BE A FLOWER HELPER (OR JUST AN ADMIRER) AT THE WORLD’S BIGGEST FLOWER PARADE

December 1, 2008 (Pasadena) — For a unique adventure just up the road, you can help behind the scenes in the days before the Jan. 1st Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena. The parade will be seen by 40 million people on Jan. 1 on TV networks including HGTV. Each float is decorated with more flowers than the average florist will use in five years!

You can volunteer to help decorate a float at the Rose Bowl Stadium's Rosemont Pavilion, 700 Seco St., Pasadena (626) 795-4171 or http://www.tournamentofroses.com/ . The Bayer Advanced Garden of Oz float, with a lion, tin man and other characters, is one of many that will have to be covered in flowers in the three days before the parade at this float site, called a “float barn”.

Or, you can arrive for the parade itself Jan. 1 and stay for the post parade “up close” tour of the floats into the first couple days of January. The website gives the details.

Bough Wow! How to give an instant appeal to your garden with a clever use of trees

TREES are a must-have in any garden – and with National Tree Week starting on November 26 there’s no better time to get planting…

ARCH

Laburnum can create a floral tunnel to link different parts of the garden. Choose the free-flowering variety Vossii, which produces long yellow flowers in June and few of the poisonous seeds.

EXPERT TIP: If laburnum is trained to make a tunnel, pruning is vital to keep the growth in order and encourage flower buds, rather than more foliage.

HOW MUCH? £16.95 from Whispering Tree Nurseries (01366 388752, www.whispering-trees.co.uk).

TREE HOUSE

Kids love dens and a tree house is the ultimate hideaway. If sturdily built, they can also be a fabulous place for adults to read, write and dream.

EXPERT TIP: You’ll need a stout tree with at least two branches spreading in a V-shape from the trunk to support the tree house corners. Otherwise, you’ll need to build it on a platform suspended between two trees and two posts.

HOW MUCH? A custom-made luxury tree house costs from £2,500 from Toys For Boys (01869 278805, www.treeadventures.co.uk).

BIRDS

By putting up a nest box you can help birds and get pleasure from seeing them set up home. If you fix them to trees where birds like to perch they may also be used as a winter roost.

EXPERT TIP: Nest boxes are best put up from August to February. Site them in a quiet part of the garden sheltered from wind, rain and sun. Installing a bird box CCTV camera will add to your enjoyment!

HOW MUCH? Nest box and camera kit £69.95 (01736 756277, www.handykam.com).

CREEPERS

AS many trees have long periods where they provide little interest, it makes sense to brighten them up with flowering climbers. Clematis is a perfect choice.

EXPERT TIP: Plant the clematis away from the direct base of the tree to avoid competition for moisture and nutrients.

HOW MUCH? Four clematis £17 (0844 557 1850, www. vanmeuwen.co.uk).

Slug rings are a good defence, but also think about beetle banks

Slugs dislike copper - how can you put this to good advantage?
I have a big slug problem in my garden, as I am constantly adding large quantities of organic matter to my soil. I have been using copper with my raised beds to find the best solution. On one bed I have added copper slug tape around the top, which seems to work well but it looks a bit Heath Robinson and is not cheap (4m costs £6.50). I am also adding 10mm copper pipe, hammered out flat around other beds. This will cost around £1.50/m. Copper lightening conductor (12.5mm thick and 1.5mm deep) is another option, but this is more expensive at £3.8m per metre run from Keison International (www.keison.co.uk, 01245 600 560).

I have just painted a thin band of new copper paint on two beds, which is a copper powder which you mix in with an epoxy resin and hardener and apply with a roller. It will cost around £80/ per square metre. Aside from deterring slugs and snails, it also looks decorative and will be available in the spring from Great Grass (www.greatgrass.co.uk; 0845 225 2114).

How about copper tools?
Many gardeners swear by them. This is very difficult to prove scientifically, but I have just bought a trowel (£24) from Implementations (0845 330 3148; www.implementations.co.uk) and am testing it out.

Any new research?
Nargis Gani, a PhD student has finished her research on slugs at Cardiff University, part sponsored by the Processors and Growers Research Organisation (www.pgro.org). Gani found that the common field slug avoided areas previously occupied by its four most common ground beetle predators. When slugs sense the presence of ground beetles they stop, raise the front of their bodies, and wave their heads from side to side, before turning away. Hopefully someone will create a product based on the extract of ground beetles for use as a slug deterrent. In the meantime, encouraging them with beetle banks works well.

How do you make a beetle bank?
Raise your soil by about 1 inch (for drainage) and grow tussocky grass such as Cocksfoot and Timothy. Let it form a thick, undisturbed thatch. This insulates the beetles from extreme temperatures. Add perennials such as yarrow, knapweed and wild carrot to pull in hover flies and ladybirds too. The Game and Wildlife Conservancy Trust (www.gct.org.uk) has measured 1,500 beneficial predators per sq metre.