If your garden plants are dying or struggling in extreme summer weather, Harry Baldwin, head of Horticulture at the Grade 2* Listed Borde Hill Gardens, explains what to do and how you can protect your beautiful borders from future summer heat and drought.
Borde Hill Gardens: https://www.bordehill.co.uk/
00:00 Welcome
00:43 Borde Hill Gardens
01:49 What to do with your garden to protect it from summer extremes
02:10 Sunny areas of the garden dry out quicker
02:28 My plant is dying – what should I do?
03:15 Should I water mature trees?
03:37 If a tree’s leaves start to die, should I cut it back?
04:12 Should I water young trees in summer?
04:38 Caring for shrubs in summer extremes
05:17 How to minimise watering in summer with good winter prep
06:01 What is a tree circle?
06:38 Best practice to protect the herbaceous border
09:22 Water azaleas, rhododendrons and camellias in a very dry summer
09:40 Don’t fertilise plants in a summer heatwave or drought
10:39 How and when to water plants
11:20 Good drought resistant plants
13:05 Plant hunters and Borde Hill Gardens
13:15 Borde Hill Gardens – A Plant Hunter’s Paradise by Vanessa Berridge, Stephen Lacey and John Glover: https://amzn.to/3cDJiFB (affiliate link, see below)
14:40 Beautiful borders playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrZRLHPUbGmCjrR_RaI01_mGKMaTlx_gf
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41 Comments
The discussion about the rhizomes retaining moisture to withstand drought was new to me. My neighbor has put up a shade umbrella attached to a contraption to repair bicycles over a crisping hydrangea which has helped a lot. We are not at record heat yet…that was last summer here in the Pacific Northwest.
We routinely have very hot spells in summer and often have 6 weeks with no rain. I've found that most established plants will wilt and go brown during very bad weather, but they are more dormant than dead. I usually water these sparingly, just enough to keep them alive, but not break out of dormancy. When the worst is over, only then do I cut them back (the wilted/brown foliage acts to protect the living core of the plant) and water well. Also, use "gray water" to irrigate. I keep a basin in the kitchen sink to catch water from washing veg, hands, etc. and use that to water the border. In very bad years, I keep a bucket in the shower with me! I hope your garden soon recovers!
I donot really feed my gardens in the usa rehoboth beach delawere zone 7 b i have good soil& mulch .i feed my roses& cypress trees & hygragias spring & Fall . But my lylain cypress trees have got brown here & tjere this season i have watered them ? The guys behind me uses weed killer in there yard 😔hope its not blowing over in my garden.gr8 VIDEOs but all your videos are sooo helpful in many ways ,💜
Why would you not want to get the best out of your plants? I Feed mine in the spring to help them along their way
Here at the Jersey Shore the drought has been pretty bad. Some of my hydrangeas are now crisp and brown. Also some astilbes have withered. I think my big mistake was putting them in the sun. Next spring will replace them with plants that enjoy sunny, dry conditions. Or maybe I'll get lucky and find some fall bloomers to replace the dead plants. Hoping it will rain has been very disappointing.
I've in PuertoRico very hot humid and with periods ofvdrout and rain .I love flower but don't know what to grow .Any advise
From a hot, dry climate, we definitely water our trees -or they die! We save every drop-off water we can – dish water, washing machine water, to put on our plants and trees. I keep a very slow, rotating drip around the trees to keep them alive.
I'm in Canada, and my family used to water in the morning, and after dark They also watered drooping plants at the base, as needed. it's worked for me, so far. Helps with pest control too.
I set up an electrical conduit frame around my hydrangea, drop shade cloth and "stitch" on a few zip ties to keep it in place. It keeps my flowers and foliage from frying up in zone 8b in Augusta, GA.😁
Great info. I am struggling with fertilizing in hot weather in my new-ish flower and veggie beds. I am working on building healthy soil, but started with terrible quality soil. It seems like I still need to add nutrition throughout the growing season for a lot of the annuals. However, in the Utah desert valley, my yard goes from frozen and shaded to full sun and 2-3 months of 90- 105 degree weather crazy fast. I barely get anything growing before it’s too hot to fertilize. Do you advise not fertilizing at all during the growing season in this situation? I am on my third year of gardening with ornamentals in the ground and veggies/ herbs/ flowers in raised beds. 1st year of adding compost, worm castings, and manure in the off season, mulching well, and using cover crops. Learning everyday!
Alexandra, this was an extremely helpful video. I appreciated the questions you asked of your guest, and I appreciated all of his answers. I learned a great deal and I thank you very much indeed. DA
Beautiful garden and very helpful tips. In the mid-atlantic US, this summer, heat hasn't been a major problem but frequent flash flooding has been. Discovering what plants suffer in standing water and what ones thrive.
