Leaf mold

Much of this afternoon was spent both in and on a pile of leaf mold. A lovely, deep pile of well-rotted leaf mold – thick, chocolately stuff, the consistency of a really good chocolate brownie, the kind that makes your mouth go all funny and sends a little shiver down your spine. The kind that offers your teeth the resistance of the barest hint of crust on the outside but rewards the persistance of your masticationary efforts with a meltingly gooey interior. The word ‘unctuous’ gets a bad press but was surely invented for this stuff – in fact, I’m not sure that anyone could ever have really appreciated the richenss of that adjective without having been here, on this pile at this moment, watching the shining blade of the shovel carve tranche after tranche out of the heap, hearing it flop wetly to the ground, crumbling as it falls. There has been rain of late in volume, and were I in particular mood I could wish the texture more friable. Candidly, I rather suspect the inclusion of grass during the incorporation of the heap, but I cannot say. I was not here at that time. But what this compost lacks in crumble it more than makes up for in luxury, and it will be more than adequate for purpose.

This lot is bound for the rose garden, to act as a mulch in order to supress weeds, and also as a soil conditioner to lighten the clay. In this the gardener will be given invaluable help from the host of worms which poplulate the rich humus, as they do the hard work of mixing the new layer organic matter with the soil. Before the mulch can be applied, I remove fallen leaves from the beds with the aid of a powered blower. These leaves will not make it into the main pile, instead meeting their fate on the bonfire and thereby minimising the proliferation of rose blackspot (the fungus Diplocarpon rosae). Once the beds are clear, applicaton of the fresh leaf mold involves accurate aiming of the barrow, and the use of a long-tined compost fork – by far the most efficient tool for spreading the mulch between the stems of the rose plants.

I have posted before (in Leaf fall and Cloth of Gold) on the wonder of leaves. As I write this on Hallowe’en, and in spite of the fierce winds at the beginning of the week, we have not yet entered the peak of the leaf raking season, with many trees keeping a stubborn grasp on their foliage. But it’s surely a matter of days if not weeks before leaves cover our gardens again, and it’s as well to have a plan of what to do with them once they’ve been coralled and collected. It would, after all, be criminal to let all that potential goodness go to waste.

Honey fungus

Autumn is the season for mushrooms, the fruiting bodies of fungi that appear suddenly in our gardens at this time of year, along with morning mists and the smell of woodsmoke. An integral part of our environment fungi play an essential role within the ecosystem, converting dead material into nutrients required for plant growth. However, in the quasi-naturalistic setting of the garden, not all fungi are created equal. There are relatively harmless saphrophytic fungi, which live on dead or decaying organic matter, and aid the process of decomposition. These perform a vital function and one which, from a gardener’s perspective, is relatively benign. There are also beneficial micorrhizal fungi which form a codependnent relationship with the roots of plants, assisting in the uptake of nutrients from the soil in exchange for sugars and carbohydrates. But there are also pathogenic fungi, which are rather more of a nuisance, possessing as they do a penchant for living material.

Two weeks ago, several patches of cinnamon hued mushrooms, each with a darker central spot on the cap, appeared in one of my regular gardens. This was not an auspicious start to the day, as these mushrooms bore a marked resemblance to one of the three signs of the armillaria group of fungi, also known as honey fungus. Armillaria is a virulent pathogenic genus – recognised by the RHS as ‘the most destructive fungal disease in UK gardens’ – which invades the roots of trees and woody perennials, weakening the plant and then consuming the decaying organic matter. The cap of the mushroom is convex at first, like a shallow dome or half a tea cake, but as it ages the outer edges curve upwards, revealing the gills beneath. While the mushrooms do not necessarily appear each year the presence of honey fungus is also suggested by a sheet of white fungal growth beneath the bark at the base of the infected plant, and by the characteristic black rhizomorphs, or ‘bootlaces’, by means of which the organism can spread long distances through the soil. The mushrooms in this garden were concentrated around the decaying remains of some old shrubs, on which both the white mycelial sheet (which smells very noticeably of mushrooms) and the beginnings of the bootlaces were evident. Finding the fruiting bodies, with their characteristic colouring, was a fairly good indicator of what was now lurking in the lawns and borders. Finding all three signs together removed any remaining vestiges of doubt. Honey fungus, I was now confident, had arrived.

To put things in perspective, it is reputedly the case that the largest living organism is a kind of honey fungus, Armillaria ostoyae, which covers an area larger than 2,000 acres in a forest in Oregon. No wonder that I wasn’t overjoyed to see its relative manifesting in these Kentish grounds.

A pair of mature birch trees dominate this garden (there had originally been three, but one had to be felled last year when I noticed a rotten hole had developed at the base of one – mentioned in a blog post here), and one of the newly planted borders near a particularly fine crop of mushrooms features a Magnolia 'George Henry Kern', Viburnum tinus, and Hydrangea 'Annabelle'. I couldn’t have created a more sumptuous menu for the honey fungus had I tried – all of these appear on the list of plants particularly susceptible to this pathogen, so we shall have to keep an eye out for signs of stress, by which time it may well be too late. I would prefer where possible to lift the plants and containerise them in the same position with some artful planting to hide the containers, a plan that’s presently in negotiation. The first step was to dig out all the infected rotten wood – stumps and roots were well decayed by now and offered little resistance to the trusty mattock – and as much soil as possible, all of which was bound for the bonfire. The chemical control for this was banned for use as a garden herbicide in 2003, so physical destruction (burning) of infected material is the only legal option at present. The legislation wasn’t able to prevent me from disinfecting my tools with Jeyes Fluid before moving on to other areas of the garden, a sensible precaution to take.

