Here We Go Gathering 'Nuts' in May!

 

 Goodness me – it’s that time of year again! Spring has crept up on us and pounced. We have been freezing cold since Christmas and my garden, on top of a hill, has been in a snit – refusing to pop out a bud or waggle a leaf while Jack Frost is still stalking the avenue. Then, without a ‘by-your-leave’, warm gusts from the Continent have turned us positively tropical and spring has sprung all over. Thomas Carlyle knew what he was talking about when he wrote:

Long stormy spring-time, wet contentious April, winter chilling the lap of very May; but at length the season of summer does come.

With Chelsea Flower Show in a couple of weeks I am sure the garden designers are heaving a sigh of relief and unplugging their hairdryers as there is no longer any need to persuade their blooms to blossom. I am looking forward to seeing what extravagant and expensive creations the designers come up with this year. 

As it happens, it seems that Chelsea is very much in tune with RHE Media this year. The RHS has designed a garden called ‘Heath, Happiness and Horticulture’ https://www.rhs.org.uk/shows-events/rhs-chelsea-flower-show/2016/Articles/health-happiness-and-healing-gardens and, much to our delight, Diarmuid Gavin has designed ‘The British Eccentrics’ Garden’ that celebrates, among others, Heath Robinson - https://www.rhs.org.uk/shows-events/rhs-chelsea-flower-show/exhibitors/2016/gardens/the-harrods-eccentric-british-garden I must say that I am very pleased that our small efforts, here at RHE Media, to spread the word about wellbeing have reached the ears of the gardening movers and shakers. Gardening is indeed a great way to add years to your life and life to your years.

Also, spookily (as Dame Edna Everidge is fond of saying) the William Heath Robinson Trust posted the following on Facebook yesterday. https://www.facebook.com/HeathRobinsonMuseum/photos/pcb.520361224821457/520361111488135/?type=3 The Hare and Hounds in Waytown is my family’s local pub, well known to me as the place to go for a pint of cider after hay-making. So it appears that the universe is telling me to write a blog post about our Heath Robinson books and, specifically, about How to Make a Garden Grow.

William Heath Robinson and K.R.G. Browne offer some useful advice on garden design and choice of plants in this helpful volume:

Re flowers, now. Before planting so much as a solitary buttercup – which would look dashed silly, anyway – the gardener should give some thought to the general colour-scheme that will result when everything (to his astonishment) has come up. A garden containing only red flowers, for example, is an affront to the eye and a menace to the peace of the home, the irritant effect of red upon the nerve-centres being well known to psychologists, bulls and the retired military. In the same way, an all-white garden tends to induce snow-blindness in the family and neighbours, while an all-yellow one just looks bilious.

The gardener, then, must either work out a preliminary colour-scheme himself or hire a local artist for a small sum in bronze. As a foundation, a few roses, tulips and/or dahlias are generally useful, as these can be had in several pleasing shades and always look well in vases. Among roses, my personal favourites are Mrs. Wapshott (light crimson: very sweet), Lady Bilch-Overspoon (glossy rose: most abundant and continuous bloomer), Prunella Simpson (pink: large), Fifi Mechante (creamy pink: very free and beautiful), General Quacklingham (rich velvety crimson: very strong), and O. J. W. Featheringstonehamptonhaugh (salmon pink: large white eye). Apart from the two last, a jollier bunch of girls one could not hope to meet.

His roses selected, and his tulips and dahlias added to taste, the gardener can turn his attention to his hardy annuals – those tough little growths which can be trusted to do their stuff with the minimum of supervision. The most popular of these, at the moment, are phlox, sox, clarkia elegans (named, I believe, after that Mr. Clark who introduced spats into England), larkspur, love-in-a-mist, fun-in-a-belfry, coreopsis, ellipsis, mignonette, candytuft, bishop’s-nightshirt, nasturtium and echsol … eschscol… (Just a moment, please)… eschscholtzia. The last-named, which is pronounced like a walrus sneezing through a double thickness of felt after a heavy meal on a murky evening in Kirkcudbright, is generally spelt “Cal-i-for-ni-an pop-py”, to the relief of all.

