In this episode, Dan and Julia share tips for keeping your garden in top condition while you take a well-deserved summer break. Your hosts advise on preparing lawns, vegetable plots, containers, greenhouses, and houseplants before your holiday. Dan chooses his favourite tools for trimming hedges and cutting back early-flowering perennials, and, inspired by Wimbledon, Julia shares a money-saving trick for propagating new strawberry plants.

Dan & Julia's Pre-Holiday Checklist:

1. Check your home weather forecast before departure and plan accordingly.
2. Water everything thoroughly, especially container plants, camellias, rhododendrons, hydrangeas and houseplants.
3. Install a drip irrigation system or seeper hose - use a timer to save water and hassle.
4. Cut and edge lawns - but not too short if hot weather is predicted.
5. Weed everywhere.
6. Guard against pest damage by laying traps, using nets and maintaining good ventilation.
7. Support tall and heavily laden plants with canes or stakes.
8. Pick open flowers, ripening fruit and vegetables - give them away or preserve them for later.
9. Move outdoor pots into the shade and houseplants out of the full sun
10. Top-up ponds and birdbaths and provide water for pollinating insects
11. Secure valuables in sheds or move them into a locked garage

And remember, if your garden looks a little shaggy when you return, it will be superficial and can quickly be fixed.

Dan's Product Picks:

• Niwaki Shears
• Niwaki Mini Shears
• Jakoti Hand Shears
• Grow Bag Trays for keeping houseplants moist while away.

Website links:

• Dan Cooper Garden
• Parker's Patch
• Produced by Scott Kennet at Red Lighthouse Local

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Dan & Julia celebrate the rose, Britain's most popular flowering plant. With so many species and varieties available to buy, there's a rose for every garden, but the choice can be bewildering - your hosts share their favourites for containers, walls, banks, wild areas and coastal gardens. Dan highlights his favourite tools and gloves for maintaining roses, and Julia explains how and why you should condition cut roses and other flowers before displaying them indoors. As always, your hosts supply a list of jobs you can do in your garden over the next fortnight.

Dan & Julia's Rose Picks

Climbers and Ramblers - 'Albertine', 'Masquerade', 'Bobby James', 'New Dawn', 'Buff Beauty', 'American Pillar Rose', 'Paul's Himalayan Musk', banksia 'Lutea', laevigata 'Cooperii'

Hybrid Teas - 'Peace', 'Fragrant Cloud', 'Just Joey'.

For Wild Areas - 'Canary Bird', x odorata 'Mutabilis', x odorata 'Bengal Crimson'.

For Coastal Gardens - rugosa 'Hansa', pimpinellifolia 'Dunwich Rose'.

For Ground Cover - 'The Fairy', 'Grouse 2000', 'Partridge', 'Magic Carpet'.

For Pots - 'Boscobel', 'Blue for You', 'Pearl Drift', 'Gabriel Oak'.

For Borders - 'Queen of Sweden'.

Dan's Product Picks:

1. Mainichi Snips - perfect for picking and pruning roses
2. Opinel No.12 Pruning Saw - ideal for tackling rampant ramblers
3. Gold Leaf Tough Touch Gloves - to protect your hands and wrists from thorns and prickles

Gardening Jobs for the Fortnight Ahead:

1. Mist houseplants with rainwater to keep the humidity up and ward off red spider mites.
2. If you're going on holiday, arrange for a friend or neighbour to take care of the watering.
3. Water and feed tomatoes, cucumbers and aubergines regularly. Irregular watering can cause the fruits to split.
4. Watch out for vine weevils in potted plants. The telltale signs are little notches in the leaf edges.
5. Keep deadheading all flowering plants and feed with a high potash fertiliser to keep the blooms coming.
6. Divide bearded irises and replant so the rhizome is exposed on the soil surface.
7. Trim vigorous climbers such as vines, jasmine, honeysuckle and wisteria if they get unruly. Prune rambling roses after flowering, removing about a third of the flowered stems.
8. Harvest courgettes and beans regularly - daily if possible so they aren't watery or tough.
9. Harvest garlic as soon as the leaves turn yellow and start to wither.
10. Keep birdbaths and ponds topped up with water - rainwater if you can, but small amounts of tap water are better than no water.
11. Thin out parsnips and carrots. You can't replant the thinnings, so eat them lightly steamed. They are delicious.

Website links:

• Dan Cooper Garden
• Parker's Patch
• Produced by Scott Kennet at Red Lighthouse Local

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dan and Julia delve into the subtle, little-understood subject of companion planting, revealing which plants get along well and which really don’t! Dan describes three fantastic new tools that have just joined his Signature range, and Julia explains the Three Sisters method of growing beans, squash, and sweetcorn together.

Dan & Julia's Favourite Plant Companions:

1. Plant basil near or at the base of tomatoes to ward off white fly
2. Grow nasturtiums as sacrificial plants to attract black fly
3. Position French marigolds attract aphids from cucumbers and runner beans
4. Tansy deters ants due to its spreading nature underground and planted under fruit trees; it helps deter flies. (It is, however, toxic to pets.)
5. Plant strong-smelling herbs such as sage and parsley to keep aphids away
6. Black mint or Hucatay, Tagetes minuta is part of the marigold family. It is an excellent companion plant for greenhouse veggies such as cucumbers, chillies, tomatoes, peppers and aubergines. The pungent smell helps repel and confuse insect pests through the flowers and leaves and releases anti-nematode compounds into the soil.
7. Grow strawberries beneath grape vines as they succumb to vine weevils first, giving you a fighting chance to save your grapes. Strawberries also indicate if scale insects are a problem on vines by getting covered in sooty mould first.
8. Grow chamomile amongst other plants to keep fungus, mildew, mould and blight away.
9. Plant onions or garlic between carrot rows to deter carrot root flies.
10. Grow lavender alongside carrots and/or leeks. The scent attracts many pollinators and keeps pests at bay.
11. Plant borage and strawberries together - borage attracts pollinators and has a mild cucumber scent; this will help keep predators off the strawberries and improve their flavour.
12. Plant calendula with courgettes as the calendula protects the courgettes from slugs and snails, in theory!

Dan's Product Picks:

1. Signature T-handle Spade - perfect for border work, planting roses and perennials
2. Signature T-handle Fork - great for working on your hands and knees in beds.
3. Signature Japanese Weeding Hoe - great for weeding raised beds.

Gardening Jobs for the Fortnight Ahead:

• Make a final sowing of summer annuals like cosmos and zinnias.
• Sow biennials, including sweet williams, foxgloves, hesperis, honesty, stocks and wallflowers.
• Sow broccoli, kale, spinach, and a final batch of runner and French beans.
• Don’t let containers dry out - bright and breezy weather dehydrates plants very quickly.
• Deadhead roses to keep them neat and tidy and encourage further flushes of flowers.
• Pinch out dahlias, fuchsias and coleus to encourage bushy growth.
• Give wisteria its summer prune, cutting all the long side shoots back to 20cm.
• Prune late-spring or early-summer shrubs after flowering, thinning out the flowered stems.
• Install a water butt if you don’t already have one.
• Harvest salads regularly.

Website links:

• Dan Cooper Garden
• Parker's Patch
• Produced by Red Lighthouse Local

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.