The next step is to have a reputable tree surgeon inspect the remaining birch trees for signs of infection, particularly as the root and stump of their departed companion resembles at present some kind of mushroom gourmand’s fantasy. These trees are too tall and close to the house, and the garden too exposed and windy, to countenance any chance of structural weakness.

Should the worst transpire, we will have to look to more resistant plants – a list of which is available here – to replace those that might succumb too easily to this voracious fungus. For now, we’re pairing the measures we’ve already taken to all the optimism we can muster, and hoping it won’t come to that.

Tthe beginnnings of blue black ‘bootlace’ rhizomorphs in the middle of this rotten stump

Eat your greens

Wandering along the farm lane, as I do several times a day with Bill, I spend many a happy while examining the hedgerows. It’s fascinating to me that while we tend to think that at this time of the year the whole natural world is a few short weeks away from bedding down for a long winter snooze, many perennial and biennial plants are gearing up for spring, thrusting out lush green foliage and staking a claim to their spot for the new growing season. Here’s a selection of native plants, most of which are doing just that, and all of which, it occurs to me, might not make it that far in an unmolested state, owing to them being either rather tasty foragers’ fare, or rather useful in some way.

Nettles (Urtica dioica) and cow parsley (Anthriscus sylvestris) making an attractive emerald tableux. The beautiful cheese Cornish Yarg (as sold by Lynher Diaries, amongst others) is wrapped in the leaves of stinging nettles. Recipes for nettles abound – soups, risottos, nettle and parmesan fritters – quite apart from which you can more or less use it as you would spinach. Cow parsley should absolutely not be consumed unless you can be entirely positive about its identification, as it can be mistaken for the dangerously poisonous distant cousins hemlock and fool’s parsley. Consult Richard Mabey’s excellent book Food for Free and find an experienced forager who can show you the key identification points to look for. If you’ve overcome the possibility of a horrible death, the leaves are quite nice in salads. But the fear of imminent expiration can play havoc with the digestion.

Burdoch (Arctium minus). Young leaf stems need to be peeled, and then can either be used raw in salads or boiled in a similar way to asparagus. You’ll want to avoid itchy balls, which cling like velcro to absolutely anything with a slight pile. But you’re unlikely to find young stems on a plant that’s gone to seed, so this shouldn’t be an issue when foraging. 

Comfrey (Symphytum sp.) Good for making a foulesomely noxious but fantastically nutritious plant tonic. There’s some evidence that it may help broken bones to heal, hence one of its common names, knitbone. Use young leaves in salads, cook leaves of any age as you would spinach. 

Garlic mustard, or Jack-in-the-hedge (Alliaria petiolata). For a piquant garlicky flavour, whose leaves make a splendid sauce for lamb when chopped with young hawthorn leaves in vinegar and sugar.

Dandelion (Taraxacum officiale) It does make you wonder why people spend such an awful lot on ghastly salad that’s steadily rotting inside a suffocating platic bag, when lovely fresh leaves that you can  hoik out by the handful are liberally clothing just about any lawn that hasn't been chemically nuked to within an inch of its life. Go on, give it a go. Stick a handful in a sandwich at first, then maybe progress to including them on the side of a plate with a hearty oil and vinegar dressing.

Hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna) Known colloquially as ‘Bread and Cheese’, presumably for its ubiquity. The leaves are very edible, surprisingly substantial with a crisp texture and a slightly nutty taste, although a little bitter at this time of year. The berries, or haws, can be used in fruit leathers or jams, though they’re not especially tasty on their own.

In between days

An awareness of the passing seasons is a grounding thing. It relates us to the world outside our window which might otherwise be perceived only in momentary glimpses as the natural realm intrudes upon our busy lives: suddenly we’re driving to work in the dark, shorts and t-shirts are consigned to the back of the wardrobe, and one day soon we’ll awake to find the lawn shrouded in leaves. We note the signs that mark our passage from spring to summer, to autumn, to winter and back to spring and, while we may complain about the less welcome aspects – complaining is in our nature after all, and something to be enjoyed – we are fortunate to live in a part of the world where the passing of time is softened by the comforting regularity of discernibly different seasons. But as much as we tend to think of clearly defined periods, each with their own individual events and moods, in reality we spend as much time transitioning between one and the next, where the interregnum is marked by a character of its own.

We are somewhere between summer and autumn, which has as distinctive a personality as a snowy winter’s day or a fresh spring morning. Fuchsias reign in the borders alongside the big daisies; asters and echinacea, dahlias, helianthus – hairy of leaf and smiley of countenance – cosmos and heleniums, while nicotianas waft and tall miscanthus shamelessly exploit the low evening sun. Sweet peas are running to seed faster than I can cut the flowers, and must now be wrested from their supports. It has become impossible to walk down the garden path without some specimen of ripened vegetation popping a seed pod at me. Earlier flowering plants have done their thing for the year and are capturing the last of the summer’s nourishing sun, squirreling it away underground in bulbs or starchy roots, before they drop their leaves and hibernate for the winter.

This week, the first of the leaves have started to turn. Not the desiccated parchment coloured foliage caused by a dry summer, which caused alarm in some quarters at the prospect of an unlikely early autumn. These are the first signs of the rich golds and reds and earthy hues in which autumn prides itself, as the green slowly bleeds out of each leaf with the shortening of the days.

By then, of course, it will be autumn proper. Something to look forward to.