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Here are just a few of the annuals&nbsp;you will find at Ashtead Park Garden Centre depending on the season and availability:

Before you reach for the spray bottle, try flower power for tackling pests and diseases. Many common ailments from aphids to carrot fly can be kept at bay by planting annual flowers and herbs, readily available in our garden centre, alongside your veg in your %locations% garden. Here are a few to try:
Carrots and spring onions: carrot fly find their prey by smell, detecting carrot foliage a mile off. Plant pungent spring onions alongside, though, and their smell confuses the flies completely.
Roses and garlic: a forest of garlic planted with roses produces essential oils the rose draws up into its system, making it taste revolting to aphids.
Broad beans and nasturtiums: blackflies enjoy nasturtiums even more than broad bean shoots – so plant these annual flowers with beans and the flies abandon your veg for them.
Tomatoes and French marigolds (Tagetes): Another strongly-scented plant, whitefly hate the smell of French marigolds, so plant with tomatoes to keep them whitefly-free.
Lettuce and chervil: you'll have lettuce minus the aphids if you grow them alongside a generous row of leafy chervil: some say slugs dislike it, too. Both make great salad ingredients.
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about using herbs and annuals as companion plants.

Good companions

Just imagine a meadow full of flowers outside your back door. It's a dream many gardeners share: and it can&nbsp;come true if you plant one of the popular annual meadow mixes, available in our garden centre. Here's how:
Preparing the ground: annual meadows need good garden soil, unlike traditional hay meadows (wild&nbsp;meadows grow best on poor land, which is why they're so hard to establish in gardens). So weed the site,&nbsp;add organic matter and rake it into a fine tilth just like you would for sowing any seed.
Choosing your mix: Cornfield annual mixes include poppies, corn marigolds and corncockle; or choose a&nbsp;blend for short stems (around 40cm tall) or perhaps combining particular colours: red flax, black-eyed Susan&nbsp;and Californian poppies, for example, for a hot-coloured meadow.
Sowing and aftercare: mix seed with silver sand so it's easier to distribute evenly, then broadcast at about&nbsp;3g – a small-ish handful – per square metre. Rake in afterwards and water, then watch it grow. After you've&nbsp;enjoyed the display, clear the ground in autumn: some will re-seed but to get your special mix back again re-sow next spring.
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about planting annual meadows.

Annual meadows

Annual flowers are among the easiest plants you can grow. They're ideal for filling gaps, or simply producing&nbsp;a dazzling display of colour from summer to the first frosts. There's a great choice of annuals in our garden&nbsp;centre in %locations%: here's how to get perfect results every time.
Under cover: half-hardy annuals can't cope with frost: sow into pots in spring to plant out later 
1: Fill trays with seed compost: you'll find the equipment you need in our garden centre 
2: Place in a shallow bowl of water to soak up moisture from the bottom 
3: Sow seeds sparingly, and cover lightly with vermiculite or more compost 
4: Pot on seedlings as they grow, then plant out after the last frost.
Direct outside: hardy annuals can be sown straight into the garden from March 
1: Weed the bed and rake the whole site level. Water if necessary. 
2: Mark areas for each type of seed, dividing the bed into irregular sections 
3: Make drills 1/2cm deep within each section to identify your seedlings as they come up in lines 
4: Sow sparingly into each drill, cover lightly with soil and water
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about growing annuals from seed.