My gardening friends tole me gator bags etc were a rip off and didn't work. Honest feedback.. Very informative video tho
Thank you so much for this video. Very helpful as my little garden suffers here in central France in this heat!
wonderrfull
Boise, Idaho, USA usually has extreme summers. It makes the zucchini look wilty in the day and so now I think I've over watered it because the leaves have turned yellow. And it's true about roses here, too. That, and like he said, the iris are two things that never seem to need watering. The leaves on my young (planted just a year ago) hazelnut tree are half brown. It had the tassels just fine in the spring but now I was wondering if the brown leaves are natural like he said about the….was it Hawthorn? Hazelnut usually doesn't like lots of water so I'm afraid I might be over watering when the brown isn't anything to worry about. Can you advise?
Garden shade fabric made for plants might help. Deep beds of mulch will really help hold water. In Southern California we mulch quite a bit and use shade cloth occasionally if a plant is struggling in fill sun.
Very interesting video. My Persicaria looks just like yours! Can you remember which plants with blue shades of flowers were flowering now in the Borders?
Great video!! He was so insightful. One of the best parts of the video was when he was talking about catalpa purpurea!! There’s a huge one at the Chicago botanic garden and no one knew the name of the plant. Now I know as it’s the same one in your video! Thanks much for another great video.
Great topic and very helpful. I live in northern US zone 5 and my gardens usually suffer from the summer heat more than the cold, snowy winters. QUESTION: I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas about gardens and borders on very woodsy properties. My property is sunny but surrounded by very tall pines and other deciduous trees and I’m struggling with a vision for a border garden along the woods edge. The woods is already so beautiful itself, am I ruining it by making gardens there? Would love to hear your thoughts! Thank you for all your wonderful videos : )
Thank you for this much appreciated information.
So depressing. Created two somewhat large gardens last summer and now in New Jersey we have had a month with nearly no rain and 95 degrees F every day. Hydrangeas not doing well and one rhododendron seems dead. Things just look horrible. My knockout roses also miserable.
Very nice information.
Great to see Harry progressing in the industry, seems only a few years ago I was interviewing him at Kew Gardens.
Really appreciate his point about knowing where a plant originally came from to know what conditions it grows under. I have been shifting my plant choices for my patio garden container which is full sun to gradually more tropicals and mediterranean plants. With the quicker onset of heat I had to move some of my plants to my small front yard. No more pansies for me, because the summer heat here in SC is starting even in May. This year, I'm telling myself to focus on the plants that are doing well and cut my losses without being too hard on myself.
I use the water from my dehumidifier for my potted plants
Yes, I live in Northern Colorado at 5,000 ft. and our summer has been warmer than usual with lots of windy days. The combination of heat and wind can really create havoc for young perennials. Even so, my small vegetable garden did great this year as I have it in 4 x 8 boxes which get watered for a few minutes each day. The young perennials all survived and get watered every other day. At first they seemed stressed, but once they settled into their new home they seemed to need less water. I am trying to plant more drought tolerant perennials so that I don't use as much water, but I find many of my favorites seem to be water loving. Another great way to save water is to plant heat tolerant foundation plants which tend to take up more space in the garden so I don't need as many plants for a nice show.
Thank you
We captured rain water in rain barrels and we shower with several 5 gallon buckets. We capture an entire 5 gallons just heating up our shower. We only flush toilets once/day or if it’s brown flush it down, if it’s yellow let it mellow. Living in a desert we are always stretching water use. Be sure to mulch everything!
Another tip- Abundant springtime watering will result in lush growth which frazzles much easier in summer. Less watering in spring will result in smaller more compact perennial forms which better survive drought!
A great video Alexandra, Harry has got some good tips, I hope the Hydrangea survives, my Enkianthus struggled when I was away for a week.
I'm just back from a week in Southern Ireland. The intensity of the colour of the flowers almost hurt your eyes they don't lack rain over there! Back now to southern England, parched straw like lawn and more brown in the borders than green but I will take on board all your tips and carry on, where would we be without our gardens.
South East England is much more arid than a lot of people realise. London on average gets less rainfall per year than Cape Town, Rome and Barcelona.
Excellent discussion.
Wow Alexandra 💖 Great interview, excellent tips, stunning garden footage! I love this channel!! Thank you! 💜🌻💚🌷💛🌹💙
I was wondering about the brown leaves I’ve been seeing on trees in my area (Maine, USA) I never knew that trees would do that in a drought. Very interesting information in this video. Thank you.
where are you Alexandra? We need you back 🙂
I am worried when mulching that the slugs will love it too, any tips on this?
Very useful gardening tips! Thank you so much!
Thanks for all the right questions, at my place it's now rained for the first time in months 🌧️
Thank you for your videos, they are always so informative and helpful!