and adding to the seed bank of the world's plant species.  Who knows that in the future one of these plants could be a new cure for cancer, Alzheimer's, or a natural remedy for eczema, for instance?  I left the hall full of admiration for Dr. Brandham and people like him .

Next month:  Monday June 13th at St. George's Hall, 7.30 pm - MEDICINAL PLANTS by Caroline Jackson.  COME ALONG!  Non-members most welcome.

Spring Show

This year’s Spring Show for Wadhurst Gardening Association members provided a wealth of colourful and scented blooms on display.  The overall standard was high and with the number of entries up competition was keen.  There were two new classes added to the schedule: one for a dish of hellebore heads floating in water and the other for a decorated hat for Easter.  The latter offered scope for innovation and both new classes added colour and interest to the show.  Our worthy cup winners were P. Maynard (Blackman Coronation Cup), R. Lavender (The Rev. Emery Cup) and J. Lavender (Clowes Pritchard Cup).

We had some fun with a quiz prepared by our member Carolyn Sanders.  See if you can identify the following flowers from these clues:

We were entertained and informed by Julia Jarman on 14th March with her talk on 'Twelve Months of Interest' in the garden.  She showed us numerous slides of gorgeous plants and knew the species and names of them all.  My head was spinning at the end of it, the room was dark and I was unable to write down any details.  However, from memory, next March go for winter-flowering cyclamen under hedges and trees (but plant them in the autumn), go for coloured wood like Cornus alba (but there are yellows and whites out there too), winter jasmine, Hellebores, and interesting foliage plants.  Why not treat yourself to a gardening book that specialises in winter plants.  Or come along to any of our monthly meetings when good second-hand gardening books are on sale for £1 or less.  Our next meeting is the Spring Show on 4th April at 7.30 at the Primary School.

Roger Platts, Chelsea Flower Show gold medal winner in 2010, kept 60 of our members totally engrossed at our February meeting.  You would think that running a design and horticultural business in Edenbridge would leave him no time to go out on a rainy and cold winter's night to talk to us, but he did and for this we are grateful.  He took us through all the steps involved in showing at Chelsea - signing contracts, getting sponsors and contractors and getting it right - on paper - before you can even think of the plants.  He actually grew all the plants himself at his nursery, which is  quite rare, only buying in the big things like trees.   Some hints from him for our own gardens?  Do the practical and hard landscaping first - the paths, the patio, the shed, the pond, the summer house.  The heavier the structures involved, the bigger the plants you need as the 'bare bones' of your garden.  Try to plan your garden so that you are not able to see it all in one glance.

One interesting fact about Chelsea that I had not realised is that all of the plants used have to naturally survive in the area planted as if they were going to be there for all time.  For instance, you could not fill up a shady corner in a Chelsea show garden with sunflowers (thinking oh well, they will survive the 6 days of the show) because the choice of plants in conjunction with their position of light, water, etc is part of the criteria you will be judged on. 

Roger spent six days on his knees, putting the plants in, at Chelsea.  An extremely talented yet humble man - the sort of man you would like sitting next to you on a long train journey. 

  On 10th January our own member Ken Turner gave a talk on 'Patio Gardening'.  Here are some of the helpful tips he passed on to those of us who grow vegetables or flowers in containers:

• Make sure the container you buy has drainage holes, if not put them in yourself.
• For hanging baskets, use a decent liner but also put an old saucer in the bottom to collect water for the plant to use later.
• Growbags can be ugly, so why not put a few annuals on the edges of whatever else you are growing. 
• 'Living Walls' of containers can brighten up an ugly garage wall - but need decent support.
• Compost quality is vital in pots, the best is if you mix John Innes into your compost.
• The dwarf runner bean Hestia is a good one for growing in pots, nice flowers and lots of beans.
• Some clematis are good in pots, Guernsey Cream is one of the best.
• You must be prepared to water frequently when its hot, or set up a clocked watering system.
• Plastic pots require less watering than clay ones and have improved in appearance.
• Cretan pots (from Crete) withstand cold winters without cracking.
  
  A big thanks to Ken - I can feel myself itching to buy a new pot already!      
  

On December 13th members of the WGA were entertained by Jane Spurr and Michael Harte with humour, song, and excellent piano playing.  Their pieces included 'Spread a Little Happiness' (which they did!), 'Foggy Dew', 'The Cuckoo' (which involved quite a lot of standing up and sitting down by Jane), and 'The Weather' by Flanders and Swann.  Members themselves were called upon for carol singing, and I especially remember 'I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas', sung lustily and with either fear or anticipation that it could well be very 'white' this year!

