It was January, 1987, when I moved to Cumbernauld. One of my
main priorities had been a house with a large garden where I could
grow all of my stuff in my own back yard. The first season was
one of mainly consolidating my stock and trying to knock the garden
into some sort of shape for the following season.
What I soon discovered was that I was no longer going to be spoiled
with the luxury of great garden soil which I had enjoyed at Bearsden,
but instead I found the soil in my new garden to be heavy clay.
I have since discovered that the area used to be a fire clay mine
(I can pick ‘em).
I decided to buy in sixteen tons of top soil for under my main
covers and proceeded to grow some of the varieties which had served
me well in previous years e.g. the Marcs, Lady Linda etc. The
Marcs, which up to this time I had considered one of the easiest
varieties to grow, turned out to be a total failure with the plants
not making any substantial growth before producing third rate
blooms. Most of the other varieties looked quite promising until
it came to the crunch and I found that they were reasonable flowers
but with very soft growth to the plant.
Things came to a head a couple of years ago when after staging
an entry in the California Cup class at the Scottish National
Show at Stirling I duly retired around 4.30 a.m. About an hour
and a half later, the phone rang. Trying to collect my thoughts
I picked up the ‘phone to hear Roy Fulton’s excited
voice. “Robert”. he said, “there’s been a
disaster at the Albert Hall”. For a few brief seconds several
variations of disasterous scenarios raced through my mind, ranging
from the hall catching fire to Jimmy Rae falling from the balcony.
(What a thought, think of all those damaged blooms). Roy continued,
“Your Lady Linda has just collapsed”. Now there was
a REAL disaster. “I thought I would give you the chance to
do something about it” he said comfortingly. “The stems
have just bent over and the blooms are hanging over the edge of
the vase”.
All right, I know it would have saved the judges the trouble of
lifting the vase up to see the underside of the flowers, but vanity
got the better of me, so I pulled on some clothes, cut some more
blooms and went back to Stirling, where I struggled in a vain
attempt to make the vase look respectable.
On the way home my car broke down, I reckon that morning I gave
an excellent impersonation of John Cleese, where in similar circumstances,
he got out of the car threatening it with what will happen if
it didn’t start, and finally ends up assaulting the vehicle
with a branch off the nearest tree.
What was the result of all this trouble and strife? You’ve
probably guessed it, I didn’t even get into the tickets.
The time had come to try to resolve some of the fundamental problems
with the bought in soil. Some three soil tests later and £28
lighter, I decided to ignore the conflicting remedies being suggested
and do my own thing, which was to dig in all the straw which had
served as a mulch with the objective of burning up some of the
nitrogen, and then to apply lime to raise the PH level up from
6.4 to 6.8, as I wasn’t convinced all the trace elements
were being released. The supplementary source of feeding that
I carried out once the plants were starting to form buds was to
apply quite heavy applications of sulphate of potash in both powder
and liquid form together with Phostrogen. I bought one of the
new Phostrogen liquid applicators for £5 which proved to
be very easy and convenient to use and I consider excellent value
for money.
The other aspect of my move to Cumbernauld is the fact that I
have a large front garden where it is not feasible to put up covers.
It has taken me a while to sort out the varieties which stand
the weather to a reasonable extent. The following are cultivars
that I feel can be grown without covering:- White Linda - S. Dec.;
Paul Chester - S.C.; The Keenes - L.S.C.; Senzoe Ursula - 5. Dec.;
L’Ancresse - Mm. Ball; Barbarry Lavender - Mm. Dec.; Wootton
Impact - M.S.C. No doubt there are a lot more, but these are the
ones I use outside.
