The Beechgrove Garden 2024 episode 17
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00Well, hello and welcome to Beechgrove Garden.
00:16This week, a healthy diet of fruit and veg gardening.
00:21Coming up, what you can be harvesting right now from the vegetable plot, George is revisiting
00:27the logan and the tayberries, and plants from the potager ready for the pot.
00:33Here you are, Lizzie.
00:37Now, when you come to Beechgrove, you don't just get vegetables, you get fruit as well,
00:42so lots for your five a day, isn't it?
00:45Oh, definitely.
00:46These blackcurrants are really ready to pop.
00:49Just at a point of ripeness, aren't they?
00:51Beautiful.
00:52Just beautiful.
00:53Hey, careful about the eating.
00:54Now, we've got four varieties here.
00:56Starting at the far end of the row, we've got this one, which is Baldwin, which is quite
01:00an old variety.
01:01Then, we come to Benconnan, which is that one.
01:06That's nice.
01:07Okay, right?
01:08Bensaric, which is in the middle.
01:09I wouldn't try that one, because it's not ready.
01:13I'll give that one a miss.
01:14That's right, because that's a later variety.
01:16And then, the one that we've just been picking is this one, and that is Big Ben, and much
01:22larger berry.
01:23And?
01:24That's really sweet and really delicious.
01:27Gorgeous.
01:28So, these, for crumbles, sponges, pies, that sort of thing, you can even do them into jam
01:34or jelly.
01:35But, what have you been doing there?
01:37I was round earlier.
01:39Well, when you're pruning blackcurrants, what you're trying to do is encourage as much young
01:43growth as possible, and often, when the crop is heavy, what happens is that these will
01:48actually droop down and sprawl all over the place.
01:51You want to have it a bit more upright.
01:53Yeah, like one of those ones.
01:54That's quite good.
01:56So, what I did was I just cut them off.
01:58What can you do with these?
01:59Take them into the house, into the kitchen, and do it in the luxury of your own home.
02:03Or while you're watching Beechgrove.
02:04That's it.
02:05That's it.
02:06Right, you going off to pick some?
02:07I am, I am.
02:08I've got another job to do just here.
02:11These were plants of Loganberry and Tayberry, which we planted back in 2022.
02:19We planted them in a cardboard box, and that cardboard box was filled with fresh, new soil
02:25because this bed had had raspberries growing in it before, and the problem is that if you
02:32put raspberries or Loganberries and Tayberries back in the same soil, what happens is they
02:37become stunted.
02:38They suffer from a replant disorder, and they would only grow about this height.
02:43They would be half what they should be.
02:45So we planted those in a cardboard box with fresh soil.
02:49We put in some mycorrhizal fungi, and this is the result.
02:55This was the growth last year, and that's it.
02:58It fruits in the second year.
03:00So it grows one year, and then it fruits.
03:03And these fruits are delicious.
03:05These you have to wait until they're really dark like that before you eat them.
03:09Don't eat these red ones, you know, the mid-red ones, because you'll take the inside of your
03:13cheeks off.
03:14What we do then is, we train the old wood there one year, and then the second year,
03:19we train the next lot up here, and that's what we've got.
03:22This is the young growth from this year, and I've got that on canes up to this side.
03:28So why do we do that?
03:30Because we want to keep them separate.
03:33We don't want to have to fight through this jungle to pick the fruit.
03:36And the other idea is that if there is any disease appears on the old foliage there,
03:41it's not going to drop onto the young canes quickly.
03:45So all I'm doing is, I've just got some bits of string here, and all I'm going to do is
03:51just tie these young shoots into the cane.
03:55And in order to get that to stick, see, round the cane like that, and then give it a twist,
03:59and then that gets tied in there.
04:01Okay?
04:02So a very simple idea.
04:06It's about keeping the plant in order, and it's also a little bit about hygiene.
04:12You don't want to be encouraging diseases in the garden.
04:15Anyway, that's one job that you could be getting on with if you've got loganberries and tea
04:19berries.
04:20I've got one more thing to show you.
04:25Right, back to the fruit house.
04:29Because it's payback time, and what I mean by that is, it's time to pay back the cherry.
04:34This is the variety Sweetheart, and believe it or not, this little tree has been in here
04:38for well over 20 years.
04:41And it's been fed once, that I know of, in the past, but it's time it was done again.
