37 h. ago 6 plants and trees you need to prune next week for better spring growth

Expert gardener explains which plants and trees need pruning in January, as it will promote growth later in the year for lush gardens

Politics

3 d. ago Plant trees, bushes and evergreens now to give your garden structure

In a less flowery garden, you can spot the gaps more easily – and fill them with bare-root plants at this time of yearThis time last year we were about to put our old flat on the market – the first proper garden I had as a gardening adult. The one that taught me so much, where I made compost for the first time and cut peonies from the bare roots I’d ordered as soon as we exchanged contracts on the place. Where I painted the back wall pink and strung up lights and held parties and watered the ground with cheap prosecco; where I planted a tree for my newborn son, and lay beneath it with him in languid, too-long summer afternoons, trying to make sense of motherhood.Anyway, every time I’d show estate agents around our two-bed flat, they’d conjure unconvincing compliments about our airing cupboard, before sticking their head cursorily out the back door and saying: “Oh, it’s winter, no gardens look good in winter, no buyers will be expecting it to look nice,” and I’d seethe. Continue read...

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3 d. ago Prune these six plants before the end of January, gardening expert says

Expert pruning of apples, pears, climbing roses, maples, hornbeams and other key plants can improve shape, encourage healthy spring growth, and boost flowering and fruiting in the coming year

Politics

6 d. ago Judi Dench backs campaign to protect London’s green spaces from developers

Actor says it is ‘more important than ever’ to safeguard city’s parks as report finds more than 50 are at riskDame Judi Dench has called for greater protections for London’s parks and green spaces, as research finds more than 50 of the city’s parks are at risk from development.The Oscar-winning actor has long loved trees, and in 2017 fronted a BBC documentary about her love for them. She plants a tree every time a close friend or relative dies, including for her late husband, Michael Williams, who died in 2001, and the actor Natasha Richardson, who was killed in a skiing accident in 2009, and one for her brother Jeffery Dench, who died in 2014. Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago Joseph Beuys review – the grotesque bathtub containing all the horrors of modern history

Thaddaeus Ropac Gallery, LondonThere’s no escape from the torments of the past in this show, which celebrates the German artist at his most Wagnerian, enchanting and sickening you simultaneouslyBorn in 1921, Joseph Beuys was the “perfect” age to fight for Hitler and he did, with the wounds to prove it. The Andy Warhol portraits that complement this exhibition, without actually being part of it, brutally catch his gaunt, ravaged face in the glare of a photo flash under the hat he wore to hide burns sustained in a plane crash while serving in the Luftwaffe. The most haunting portrait turns Beuys into a spectral negative image, all darkness and shadow, his eyes wounded, guilty, lost. This was in the 1970s when Beuys was a charismatic one-man artistic revolution, inspiring young Germans to plant trees, lecturing about flows of ecological and human energy – and, in breathtaking performances, speaking to a dead hare or spending a week locked in a cage with a coyote.All that remains today ...

Events

2 w. ago Alan Titchmarsh issues major warning to 'impatient' gardeners about vital winter job

Gardening expert and Love Your Weekend presenter Alan Titchmarsh has shared the pitfalls of bare-root planting, while revealing the best time to plant trees and shrubs

Events

2 w. ago Get fruit in your garden 'every year' by planting 1 small tree this winter

Gardening expert, Bex Edwards has identified the perfect compact tree to plant in your garden now that can yield up to 5kg of fruit every summer once established

Politics

2 w. ago Planting 1 tree now will 'bring you fruit in your garden for years to come'

Horticultural expert, Bex Edwards has highlighted one particular winter hardy tree than can be planted during the cold winter months and will bear plenty of fruit despite its small size

Politics

2 w. ago Hundreds of trees to be planted high on popular Highland Munro

NatureScot staff have already been up the mountain in snow and ice to prepare the ground for planting.

Politics

2 w. ago As the Israeli bombs fell, my family committed an act of rebellion: we planted a garden in Gaza | Taqwa Ahmed al

Amid constant danger, each planted seed was a tiny act of resistance. As they grew, they offered us food – and a sense of achievement amid the devastationMy 12-year-old brother Mazen ran into the kitchen, shouting that the eggplants were sprouting. He held up the tiny green shoots, his hands shaking. My older brother Mohammed and I rushed outside, laughing despite the fear that had become our constant companion. Each sprout was a victory.Before Gaza’s skies darkened with smoke and the ground shook with bombs, our garden was a lush tapestry of trees and plants, each leaf and branch woven into our family memory. Birds danced above the branches. Five ancient trees stood tall, twisted trunks weathered by sun and wind, branches heavy with black and green olives. Fruit trees filled the air with sweetness – orange, lemon, a broad-leaved fig and a small clementine. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago North Korea leader Kim Jong Un drives pallet truck to plant tree at memorial service

Kim Jong Un paid a visit to a memorial for fallen North Korean soldiers, where he delivered a tree for planting via a pallet truck.

Politics

3 w. ago How fungi ‘superpowers’ from mushroom pellets are restoring forests across the world

‘Rhizopellets’ are being planted alongside saplings and enhance the roots of the tree as it grows

Politics

3 w. ago ‘The source of all life is here’: plan to mine lithium in Chilean salt flat sparks fears of water scarcity

The Colla Indigenous people claim Rio Tinto’s plans to extract the key mineral will harm fragile ecosystems and livelihoodsMiriam Rivera Bordones tends her goats in a dusty paddock in the russet mountains of Chile’s Atacama desert. She also keeps chickens and has planted quince and peach trees and grapevines, which are watered by a stream winding down the hills towards the Indigenous community of Copiapó.But now the huge British-Australian mining multinational Rio Tinto has signed a deal to extract lithium, the “white gold” of the energy transition, from a salt flat farther up the mountains, and she fears the project could affect the water sources of several communities in the area. Continue reading...

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