A couple of experiments I tried this year was the ‘run-on’
method and I was also interested in finding out how long it took
from securing a bud (i.e. the earliest time you can get access
to remove the side buds and any unwanted side-growths down the
stem) until the bud had fully developed into a mature bloom ready
to be exhibited. In the latter experiment I tied labels marked
with the current date when securing the bud and then referenced
these later, when the flower had fully developed. What surpised
me was the fact that the miniatures took the same time to mature
as the giants. At the beginning of the show season I found that
the bud developing period was 29 days which gradually pushed out
to 35-38 days in the forthcoming weeks. It should be stressed
that this will vary according to weather conditions and the position
in the garden that the plants are grown in e.g. more or less light
and sun.
The second experiment I tried was that on some plants I used the
‘run-on’ method as described by Dave Spencer and David
Boyd at their recent lectures. It is not an easy thing to explain
but I would say that it is similar to lightly pruning back the
stem to just above one of the leaf joints and removing all unwanted
leaf-breaks, thereby leaving the one at the top of the stem, which
will develop and carry a replacement stem and bud. The effect
of this, is of course, to delay the time of flowering. The point
of knowing roughly how long it takes for a bud to flower and secondly
the use of ‘run-on’ technique, is that when used in
conjunction with each other, it should enable the grower to exercise
a degree of control over when his plants will flower.
This year I was fortunate enough to be allowed the use of my works’
van, on the understanding that it didn’t interfere with normal
business hours, which was a great boon. For Gateshead and Harrogate
Dougie Semple and I reverted to our normal arrangement of sharing
a hired van which we double tier and wedge our buckets into simple
wooden frames which we have developed, after having suffered some
heartbreaking experiences of damaged blooms in years gone by.
I ‘phoned Dougie, who was on duty at Stirling on the Wednesday,
to say that I though that if we combined the efforts of some of
the Monklands lads we could stage a reasonable entry in the inter-Society
class at Gateshead Festival Show. The following morning I cut
my own blooms and then went to John Whyte’s to pick up some
Pink Jupiter and thereafter to Gargunnock for extra blooms of
L’Ancresse from John Buchanan.
We duly arrived at the Festival site around 10p.m. to find it
was rather chaotic with only one small doorway being used for
access for exhibitors. Yours truly then had the bright idea of
making use of a fire exit door adjacent to the floral art section.
It seemed a good idea at the time until a very irate gentleman,
wearing a brightly coloured cravat, started to ‘do his nut’
because the breeze coming through the door had disturbed the chiffon
draped over his floral art exhibit and proceeded to lock us out.
Well, it had already been a long day, and I’m not sure if
the chap in question had ever had the privilege of seeing Rab
C. Nesbit in action, but the verbal that he received would have
done Rab proud:- “I will tell you boy” etc. etc. So
the door was hurriedly reopened to let in ‘the savages with
the funny accents’.
Later Tom Meirose, then John Jack accompanied by his good lady
arrived. They both had a van load of flowers. Tom, remind me never
to offer to give you a hand in with your buckets again. I think
I got a double hernia trying to lift them. Did nobody ever tell
you that you only require six inches of water in them?
After we had sorted out what blooms were available between us,
we had 19 blooms of Suffolk Spectacular to choose from, as well
as good coverage for the other classifications required. The exhibit
ended up with us using three Pink Jupiter; five Suffolk Spectacular;
five Kiwi Gloria and five L’Ancresse with contributions from
Dougie; John Whyte; John Jack; John Buchanan; Tom Melrose and
me. The strongest opposition looked to be from Eston Chrysanthemum
and Dahlia Society, who had canes on their blooms of Edna ‘C’
until just before judging.
With the exception of Dougie, who was staying on to assist with
the judging, we retired for a well earned rest to our digs at
Newcastle Polytechnic.
A delighted Scottish contingent converged on the Show Hall at
the Festival later that day. We had won by a clear eight and a
half points. John Jack had staged a super entry in the six vase
class of giant semi-cactus to win convincingly with a selection
of Jupiters. His Daleko Jupiter was reckoned by many to be one
of the best blooms ever seen. John also won the three vase of
giant semi-cactus and was runner-up in the nine blooms of giant
decoratives. John Bayne from Polmont, had also made the journey
down from Scotland and he also staged a good entry of six semis
to be second to J.J. Unfortunately John had made a ‘boob’
in his giant decorative entry staging three blooms of Wanda’s
Capella when no more than two blooms of one variety was allowed.