04:46Now, the covering underneath, we've got gravel, and then we've got a black fabric underneath.
04:50And what I've done is, I've pulled back the black fabric on this side, so you can see
04:55the exposed soil.
04:57Some of that's actually quite dry.
04:59But what I'm going to do is, I'm going to give that just a little scrape on the top,
05:03so that I open it up.
05:05Because what I'm going to do after that, is I'm going to add some of this.
05:09Now this is a new enriched compost.
05:11This is leaf mold and compost mixed together with a well-balanced fertilizer.
05:17So that's going to go on the top there.
05:19And all I need to do is to just push it onto the top, and then level it out like that.
05:25Pull the black fabric over the top, and then the gravel back.
05:28And once I've done that, give it a jolly good water.
05:32Because it's now got fertilizer accessible to the roots, I'm going to get lots and lots
05:37of young growth, just like that there.
05:39And that's what I want, because if I don't have that young growth, I can't rejuvenate
05:43this plant.
05:44I can't keep it going for, hopefully, another 10, 20 years maybe.
05:49You have to pay things back.
05:51So while I finish off this task, you are going off to visit a wonderful garden in the Scottish
05:57Borders.
05:58Doick Botanic Garden is a regional garden of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
06:06It sits just south of Peebles, and as well as many seasonal displays, has one of Scotland's
06:12finest tree collections.
06:14Graeme Stewart is the plant curator.
06:17Where we exist within the context of Scotland, we're in a fairly significant microclimate
06:24of our own.
06:25When considered coast to coast, we're about as inland as you get in Scotland, which gives
06:28rise to the kind of climate that is quite specific for certain types of plants and trees.
06:34So it also means that the temperatures, winter temperatures, are very low and summer temperatures
06:39are higher, although it gives you a shorter growing season, because you have early frost
06:45and late frost either end of the growing season.
06:48So Doick Botanic Garden is very much the hardy garden of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh's
06:52regional gardens.
07:05This is the Doick beech, and this is one of our very favourite trees here at Doick.
07:11This is what you would call a horticultural oddity, or a horticultural anomaly.
07:17When you look at the shape of this tree compared to a normal beech, a normal beech has a very
07:22broad spreading crown.
07:24When you look at this one, it's very columnar, very upright, and it has what's known as a
07:28fastidiate form, it's more like a poplar.
07:31Now this tree, not this exact tree, but the mother of this tree, appeared by chance on
07:37the estate in the early part of the 19th century during the Naismith tenure in Doick House.
07:45And the tree grew in a batch of seedlings as an oddity, but unusually it doesn't come
07:50true to type from seed.
07:51If you grew seed from this tree, then it would revert back to the normal beech.
07:56So it has to be grown from vegetative propagations, or cuttings from a proper Doick beech.
08:04So if you happen to have one of these trees, or you see one of these trees when you're
08:07out and about, then it's really interesting to note that it will have come from the original
08:12Doick beech which still grows here at Doick.
08:26This area of the garden is dedicated to the study of lower plants.
08:37Lower plants like fungi, mosses, lichens and liverworts.
08:42The area here behind me is called the Cryptogamic Sanctuary, and it's the world's first Cryptogamic
08:47Sanctuary.
08:49It's an area that could really be considered one of the most studied places on earth.
08:55For our purposes, it's an area that's left relatively untended.
08:58It allows the opportunity for the debris that falls, the leaf litter that lands on the woodland
09:03floor to be decayed, broken down into the soil to be able to feed future generations
09:12of trees.
09:21So we're here in the Plant Isolation House, which is an area where when we bring plants
09:28in to be planted into the garden, we hold them here for a period of time, generally
09:32a number of months to monitor them for any pests and disease because we don't want anything
09:37untoward being brought in inadvertently and then going on to cause an infection within
09:44the wider garden.
09:46So this young tree here, which is a European Silver Fir, has been in the Isolation House
09:51for a period, probably in excess of three months, so we're quite happy that this is
09:56in good condition health-wise and this is ready to be planted out in the garden.
10:01So we're going to take it up and plant it in the silverwood.
10:09So in the same way that we are currently enjoying the garden that's been created over a considerable
10:16timescale by our forefathers, if you like, we are looking at looking after the garden
10:22for today but also considering planting for the future to give a window to something wonderful
10:28300, 350 years from now.
