Landscape Juice

The heritage of the Garden Museum goes green

It was proving difficult to track down the Garden Museum, until I asked a passer-by who opened up their sat nav and pointed me on my way, writes Carol Miers.

I was meeting Jess Turtle the museum manager and fascinatingly, the burgeoning museum is inside its own de-consecrated church.

Cuckoo eggs for every occasion in a survival race

The cuckoo is pitted against other birds in a survival race as it has to sharpen its egg mimicry skills to outwit the improved detection abilities of other birds.

Cambridge University researchers studied 248 nests in Tring, Hertfordshire that contained a cuckoo camouflaged egg among other eggs, according to the BBC.

Birds, unlike humans, can detect ultraviolet light wavelengths as they have four colour sensitive retinal cones rather than the human eye's three. They, therefore, have a broader visual spectrum than humans.

Fearn's prickly cacti multiply at the Abbey Brook nursery

In 1956 Brian Fearn began the Abbey Brook cacti nursery. Brian had a childhood fascination with these succulents, a fascination that had grown over the years into cultivating cactii.

Today, fifty five years later Brian and his wife, Gillian have seven Plant Heritage National collections, including Echinopsis hybrids. Having won the Brickell Award in 2010 for his life's studies of lithops, Brian Fearn is turning to publishing his discoveries.

Recently Brian published a booklet on Echinopsis Hybrids and hopes to shortly bring one out about Lithops. Brian and Gillian have 5,000 lithops in 800 pots, some of which are sixty years old.

It all began long before the nursery. As a little boy Brian brought back from holiday his first six cactii plants bought with his holiday pocket money.

Elm tree to save rare White-letter Hairstreak butterfly

The interdependence of trees and insects comes to mind in a report by Butterfly Conservation that investigates the food supply of a rare butterfly.

The loss of the English elm from Dutch elm disease has affected the numbers of the White-letter Hairstreak.

This butterfly feeds on elm flowers and is now on the DEFRA UK 'priority' register as a result of its scarcity.

MRSA 'Superbug' killed by Thyme

It is often said that time is the greatest healer and it could quite literally be true.

Researchers at the University of Brighton found in tests that the oil from the herb thyme - normally associated with cooking and aromatherapy - will kill MRSA bacteria [Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus] within two hours.

A clean and attractive garden helps to sell houses

It's a difficult housing market out there at the moment; buyers can pick and choose what they buy or rent and probably haggle for a good price as well.

If you are selling or trying to let a property, take note; sixty-seven percent of potential buyers recently surveyed, say they would be put off buying or renting a potential property if it had an unattractive or untidy garden.

Forty-eight percent say that they would expect to get at least £50 a month knocked off of the monthly rental charge if the garden was untidy and forty-five percent of potential buyers would expect at least £5,000 knocked off of the sale price if it didn't meet standards.

Help scientists to record Non-native species

I remember once, when playing a game of golf, standing on the tee read to tee-off when all of a sudden out of the bracken came twelve Muntjac deer. They made a helluva din and boy could they shift for their size.

I estimate that they were no bigger than my labrador dog but ran as fast as a greyhound; I was extremely pleased that they decided to scarper down the fairway and not towards those of us standing on the tee.

Botanical gardens planned for Kabul University

The Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh is teaming up with the Kabul University to set up botanical gardens in the Afghan capital, Kabul.

An AFP news release reports that the new gardens will help future generations of Afghans learn horticulture and all about native plants.

Mohammad Yasin Mohsini, dean of the Kabul University's agriculture faculty, said that the gardens will play an important role and he believed they would become a popular asset with students.

The RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch event

The weather will have affected our garden birds considerable this winter: I found a dead Robin on the floor of my barn just after Christmas and judging by the poo plops around him, I suspect he had fallen from his night-time roosting perch - the lack of food and the cold probably became too much.

On today's Times Online, they say that the Robin may fall out of the top ten list of British birds in this weekends (30 & 31 January 2010) RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch event, due to the severe winter we are having.

Wellesbourne research centre at Warwick University to close

Warwick University has come under attack for its proposal to incorporate Wellesbourne research into its biological sciences department, reports Farmers Weekly.

The unit which employs 226 staff has been based at Wellesbourne for sixty years. Its closure will bring with it a reduction in research and development facilities in the UK.