Stephanie's Garden Blog

Potato growers across the country – both amateur and those whose livelihoods depend on a good harvest – are still coming to terms with a disastrous 2007 season, where summer floods and widespread blight combined to decimate crops, explains horticulturist Martin Fiddes.

Hot on the heels of our announcement that pest control guru Julian Ives has joined the Harrod Horticultural team is the publication of a little book which is sure to get plenty of use in the kitchen garden, down at the allotment and in the vegetable patch this season – our Little Book of Pests.

One of the challenges of kitchen garden, allotment and vegetable plot growing is to overcome the army of garden pests with designs on your crops.

National Nest Box Week February 14th is intrinsically linked to love and romance, and here is a bit of a different slant on Valentines Day this year, show some love to your garden birds!

The fluctuating winter weather is proving havoc with the country’s insect population – and ladybirds in particular are feeling the cold, according to the UK Phenology Network.

This remarkably named moth (plodia interpunctella), which measures 10mm long, lurks in the larder. The adult moths are are grey/white colour at the front and the lower half is a rusty brown; the moths like to fly at night and lay eggs on grain and dried food.

The aim of growing vegetables is, ultimately, to enjoy the harvested end product. Unfortunately, this is also the main objective of most other creatures in the garden who are dead set on eating their fair share, and often more, of the crops before you!

They’re a great help in the garden, are both endearing and lovable, they’ve been mentioned in works of Shakespeare and far too many perish under the wheels of a car – all good reasons why we should be helping the hedgehog this winter.

A great many gardeners and allotment holders grow cabbages or other members of the brassica family each year, so will no doubt be familiar with a common garden pest – the mealy cabbage aphid.