10:42So back in May, George and I were planting up this potager garden and it is starting
10:47to look fab.
10:49Now what I mean by a potager garden is they've got plants in them that look really good but
10:54also have an edible element.
10:56So we've got some chives, we've got nasturtiums, we've got some tree spinach over there but
11:01the real star of the show are these artichokes.
11:05Now these are quite young plants, they've got lovely foliage and they're also starting
11:11to produce a small little flower head.
11:15Now what I'm going to do is I'm actually going to cut that flower head off.
11:19Now what that means is the plant is going to put all its energy back into the roots
11:25to produce really strong healthy plants for next year which means we're hopefully going
11:30to get a better crop of artichokes next year.
11:33So we're just going to snip that part off, we can put it on the compost heap.
11:40Artichokes are really tasty but they are also really ornamental plants as well.
11:46This one has come from my garden and I've got some plants that are about three or four
11:52years old.
11:53Now they have started to unfurl and if I were to leave it, it would produce a really huge
12:00thistle with a lovely purple centre which the bees love.
12:04Now you might look at something like that and think how on earth am I going to eat that
12:08or prepare it?
12:10But it's really quite simple.
12:13All you need to do is take your artichoke and you want to cut off the top about a quarter
12:22or a third of it.
12:24Then peeling off the outer sepals one by one and then take a pair of secateurs or some
12:34scissors and chop off all of those spiky bracts that aren't going to be very good for
12:45eating.
12:46Once you've done that, it's up to you.
12:50You can either remove the choke before you cook it or you can do it afterwards but it's
12:57this part here of the artichoke that you are really looking for and this is the heart of
13:02the artichoke which is the really good eating part.
13:06On top of it, you can see the choke and it's really quite fuzzy and it isn't very pleasant
13:13to eat so we're going to remove that by just taking a spoon and very carefully pulling
13:20out the choke of that, there we go, taking that all out.
13:26Now if you're preparing quite a few of these, what I would definitely do is I'd have a bowl
13:31of water with some lemon in it or some lemon to hand to just rub on top of the artichokes
13:38and that's going to stop any sort of discolouration before you get them cooked.
13:44Now once you've done, you can either steam it or you can roast it.
13:48If you are going to steam them whole, make sure that you steam them upside down like
13:54that and that's going to stop any water from running back down and for the heart to become
14:00waterlogged and will be pretty tasteless.
14:03So steam it upside down in your steamer like that.
14:06If you're going to roast them, you can roast them whole and that's what I did with these
14:10ones here and it's really very easy because the artichoke is so nice and soft, it's really
14:19easy to remove the choke just like that once it's been cooked.
14:25Now you want to cook them, I cooked these for about an hour in some tin foil with some
14:29butter and we're going to do a little taste test with George which I know he's really
14:35looking forward to later on but now it's off to Leven to get an update from Callum and
14:41his allotment.
14:42I've been on the allotment for six years now and this pear tree has been here since day
14:57one and I know it's looking a wee bit neglected now but to be honest I kind of gave up on
15:02it a wee bit because it's hardly producing any fruit.
15:05Over the last six years I've only ever had one pear from it and actually somewhere in
15:10there is a plum tree that has a real meaning to me.
15:13So what we're going to do, the pear tree is going to come out, we're going to cut it right
15:17down and then that's going to allow more light into the plot and it's going to be beneficial
15:22for the plum tree.
15:52Look at the sheer amount of light now that's coming into the plot and we've found the plum
16:16tree.
16:17So we're now going to turn our attentions to the plum tree but I know what you're thinking,
16:21Callum you've been a wee bit brutal there, well maybe more than a wee bit actually, with
16:26the pear tree but not to worry I'm not quite giving up on the pears yet.
16:30I've bought a patio one that I'm going to put into a pot so we'll see how we get on
16:34with that.
16:35So although we've cut one tree down for the benefit of this one, well I've still got another
16:39pear tree to try.
16:41So right now is the perfect time mid-summer to prune your plums, that is because there's
16:48going to be less chance of getting silver leaf disease and what that is is when we go
16:52into prune, they're more susceptible if you were to do this earlier in the season for
16:58the wounds to get infected, the foliage would then turn silver and then would kill the branches.
17:03So what we're going to do is we're going to get some sicketeers and we're going to cut
17:09some of these really long branches back to about a third.