He therefore incurred the wrath of the judges and received the
dreaded N.A.S. Despite this he did himself proud with the quality
of blooms that he had brought a long way. The rest of us managed
to do reasonably well individually either winning or getting into
the tickets in some very strong classes.
So, it was with new found optimism and enthusiasm, that plans
were made for Harrogate the following week. By this time young
Andrew Semple’s giants had started to come on stream and
it was he who was to figure prominently at Harrogate. Dougie and
I drove a solidly packed van of flowers south, leaving Andrew
and his uncle Drew to follow by car. John Jack had passed on some
excellent blooms for us to exhibit on his behalf and I assume
that his adrenalin was starting to flow again as John rushed off
to make a frantic eleventh hour plea to his boss for just one
more day’s leave. We met up later that night at Harrogate
and I noticed the dirt on the knees of John’s trousers.
For the Inter-Society entry we decided to use John’s Wanda’s
Capella in preference to his two Bonaventure, one of which did
not have much left in the centre, although both were tremendous
blooms.
At the conclusion of staging we headed for the Guest House for
a few hours kip, only to discover that some idiot had misplaced
the keys. After a frantic search lasting some fifteen minutes
they were found on the floor of the van. The following day turned
out to be one of the most enjoyable and memorable that 1 have
experienced in my years of showing. Andrew won the Championship
Class for six giant semi-cactus plus the three vase class of giant
semi-cactus. With this exhibit he was runner-up to the Most Meritorious
Exhibit by a Member and one of his Rose Jupiter was the Best Vase
of Cactus or Semi-Cactus dahlias in the Show, finally ending up
with three Silver Medals and two Bronze Medals. John Jack had
the Best Bloom of Giant or Large Decorative in the Show with one
of his Bonaventure and was awarded the coveted Stredwick Trophy.
Once again we had triumphed in the Inter-Society Class - nine
points ahead of
High Wycombe with the Midlands in third place. One of the pleasing
aspects of our
exhibit was the number of exhibitors contributing blooms towards
it: John Jack -
Wanda’s Capella; Andrew Semple - Pink Jupiter; Doug. Semple
- Suffolk
Spectacular;, John Whyte - Eastwood Moonlight; Robert Fulton -
Kiwi Gloria.
Yes, truly a day to remember. Even when we adjourned for a pub
lunch, we basked in the hot sun of a glorious autumn day.
Hopefully this will serve to encourage fellow Scots, who I know
would do well, to make the trip over Hadrian’s Wall. After
all we’ve enjoyed the patronage of English exhibitors at
Stirling, and besides, Wembley is a thing of the past.
Finally, on returning I decided to use the hired van to take some
blooms to Townhead Show. As I pulled into the car park about 10.30
p.m. I noticed Jimmy Rae wandering about staring into darkness.
“Hello Jimmy. Not a bad night.” No reply was the answer.
I went into the hall a bit concerned about Jimmy’s state
of mind. Well we have often been concerned in that score, haven’t
we? Had the strain of running the tombola stall at Stirling finally
got to him? Or has he taken up astronomy?
I was told that Pat Comrie’s van had just been stolen
as Pat was sitting in the hall enjoying the hospitality of the
Townhead committee. A ‘Keystone Cop’ chase was in progress
with the ‘joyriders’ throwing exhibits out of the van
in their wake while making for the sanctuary of Drumpellier Country
Park. Police have now issued a description of a man they would
like to interview in connection with this incident. He was seen
running from the van into the bushes still clutching some beautiful
spray chrysanthemums.
Description is:- about 5’ 9” tall; late middle-aged;
almost bald; and indeed he looks a lot like Andrew Pinkerton!!