Sowing annuals

One of the great luxuries of gardening is collecting armfuls of cheerful flowers for filling vases to overflowing&nbsp;with colour and scent for the house. Some of the best flowers for picking are easy-going annuals, and we've&nbsp;picked our top ten from the wide range available in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre.
Bupleurum: lime-green flowers and foliage, contrasting perfectly with brighter colours
Cosmos: graceful daisy-like flowers on 90cm tall stems: 'Purity' is exquisite white, and 'Dazzler' is vivid pink
Ammi majus: frothing umbels of pure white flowers, like an elegant cowparsley
Tobacco plant (Nicotiana): tall, airy flowers in colours from white to pink to lime green
Snapdragons (Antirrhinum): pretty cottage-garden flowers with generous blooms
Cornflowers (Centaurea cyanus): blue is the classic colour, but they come in white, pink or darkest purple
Sweetpeas (Lathyrus odoratus): choose Spencer types for scent, and Grandifloras for big, blowsy flowers
Love-in-a-mist (Nigella): exquisite starry blue or white flowers are followed by architectural seedheads
Larkspur (Consolida): a rich royal blue flower with tall spikes produced till the first frosts
Bells of Ireland (Molucella laevis): curious curving spikes of vivid green bell-like flowers veined with cream
Please ask the staff in our garden centre for more information and advice about annual flowers you can pick&nbsp;for the house.

Annuals for picking

One of the best things about having a garden packed with annual flowers is that it's also full of wildlife.&nbsp;Butterflies, bees and other pollinating insects like hoverflies adore open annual flowers: birds will be hot on&nbsp;their heels after the big, generous seedheads.
Here's our pick of the five best varieties from the range in our garden centre to attract insects into your %locations% garden.
For butterflies:
Marigolds (Calendula officinalis): cheery orange flowers which are adored by butterflies 
Honesty (Lunaria annua): lots of simple, open pink or white flowers butterflies can reach easily 
Stocks (Matthiola): the scent of these cottage-garden favourites attracts butterflies in from miles around
For bees:
Phacelia tanacetifolia: fuzzy smoke-blue flowers on dense foliage which bees find irresistible 
Cornflowers (Centaurea cyanus): choose native blue types and they'll be smothered in bees 
Forget-me-not (Myosotis): these late-spring arrivals provide much-needed early nectar for emerging bees
For birds:
Sunflowers (Helianthus annuus): leave old sunflower heads in place for upside-down bluetits to feast on 
Love-in-a-mist (Nigella damascena): architectural seedheads provide valuable food for birds 
Teasels (Dipsacus fullonum): biennial, flowering in its second year, goldfinches adore spiky teasel heads
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about choosing annuals to attract&nbsp;wildlife.

Annuals for wildlife

Annual plants are here-today, gone-tomorrow party girls. They may have just one season in the sun, but what a season: they flower for an incredibly long time and are invariably so spectacularly beautiful you'll lose your heart to them.
We stock two kinds of annual in our garden centre in %locations%: hardy annuals to sow direct from March onwards, and half-hardies to sow under cover as they don't like frost. Here are just some you'll find in our garden centre.
Hardy annuals: 
Ammi majus: lacy white flowers over feathery foliage 
Poached egg plant (Limnanthes douglasii): cheery yellow-and-white flowers 
Love-in-a-mist (Nigella damascena): starry blue or white flowers followed by architectural seedpods 
Ladybird poppies (Papaver communtatum 'Ladybird'): scarlet papery petals each with a black blotch 
Nasturtiums: abundant red, orange or creamy flowers over rounded leaves
Half-hardy annuals: 
Cosmos 'Purity': clear white daisies with yellow centres on long stems 
Zinnias: pompom flowers in brilliant scarlets, yellows and purples 
Swan river daisy: profuse mauve daisies tumbling over pots and baskets 
Nemesia: another perfect container plant with pretty, delicate blooms 
Tobacco plant (Nicotiana): charming open flowers in pink, cream and green over big leafy rosettes
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about choosing and growing annuals.

Filling your house with the colour and fragrance of fresh flowers cut from the garden is one of the great pleasures of gardening. The trouble is, though, if you take all the flowers from the garden, there&#39;s nothing left to look at outside.

The answer is to create yourself a cutting garden &ndash; an area of your garden dedicated to raising flowers to enjoy indoors. The whole purpose of such a garden is to be harvested regularly, rather like a vegetable garden, so you don&#39;t mind if it&#39;s sometimes got a few bare patches.