17:13So we'll just go in, cut them off and leave about a third, it's really important that
17:19you cut just above a bud and that's going to encourage new growth for next year.
17:24And you'll see anyway that most of the plums are around the sort of base of the branches
17:29anyway.
17:30We really want to look for dead, diseased and crossing wood so we'll keep an eye out
17:35for that and we want to keep the centre nice and open so any branches you see growing inwards
17:41we're going to cut right back to the trunk and that's going to allow more light and air
17:45in to the centre of the tree and it's going to help righten the plums.
17:52I'm now able to get closer into the tree and I'm noticing that I've got a bit of dead wood
17:57here so what I want to do is just go right back and cut this off.
18:03Just like that, I just went right back to the trunk and cut it completely off and then
18:06also remember I spoke about you want to have the centre of the tree, you kind of want to
18:11get like a wine glass, you know, you've got all the branches up but the centre open as
18:15much as possible so this branch here we're going to cut it as far back as it'll go.
18:22Just look at the amount of space that's been opened up just by cutting one branch off,
18:26that's going to allow air in and light to help the fruit ripen.
18:33Once you're happy with your pruning, what you want to do is then focus on the crop.
18:38You'll see that I've got a lot of plums on the tree, now you're going to do some thinning out now.
18:43Now this would happen naturally in June called the June drop and that would be maybe some of
18:48the fruit that's not been pollinated or you know a gust of wind and some of them will just fall off
18:53but you may need to go in and give them a bit of a helping hand because look at all the plums on
18:58this branch alone here and you can see it's already weighing it down. Now yes we're going
19:03to thin them out, we're going to get less crops but it's better to have 30 top quality ones than
19:0970 piddly wee things and as I say if we were to leave all them on it's going to weigh this branch
19:15down potentially break the branch and do more damage to the tree. So what you want to do is
19:19just go in finger and thumb and just pull off some of the plums. You'll see even some of them will do
19:27it naturally it'll just fall off but that's okay you want to leave about five to eight centimeters
19:33in between each fruit that you're leaving on. Some people say as well you can leave them on as a pair
19:40that's okay and then just space them out but I generally feel when you go harvest them you think
19:44oh look they look really good but then insects have gone in between both them and then they've
19:49started eating them for the inside and then you can't use them so it's better to have them spaced
19:53out five to eight centimeters apart. When you're doing this you want to look and you sort of see
20:01you know is there anything wrong with the plums are they marked you know like that one's got a
20:07bit of bruising there so I think we'll take this one off. There we go. I know we've done a lot of
20:14work today but it's certainly going to improve the crop for this year and for years to come.
20:31So we are here in the vegetable garden and it's time for some harvesting George. I'm so excited.
20:37Now a couple of weeks ago Ruth and I were here and we were putting down grass clippings as a mulch.
20:43That's right. Now has it done its job? I think it's done a perfect job. Now what I mean by a mulch
20:49and why we were doing it is so that it was going to suppress weeds, it was going to keep moisture
20:54in the soil which is what the brassicas need and also once you've harvested you can dig it in and
21:01it's going to feed the plants. Recycling at its best. Oh it's brilliant. So what have we got?
21:06We've got some purple sprouting broccoli over here which isn't obviously going to be ready for
21:11a wee while yet but we've got this one here which is definitely ready to be harvested and this
21:16variety is called hersia. Now I know that it's going past its best because I can start to see
21:24that little telltale sign of the yellow flowers. No we don't want that because that's going to
21:28affect its taste. It can sometimes get quite bitter once it starts to flower. We want it nice
21:34and tightly packed and we're going to take a cutting probably about two to three inches down
21:41because I quite like the stalk. Well I've tried it and it's wonderful steamed. You just take the
21:47green off the outside and use the inside of the stem and it's just oh it's so sweet. It's lovely.
21:53Now what I would do just now is I would give that a really good liquid feed and that means that
21:59it's going to produce these lovely side shoots and there's really good eating in those as well.
22:05They're not going to be as big as those. They'll be like tender stem broccoli. You get these long
22:09stems which are again succulent. Just wonderful when you steam them. One for the basket.
22:15One for the basket. There we go. I love my knife. Thank you. Because over here we've got a different
22:21variety and it's presenting itself in a different way. This is one called sky tree and look at that.
