Flowering Months range abbreviates month
to its first 3 letters (Apr-Jun is April, May and June).

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Plant Description Page of the Plant named in the Text box below that photo.

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links to where you personally can purchase that plant via mail-order.

Bulb and Perennial Height from Text Border Colour

Bulb and Perennial Soil Moisture from Text Background

Moist Soil

Shrub
Height from Text Border Colour

Shrub
Soil Moisture from Text Background

Moist Soil

Tree
Height from Text Border Colour

Tree
Soil Moisture from Text Background

Moist Soil

Climber
Height from Text Border Colour

Climber
Soil Moisture from Text Background

Moist Soil

Aquatic, Bamboo, Bedding, Conifer, Fern, Grass, Herb, Rhododendron, Rose, Soft Fruit, Top Fruit, Vegetable and Wildflower
Height from Text Border Colour

Aquatic, Bamboo, Bedding, Conifer, Fern, Grass, Herb, Rhododendron, Rose, Soft Fruit, Top Fruit, Vegetable and Wildflower
Soil Moisture from Text Background

Moist Soil

From Peter Beales Roses An illustrated encyclopaedia and grower's handbook of species roses, old roses and modern roses, shrub roses and climbers by Peter Beales (ISBN 0-00-272178-3) Published 1992:-

"For a formal structure, rough-sawn timber is the least expensive of the prepared materials and should likewise be ready-treated with preservative. Upright poles or posts should be a minimum thickness of 4" (10cm) and should always be sunk at least 2' (60cm) into the ground. Rails and cross-members can be thinner than this but not less than 2" (5cm). Since the principal purpose of such structures is to provide support for climbing roses which will eventually cover them almost completely, the pattern created by criss-crossing timber need not - unless so desired - be very elaborate. What is important, in order to ensure long life, is the quantity and quality of the upright poles placed in the ground. The spacing of these poles is therefore crucial. The best rustic trellis has uprights placed at about 6' (1.8m) intervals. Rustic arches should be well anchored in the soil at each corner."

Ordinary trellis should be 1" (2.5cm) x 1" (2.5cm) timber in 6" (15cm) squares to carry the weight of the roses.

A more simple form of support for climbers and ramblers is post and wire. 4" x 4" Posts can be set at 6' (1.8m) apart before attaching chainlink fencing from 2' (60cm) to 5' (1.5m) in height up the 6' above ground post. All end or corner posts should have additional straining posts to enable the chainlink to be stretched tightly.

Climbing roses, if grown on walls, will need support. Starting at 18" (45cm) above ground drill holes in the centre of the brick to take screw-eyes in their plastic plugs. Vertically every 4th brick and then horizontally every second brick will provide the neccessary support structure. The top and bottom rows with each end column of short vine-eyes should have its screw thread fully screwed into the plug to provide a secure unbending vine-eye so that the wire can be stretched tightly between each end of each row. Then, the remaining 4" long screw-eyes with their 1" length of screw thread should have their screw thread fully screwed into the plug to give a 2" gap behind the wire stretched in the vine-eyes to allow air ventilation for the roses.

"Rambling roses are vigorous and can become wild and unruly if not kept under control on a regular basis. They produce lots of new flexible stems each year, making them ideal for training into a variety of shapes. When pruning them there are two important things to bear in mind. One, that they flower on wood produced in the previous year. And two, that the way to get maximum inflorescence from them is to train as much of the stems as you can to as near horizontal as possible.

Traditional advice was always to cut back old branches to the ground after flowering in Summer or Autumn but to be honest you will find conflicting information depending on which edition of the RHS Pruning manual you look at! In fact, that is often the beauty of gardening. There is not always a ‘right’ way to do things and different gardeners will have different ways of working. We believe that it is best to wait until Winter to tackle our climbers and ramblers and it always works well for us. It took Rhiannon, Matthew and myself nearly 3 days as well as a whole ball of string and many bleeding fingers to completely finish pruning and tieing in this rose!

Heads for heights

We started by removing any diseased, damaged or dead wood before ‘snibbling’ off any unwanted, wispy side shoots. This cleared the tangled mass of stems a little and allowed us to see the overall structure better. We then took out all of the support wires and threaded them back behind the stems. Many of the growth shoots from last year had grown behind the wires and this is not ideal as it can cause rubbing, restrict growth and movement and destabilize the wires supports. The process of choosing which stems to keep and where to keep them then began. Getting as many horizontal shoots as possible was tricky and we had to break a few ‘rules’ by having crossing branches. As this training system is re-done almost from scratch every year, this shouldn’t causes any problems, especially as we put bracing ties behind each crossing point to reduce rubbing." from Chartwell Gardens.