I am sure the Chelsea designers will find such advice most useful and I am going to search the plant catalogues for fun-in-a-belfry and bishop’s nightshirt!

For those without outside space, don’t forget that you can learn much about spring planting indoors from another of our other gardening titles – Room and Window Gardening.

As ever, after an energetic morning digging weeds out of the lawn with a screwdriver (a handy tip from Grandad and using the screwdriver he gave me) and ducking dive-bombing seagulls while rescuing a drooping passion flower, my mind turns to lunch. It turns out that it is British Sandwich Week this week, which reminded me of my blog posts http://www.wordstothewise.co.uk/blog/my-life-in-sandwiches-part-1 and http://www.wordstothewise.co.uk/blog/my-life-in-sandwiches-part-2  Having little in the fridge I looked in the freezer and spotted a box of fish fingers, no doubt bought in anticipation of a visit from my nieces or nephew. Now the fish finger sandwich is much celebrated and there is considerable debate about the correct ingredients. I like to spread the bread (usually brown, but I know white is more popular) with mayonnaise, add the hot fish fingers and top with some tomato ketchup. I have also tried tartare sauce instead of mayo and that is very good too. For more thoughts on how to eat a fish-finger sandwich see - http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/dec/15/how-to-eat-fish-finger-sandwiches

Hand over that fish-finger sandwich RIGHT NOW! By Stu's Images, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=27048015

I was admiring my pear blossom this morning and I wondered what Mrs Beeton recommended for preserving pears in Mrs Beeton’s Jam-making and Preserves. Here is her recipe for Pears, Sweet, Pickled:

Select some nice firm pears. To each lb. allow ½ a lb. of brown sugar, and ¼ of a pint of malt vinegar, cloves, cinnamon, and allspice.

Peel the pears and tie the spices in muslin. Place the vinegar, sugar and spices in a preserving-pan; when boiling add the pears, and cook them gently until tender. Remove the pears to a bowl or large basin, boil the syrup for about 10 minutes longer, then pour it over the fruit. On the following day boil up the syrup, and repeat the process the two following days. On the third day place the pears in jars or wide-necked bottles, and remove the spices before adding the vinegar to the fruit. Store in a dry, cool place.

My mother makes pickled pears (I think her recipe is similar to Mrs B’s) – great with ham and other cold meats and my Dad’s favourite. The lovely painting on the cover of our edition of this book shows pears and the equipment needed for preserving them.

Finally, looking ahead, don’t forget that it is Father’s Day on the 19^th June. TheDangerous Book for Grandads is the ideal gift for Dads and Grandads. It includes lots of ideas for outdoor activities with the grandchildren during the holidays so get your copy now (it’s available in all good bookshops as well as online in The Great British Bookshop and Amazon) and start filling your notebook or scrapbook with plans for derring-do! For example, now the soil is warming up and (we fervently hope) the risk of frost is past, you can plant the seeds of your giant sunflower or enormous pumpkin!

With thanks to Rupert Stephenson

Of course, if your Dad and/or Grandad appreciates the outdoors more in theory than in practice then he has much in common with William Heath Robinson and K.R.G. Browne in How to Make a Garden Grow. I think they should have the last word:

The fact that neither Mr. Heath (“Towser”) Robinson nor myself has ever grown any of the flowers or vegetables mentioned in this work will not, we hope, detract from its educational value or its usefulness as a fly-swatter. After all, very few dramatic critics – a curious breed of men, remarkable chiefly for their ability to sleep through the loudest shows – have ever written plays; and, of those who have, the majority are now wishing that they had chosen something easier, such as making little woollen models of the Albert Hall. The looker-on, in other words, sees most of the game; and as onlookers (preferably from arm-chairs, with a large jug of something soothing within easy reach) Mr. Heath Robinson and I acknowledge few superiors below the rank of K.B.E.