22:26That's just ahead of the right sort of size that one isn't it? If you were in a house where there's
22:31just two of you, that you could cut and you could eat that in a winner. No waste. Yeah no waste at all.
22:37No waste. It doesn't go in the fridge and moulder for a while. So I'm going to do the same. Just
22:42cutting it down there and then that leaves a lot of space at the bottom for it to produce the side
22:47shoots. Now the thing is you see it's had its breakfast and it's produced this to here. It now
22:52needs some more lunch. That's why we're feeding it. Yeah definitely. What we've got here? We've got
22:57this red boar kale and I love it. Look at that. It's so pretty and ornamental. Look at the purple
23:03stems. Great for putting in your smoothies. Smoothies? Yes. I'm going to have a few of those
23:11leaves as well. You're just taking the leaves? Yes just taking the leaves. Any ones? Can these ones be
23:16picked as well? I would leave maybe some of the bottom ones. They may be a little bit
23:21tougher. Oh you're a bit. I'm a bit picky. What would you do with those apart from smoothies?
23:26Anything else? Well you could blanch them and use them as a nice green. That's probably what I would
23:31do with a bit of butter and some garlic would be quite nice. What I've heard is that if you cut it
23:36up small, some salt and some olive oil, put it into a hot oven and it goes crisp and that way you can
23:42eat it as broccoli crisps. That sounds amazing. And you can do the same with the cavolo nero. This is
23:47this other one but that again is an ornamental plant. Look at it. It is beautiful. Full of iron
23:53though. Full of iron. Yeah so therefore for some people's taste it's a bit bitter. Yeah. But it's
23:59still a fabulous plant for you know for the winter and for putting in soups and things like that.
24:04Ideal. But what about this one? This is the star of the show. Oh it's amazing. Absolutely astonishing.
24:09This is the Romanescu cauliflower. Now I'll just cut that one and I'm going to cut it just in that
24:15bit there. There we are. Oh perfect. See that. Look at that. It's amazing. Look at the spiral that we've got in
24:24the top there. I mean so artistic. This is the one that costs a lot when you go to a restaurant.
24:30Well you can see why. It's very very beautiful. Very attractive. But the thing is you can grow it at home. You don't need to go to the
24:35restaurant just to buy it you know and spend money on it. But this is a greenish yellow one. I believe
24:41you can get them in purple and you can also get them in orange. So multi-coloured cauliflower. Brilliant. Brilliant isn't it?
24:56Time now for this week's handy hints and to keep your borders and your plants looking beautiful
25:02you need to be deadheading regularly like I'm about to do with this rose. Now why deadhead?
25:08It makes the plant not want to produce seed and you get that second flush of flowers.
25:19Roses, particularly standard roses, are grafted onto a vigorous rootstock. That is to give them
25:26a clean stem before you get the bushy bit on the top. That's what this one is grafted onto
25:32and if you notice we've got this huge shoot going right the way up through. That is the vigorous
25:38rootstock. So that is different to this rose, to the pink rose. So what am I going to do with this?
25:43I'm going to take it out because it's taking the vigour away from the main plant that we want,
25:48the pink one. So I'm just going to cut it there.
25:53Just like that. Might actually then have to take the saw and saw it off because it's a thick shoot
26:00right next to the stem.
26:10Job done.
26:18As promised George, there's your little artichoke snack in the form of a dip. Now I've roasted the
26:24artichokes, put them in the food processor, blended them up a bit, put a bit of cream cheese, some
26:30garlic, some lemon, some black pepper and I think it's quite nice. Do you? Yeah. Well wait till I see.
26:36What do you think? Well just a minute. Here we go. Get a good spoonful. Yeah.
26:43Really tangy. I mean the lemon comes through and then the garlic and that's the first time I've
26:48eaten artichoke. Really that's the first time and I would have it again. I would have artichoke dip
26:53again. Nice on a hot sunny day in the garden. Yeah. Anyway while we're gobbling this,
27:01that's all from us really. But Brian and Carol will be here next week and it's very exciting,
27:06it's the first crop of tatties George. That's right and if you want to see how the potatoes got to that
27:11stage, just ready for lifting, go back on your iPlayer to April and you'll see how the whole
27:16process was started. And you can catch the whole series on the iPlayer as well. Yeah so from a pair
27:22of us for now, bye-bye. Bye. It's good, I like it.
27:52Bye.