There are further details on the Climber Page and the Pruning Page of the Plants Section.

Ramblers Scramblers & Twiners by Michael Jefferson-Brown (ISBN 0 - 7153 - 0942 - 0) describes how to choose, plant and nurture over 500 high-performance climbing plants and wall shrubs, so that more can be made of your garden if you think not just laterally on the ground but use the vertical support structures including the house as well.

There are 3 sectors on a house wall or high wall:-

• 0-3 feet in height - The Base. This gives the most sheltered conditions in the garden, with soil and air temperatures above those of the surrounding area. This area will suffer less buffeting from wind. Soil care will be ensuring a high humus content - to enrich the nutrient value and help to create reservoirs of moisture. Light intensity will depend on the aspect of the wall (North-facing will get very little sunlight) with the surrounding buildings and plants, including trees.
• 3-10 feet in height - The Prime Site. As the plant moves upwards to about 6 feet, conditions change: plants still benefit from the reflected heat and stored heat of walls warmed by the sun but have more light and air. Many climbers will have established a trunk below and now begin to spread themselves. This middle section is visually important, because it is at eye level and just below that that we should display those items to which we want to draw most attention. Most of the shrubs that are suitable for growing against walls are between 3 and 10 feet in height.
• Above 10 feet in height - The Higher Reaches. This is only likely to occur on house walls and other tall buildings with climbers and trained trees/shrubs covering all the way up to 3 feet from the guttering at roof level ( to prevent ingress to the internal roof space or blockage of the guttering).

The climbers in this page have been placed into one of these 3 heights with the Text Box Boundary in:-

• Blue for 0-3 feet
• Green for 3-10 feet
• Red for above 10 feet.

This Page splits the climbers into their following ways of climbing:-

• Ramblers/Scramblers - These climbers lean on other plants or need artificial supports to climb - Roses, Jasmine, Espalier-trained Fruit Tree/Fruit Ramblers. These are suitable for house or building walls where vine-eye and wire or 1 inch square timber trellis support structures can be erected up to 3 feet below the gutter for the climbers to be tied to with natural twine (not plastic or metal wire - stems grow sideways but plastic and metal constrict this, whereas natural twine will eventually rot or be broken by the expanding stem), or they can be trained on chainlink fences, trellis, pergolas or arbours. Herbaceous Clematis has been added since the top growth dies off completely in the Autumn and Non-Climbing Clematis since it will require being tied to a support structure.
• Self-Clingers: Aerial Roots - A series of roots are produced along the length of its stems. These attach themselves very strongly to the surfaces they find - Ivy (Hedera).
  
  Self-Clingers: Sucker Pads - Tendrils are produced along the young growing stems, opposite the leaves. The main tendril stem divides into a number of slender filaments, each of which has a scarcely perceivable pad at its tip.Once the tips have established contact, the tiny pad is much expanded and becomes a significant sucker, which fits so strongly to the surface that if the stem is pulled away the suckers are left behind- Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia).
  
  Self-Clingers: Twining - Many climbers find support simply by twining their stems around any object they find - Wisteria and Honeysuckle.
  
  Self-Clingers: Twining Leaf-Stem - Some climbers make do with sensitive leaf stalks which wrap themselves around objects for support - Clematis. Others establish themselves with thorns, hooks, spines and prickles.
  
  Self-Clingers: Twining Tendrils - A group of climbers climb by producing a series of tendrils. These are touch sensitive and will curl round any small object they come into contact with and thus enable the plant to climb securely on itself or other plants or manmade support structures - Chinese Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus henryana), Sweet Pea and the Pea Family (Leguminosae).
  
  These Self-Clingers are suitable for garden walls, chainlink fences, trellis, pergolas or fedges.

Warning - Just as it is a mistake to try to keep a tiger in a dog's kennel, it can be a disaster to plant a rampant grower in a site that it will very quickly outgrow. Strong climbers, especially self-supporting ones (Ivy, Ampelopsis, Parthenocissus and Vitis), can quickly get to the eaves, where they may sabotage gutters, and if allowed to get onto the roof, distort or even dislodge tiling. Climbing roses must be supported by humans tying them to structures since the roses cannot do it themselves ( keep the top of the structures 3 feet below the eaves so that annual pruning can reduce the risk of the odd stem reaching the guttering!!).