Why has my tree not come into leaf this spring?
The scratch test that tells you in ten seconds whether it is alive, the species that are simply late, and the six causes of genuine spring failure.
beginner30 min5 min read
Pests & Problems
Diagnosing what's eating, wilting or spotting your plants.
102 guides in Garden
Why is there grey fuzzy mould on my plant?
Botrytis takes hold on dead and damaged tissue and then moves into healthy tissue — why it is really a ventilation problem, and the cuts that stop it.
beginner15 min4 min readWhat are the brown bumps on my plant's stems and leaves?
Scale insects hide under a waxy shield that no contact spray penetrates — why physical removal is the treatment and when the one vulnerable stage occurs.
intermediate20 min4 min readWhy do my greenhouse crops get worse every year in the same border?
Greenhouse soil sickness — what actually accumulates in a border grown with the same crop, how to recognise it against the things it is mistaken for, and the four real remedies.
intermediate2 hr4 min readWhy does the same plant keep dying in the same spot?
Replant disease, soil-borne pathogens, buried obstructions and the ordinary site problems behind a place in the garden that kills whatever you plant there.
intermediate30 min4 min readHow do I disinfect a greenhouse after a disease outbreak?
What survives the winter in a greenhouse and where it hides, what disinfection can and cannot achieve, and the order of work that gives you a genuinely clean start.
intermediate4 hr4 min readHow do I keep deer and rabbits out of a garden?
Identifying which animal is doing the damage from the cut, the fencing heights that actually work, and the plants each tends to leave alone.
intermediate4 hr3 min readHow do I net fruit without trapping birds?
Mesh size, tension and a frame are the three things that decide whether netting protects fruit or kills wildlife — plus what to do when you find something caught.
beginner1 hr 30 min4 min readHow do I stop squirrels digging up my bulbs?
Physical barriers that work, the bulbs squirrels leave alone, and why every scent-based deterrent stops working within a fortnight.
beginner45 min3 min readHow do I stop wasps ruining my fruit?
Wasps rarely start the damage — they enlarge holes made by birds, codling moth and splitting — so the practical answer is removing the first wound, the fallen fruit and the sugar sources.
beginner40 min4 min readWhat is the sunken cracked bark on my apple tree branches?
Identifying apple and pear canker, why it takes hold on wet heavy soil and around wounds, and the cutting-out and hygiene that stop it spreading through a tree.
intermediate1 hr4 min readWhy do my leaves look dull, silvery and finely speckled?
Stippling, silvering and bronzing are the signature of sap-suckers feeding cell by cell — how to tell red spider mite, thrips and leafhopper apart, and what each needs.
intermediate20 min5 min readWhy does my peony not flower?
Planting depth is the answer in most cases and it is the one people find hardest to believe, plus the other five causes and the buds that brown off just before opening.
beginner30 min5 min readWhy has my gooseberry bush been stripped of its leaves?
Gooseberry sawfly can defoliate a bush in days, always starting low in the centre — which is exactly where to look, and why checking from mid-spring is the whole technique.
beginner30 min3 min readWhy have the leaves on my plum tree gone silver?
The test that separates real silver leaf from harmless false silvering, how far the infection has usually travelled by the time you see it, and when a tree is worth saving.
intermediate45 min5 min readWhy is my tree sending up shoots from the roots and base?
Suckers from a rootstock, water shoots after hard pruning, and root suckering species — three different causes with three different responses, and why cutting them makes it worse.
beginner30 min6 min readWhat does bracket fungus on a tree trunk mean?
What a bracket is actually telling you, why its position on the tree matters more than its species to a non-expert, and why removing it achieves nothing at all.
intermediate25 min4 min readWhat has cut neat notches round the edges of my leaves?
Telling a leafcutter bee's smooth semicircle from a vine weevil's ragged notches — one needs nothing done, the other is a warning about the roots.
beginner12 min4 min readWhat is honey fungus and can I save my plants?
Confirming honey fungus rather than assuming it, why there is no chemical control, and the management and replanting choices that actually help.
intermediate40 min3 min readWhat is the white fluffy stuff on my plant's stems and leaf joints?
Mealybug indoors and woolly aphid outdoors both hide under white wax — how to tell them apart from mould and from cuckoo spit, and how to clear them.
beginner18 min4 min readWhy do my pear leaves have bright orange spots?
European pear rust needs both a pear and a juniper to complete its life cycle — which is why it has spread through UK gardens, and what can and cannot be done about it.
beginner25 min3 min readWhy do my plants die after heavy rain, and how do I tell drowning from drought?
Waterlogging kills by removing air, not by adding water — the symptoms it shares with drought, the ones that separate them, and what to do while the ground is still wet.
intermediate20 min5 min readWhy do my plums and cherries split after rain?
Splitting is a water problem with two halves — rain absorbed through the skin, and soil that swung from dry to wet — and only one of them is under your control.
beginner20 min3 min readHow do I deal with lily beetle?
Recognising the beetle and its disguised grubs, why hand picking beats spraying, and the timing that keeps lilies and fritillaries intact.
beginner20 min3 min read