Our next meeting will be on Monday 10th January at St. George's Hall at 7.30 pm.  The competition of the night is a 'Pair of Root Vegetables' and 'A Spray of a Shrub showing winter interest'.   Ken Turner will be speaking on 'Patio Gardening'.  We would welcome anyone interested in joining us or re-joining us to come along.

On November 8th WGA members very much enjoyed a talk with accompanying slides given by Ian Currie, who is a Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society.  Mr Currie's subject was "Frosts, Freezes and Fairs" and he gave detailed descriptions of Frost Fairs on the Thames in the 17th and 18th centuries, with incredible statistics on weather and temperatures in England over several centuries.  The Frost Fairs were great centres of entertainment, but once the old London Bridge was demolished and the new one built with only a few arches, the flow of the Thames increased so much that, in spite of freezing temperatures, the ice floes could not build up in the same way.  We were shown some fascinating old prints of London, the frost fairs, and photographs taken in the 19th and 20th centuries of the vagaries of English winters. The Annual General Meeting preceded the talk.

The Wadhurst Gardening Association members enjoyed a very interesting and amusing talk by Dr Simon Charlesworth from Downderry Nurseries near Hadlow entitled "A World of Lavender" on October 11th.  There are over 350 different lavenders grown mainly in France, also in central and southern Europe, North Africa, and in Somalia, Oman and the Yemen.   Generally lavender enjoys sun and poor soil and can withstand intense cold but not wet winters.   There are colours ranging from white and pale blue, dark blue and pink to dark green.  It has many health-giving properties, is used to flavour sugar, puddings etc., the milder flowers provide scented oil and perfumes and the more intense lavenders are used in soaps, detergents and polishes.

 Autumn Show

©M Flegg

WADHURST GARDENING ASSOCIATION SUMMER SHOW RESULTS.

In spite of the Wadhurst Gardeners saying it is either too cold, too wet or, on this occasion, too hot and dry, they still managed to produce as always an excellent display for their Summer Show.  Presentations of the Cups were made by the President Mr. Jim Cooper, and one particular member, Mr Jim Overy, was surprised and delighted to be presented with the Sharp Cup for a vase of Sweet Peas.  The Presentation was followed by a snack buffet.  Towards the end of the evening members enjoyed a display of their Committee Members’ photographs when they were young.  The brain teaser was trying to fit the photos to the right Committee Member.  Fun was had by all, particularly as there was a joker in the pack.

CUP WINNERS:-
SHARP CUP – One vase of Sweet Peas   Mr Jim Overy

COURTHOPE CUP -  Vase 3 large (HT) or cluster flowered (floribunda) Roses: Rosemary Lavender
DRUMMOND CUP - An exhibit in which Sweet Peas predominate: Jean Lavender
SERJEANT ROSE BOWL - Collection of mixed herbaceous perennials: Kay Barden

OTHER RESULTS:-

One vase of Sweet Peas - 2nd Kay Harden. 3rd Kath Cooper.
Vase 3 large (HT) or cluster flowered (floribunda)Roses - one entry only as above.
A stem of any other variety of Rose - 1st Rosemary Collins. 2nd Rosemary Lavender.  3rd Mary Terry.
A dish of 10 fruits - 1st Rosemary Lavender. 2nd Rosemary Collins. 3rd Carolyn Sanders.
One specimen Rose - 1st Kathy Cooper. 2nd Inyca Humphreys. 3rd Kay Barden.
One scented Rose - 1st Sue Petrie. 2nd Kay Barden. 3rd Kathy Cooper.
A summer vegetable - (as listed) 1st Colin Maynard. 2nd Sue Petrie. 3rd Kay Barden.
Collection of vegetables/fruit in a small trug. - 1st Sue Petrie. 2nd Jean Lavender.
Exhibit in which Sweet Peas predominate - 2nd Carolyn Sanders. 3rd Mary Terry.
Patio Pot of Summer Flowers - 1st Jean Lavender. 2   Mary Terry. 3rd Rosemary Lavender.
Collection mixed herbaceous perennials - 2nd Jean Lavender. 3rd Rosemary Collins.
One Hydrangea head - 1st Rosemary Collins. 2nd Kay Bardin.
A flowering Pot Plant - 1st Rosemary Lavender. 2nd Nan Fuggle. 3rd Jean Lavender.
A Chocolate Cake (not sponge) - 1st Mrs P. Maynard. 2nd Janet Overy. 3rd Jean Lavender.

Gardeners' Question Time report   [photos © Michael Flegg]