Yes, it’s that time of year again when you begin the work to build your garden for next year. The idea is that over the next couple of months we bring the garden back into shape ready for next year’s growth. Remember this is a staged process so don’t rush out now and chop everything down. Let nature take its course, let leaves fall, stems wilt and sap descend to roots. Cut back too soon and you damage the potential for next years growth. The starting point is always your flower beds. All the annuals should have more or less died back and the perennials are in need of a trim. Needless to say I have been doing all this under a continuous state of siege as I am harried by chickens at every turn. More of this later; on with the gardening.
2nd December 2023. Things I have been doing lately:
Cutting back Canna. If you have followed my instructions – and I am sure you have – you will have left your Canna to wilt and wither to ensure that all the sunshine can be gathered from the dying stems and taken back into the rhizomes (ugly bulbs). The photos below show a selection of my dead and dying cannas. Click on each photo for a larger view.
To be honest it has not been a good year for Cannas they suffered from the lack of rain, so by cutting back now we can hopefully have a better flowering next year. The secret to cutting back Cannas is not to cut them right to the ground. If you do, then you are in danger of letting water and eventually rot get down into the rhizome. Instead cut the stem about 3 to 5 inches from the ground and just leave them. The cut stems will mainly dry off and can be plucked out next year, whilst new stems will grow from other “eyes” in the rhizome. The photos below show some of my cannas cutback. Click on each photo for a larger view.
Clearing Marigolds. By now most of your beds will have been cleared as you will have deadheaded and removed spent plants throughout the summer. You should just be left with stubborn annuals and perennials. I have been selectively saving Marigold seeds over a period of about 10 years so consequently I can have quite large Marigolds flowering all the way from March to December. But now is the time to take out the survivors. The photos below show my by now deshabille Marigolds. But I love them and we always say a prayer of goodbye when it is time for them to go. Click on each photo for a larger view.
Reshaping Osteospermums. These daisy type plants are real garden troopers. They will flower all summer and then put up with the harshest of cutbacks at the end of the season. I generally cut back to new leaf growth at about between 3 to 5 inches using secateurs. But where I have massed plants I quite happily get my garden hedge trimmer out and go at them with a will. The photos below show my overgrown Osteospermums before and after their drastic trim. Click on each photo for a larger view.
The main benefit of cutting back Osteospermums now is that they are prolific self seeders. By cutting back you are letting air and light get to the soil and this will encourage the hundreds of seeds under the plants to begin to come to life. I will begin to see tiny seedlings spring up over the next month or so. I then remove these and pot them up in seed trays ready to plant out in February. In this way I get all the benefits of the self seeding plant, but, I get to put them where I want them.
Weeding around emerging bulbs. Another important reason for clearing your flower beds is that if you have lots of bulbs then you might begin to see the early flowerers beginning to emerge. If you are not a knowledgeable gardener (and I don’t mean you of course), then there is always a danger of cutting off new bulb growth in the mistaken belief they are weeds. To stop this happening you need to get back to old fashioned gardening, get on your knees and hand weed.
New bulbs will often emerge surrounded by grass and other weeds. To differentiate the bulb stems from weeds you just need to take off your gardening gloves and feel the stems. Bulbs stems will be rounded, whilst grass will be in thin flat blades. If the grass is too close to the bulb stem to remove it with your trowel, then just pluck out the blade of grass. Do this weekly and it will eventually kill off the grass, or at least keep it at bay until the bulb growth can shade it out. The photos below show my poor bulbs surrounded by grass, then how to differentiate between the two, and finally the resulting weeded area. Click on each photo for a larger view.
Keeping my chicken defences up. Regular readers will know that I have had to erect small mesh fences around my flower beds to stop Cruella’s (my wife) chickens from marauding through them and digging up plants. I will be honest with you it has been very stressful working on the flower beds. It is like being a dying man watched by vultures. They have hung around me, watching and waiting for any gap in my defences. The photos below show my finished flower beds and the problems I have faced. If you look carefully in the photos you can see lurking chickens. The last photo shows Big Bertha brazenly eyeing up the newly weeded flower beds. When I protested to Cruella she said “what’s the matter with you she’s only looking”. Click on each photo for a larger view.
Cruella invents a chicken heroine. The whole flower bed issue was so stressful that I complained to Cruella that her chickens should be kept in their coop and not allowed the run of the garden. Cruella flew into a rage denouncing me and the Patriarchy saying that I have male privilege and that she and her girls are oppressed. She stormed off shouting that “the counter culture fight back starts here”.
Anyway, the outcome is that she has invented a chicken heroine and is writing a self help “chicken power manifesto” along with a positively reinforcing novel for her girls. The heroine in her novel is called “Clara Cluckles” who although born in a lowly chicken coop, eventually rises up against the patriarchy , becomes a super heroine and performs a series of vengeful liberating acts against male privilege using her super powers. It appears that the arch villain in the novel is an evil gardener called ““Malevelo”. When I complained to Cruella. That this was demonising gardeners and smacked of cultural appropriation, she called me a privileged Prat and swore at me in chickenese (at least I think she did).
Since Cruella issued her Chicken Manifesto things have moved very fast. She has made herself a Clara Cluckles costume so that her girls can visualise the struggle. She has written to Disney floating the idea of a film to be called “The Eggventures of Clara Cluckles”. She has also suggested a Theme Park ride to be the main attraction in “Cluckles World”. She is making all her girls Clara costumes for Christmas and reads them the Eggventures of Clara Cluckles every night before bed. Unfortunately you won’t be able to buy it in the shops yet as the first edition is only in Chickenese. The photos below show Cruella in her Clara costume and the chickens lining up for their evening story. Click on each photo for a larger view.
Spanish Garden 
The Canna are just beginning to die back. Do you grow banana trees or any of the gingers?
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Hi Tony, Lots of people around the Costs Blanca have banana trees, but I don’t personally as they look a bit messy. As to gingers, what would they look like?
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Gingers, at least the popular sorts, may be known as Hydechium or Alpinia, or perhaps Zingiber. Some resemble Canna, but with more ribbony and fragrant flowers. My colleague in Southern California also reminded me that banana trees are sloppy. I still grow them, but of course, they really are . . . not very neat.
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