In our area we should have loads of butterflies and bees because we have more dandilions than you could shake a stick at, but we are lacking in both these beautiful insects, I grow Dead Nettles with their pretty white flowers, the butterflies and the bees love them and they don't sting like the blue flowered kind.
Dandelions in massed flowering are beautiful - like slightly small pompom chrisanthamums. We have a large grassed area which is more dandelion than anything else, and I pick the flowers to make dandelion wine - very powerful when left a couple of years. I've read you can eat the leaves in salad - do they need to be blanched with a bucket over them first?
Ahh, dandelions, I quite agree, they're stunning. But then you see I also find clover, both its foliage and its honey-scented flowers, really attractive and yes, I even like it in grass, far more interesting than plain old grass.....and wonderful to lie amongst!
Umm actually all plants don't start with two leaves. Diocotyledons start with two and Monocotyledons (e.g grasses) start with one. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dicotyledon
The RHS website have a brilliant advice section which I have only recently discovered, you have to search a bit sometimes but it is well worth the effort and some of the old videos are HILARIOUS.
Lizzie I would agree with the others and say let it all gow until you can figure out what you don;t like and 'weed' that.
This year I had a flush of unknown bulbs come up in an awkward place and I left them and left them and FINALLY this week they flowered and they are stunning white star shaped flowers with pretty green striped foliage ...so once they die back I'll be digging them up and moving them to somewhere less 'in the way' so we can enjoy them next year.
If you're sowing ahrdy annuals it is well worth sowing them in areas subtly marked with play-sand or horticultural sand so that you know approx. where you expect them to come up. I'd also suggest sowing in straight lines within these areas - weeds therefore easier to spot, and the horrible rigid formailty of the lines goes un-noticed by the time the plants are a decent size ! PG
i have horsetails in my garden and on my allotment they are hell to get rid of i dont use weedkilers so i just keep on diging them out the root is black and if you snap it a new one grows so try and get most of it i have been on my allotment for two years now and i am just geting on top of it now but i dont think i will get rid of it alltogether you never no?
On the subject of weeds..... I have a problem with CUCKOOPINT ( I believe otherwise called Lords and ladies). They began as one stalk and I thought I'd dug it out, then ... it's everywhere. I've tried digging and, much against my liking, most brands of weedkiller. I just can't get rid of them. I agree they look quite bright and pretty for a short while but everytime I see another one appear my heart sinks. Any ideas on irradication please?
Try looking at the flowers of weeds with a magnifying glass. Many flowers have delicate patterns - flightpaths for insects I wonder? - and weeds seem to have some of the most intricate.
Posts
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dicotyledon
The RHS website have a brilliant advice section which I have only recently discovered, you have to search a bit sometimes but it is well worth the effort and some of the old videos are HILARIOUS.
http://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/index.asp
GW and the BBC also have a good advice/reference site, also full of great old vids
http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/
and
http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/grow_your_own/
for Botany stuff try this one:
http://theseedsite.co.uk/botany.html
Lizzie I would agree with the others and say let it all gow until you can figure out what you don;t like and 'weed' that.
This year I had a flush of unknown bulbs come up in an awkward place and I left them and left them and FINALLY this week they flowered and they are stunning white star shaped flowers with pretty green striped foliage ...so once they die back I'll be digging them up and moving them to somewhere less 'in the way' so we can enjoy them next year.
PG
They began as one stalk and I thought I'd dug it out, then ... it's everywhere. I've tried digging and, much against my liking, most brands of weedkiller. I just can't get rid of them. I agree they look quite bright and pretty for a short while but everytime I see another one appear my heart sinks. Any ideas on irradication please?