You&#39;ll find all you need to create your cutting garden in our garden centre in %locations%. Here&#39;s how to go about it:

<ol>
	<li>Find the right spot: you&#39;ll need somewhere in full sun, as your plants will only flower to their full potential with plenty of light. Planting densely also demands a lot from your soil, so choose the best-quality patch you&#39;ve got.</li>
	<li>
	Get ready: before you start, dig over the area, removing weeds and large stones, and work in plenty of well-rotted farmyard manure. Then put in hedging and edging: you&#39;ll find plants for low hedging in our garden centre, and materials to lay a smart path.
	</li>
	<li>Choose your plants: select &#39;hardy annual&#39; seeds from the range in our garden centre. Great choices are bright, cheery Sunflowers, Cosmos with lovely daisy-like flowers and of course sweetpeas to train up a wigwam in the centre. Asters are also lovely and a great tip is to cut them early in the day.</li>
	<li>
	Start sowing: Sow your flowers from March onwards just like vegetables, in straight lines to make picking them easier. Make shallow drills and sprinkle the seed sparingly along the bottom. Cover with a little soil, label and leave.
	</li>
	<li>Keep the display going: sow little and often so you&#39;ve got some plants to pick, some coming up to flowering and some just sown. Support taller varieties like larkspur by sticking canes in each corner of the row and threading round string at intervals up the height of the plants.</li>
</ol>

Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about planting an annual cutting garden.

Annual cutting gardens

Natural planting using swathes of gently-swaying grasses shot through with drifts of tall, open perennials to mimic the wild look of the American prairie lands caught the imagination of gardeners across Europe in the 1990s, and it's been going strong ever since - you can see some fabulous examples at public gardens like Trentham in Staffordshire. It's a look you can adapt easily at home in %locations%&nbsp;for a gorgeous, contemporary design that's also very low maintenance.
You'll find all the plants you need in our garden centre: here's how to create your own back-garden prairie.
<ul>
<li>Choose the right spot: prairies need sunshine, so pick an open, bright area of your garden, preferably not too damp as most prairie-style plants prefer free-draining conditions. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Restrict your varieties: prairie planting relies on repetition for its effect, so limit your range of plants to a handful of grass varieties and a few perennials or annuals - just plant lots of them. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Start with the grasses: these form the backbone of your design, so choose carefully. Tall grasses move gracefully in the wind: good choices are Calamagrostis x acutiflora 'Karl Foerster', Molinia caerulea 'Transparent' or evergreen Stipa gigantea. All have spectacular flowers which sparkle in the frosts of winter. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Mix in the flowers: flat-headed or spherical flowers work best with grasses as contrasts in texture and shape. They often flower at the same height, too, giving that level prairie-like look. Go for achilleas, autumn-flowering asters, and other daisies: both echinacea and rudbeckias were made for prairie settings. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Plant in drifts: design your planting not in blobby groups, but in drifts of the same plant meandering naturally in waves through the design. Plant seven, nine or eleven of the same plant together: be generous for maximum impact. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Don't be too tidy: part of the charm of a prairie planting is the effect of frosty winter weather on seedheads and dead stems, so leave clearing up until February, when you can just chop everything back down to the ground and let it do it all over again.</li>
</ul>
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about designing prairie planting.

Prairie planting

Most gardens have a shady spot: a north-facing wall, perhaps, or under a tree, or in the shadow of a nearby building. Learn to love your shade: you'll find a world of new plants opens up, and you get a cool, pleasant nook to sit out of the heat of the day: perfect for enjoying an iced drink after a hot session gardening.
The range of plants you'll find in our garden centre in %locations%&nbsp;to grow in shade is extensive and includes delicate woodlanders, broad-leaved foliage plants and pretty spring flowers. We've picked our top ten shade-loving plants to turn your shady bits into garden highlights.
<ul>
<li>Hostas: there's an ever-wider choice of bold, broad-leaved hostas, from beefy ribbed 'Sum and Substance' to white-splashed 'Fire and Ice'. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Ferns: damp shady spots cry out for graceful Osmunda regalis or silver-and-purple Japanese painted ferns.&nbsp; If your shady spot is dry, grow Dryopteris felix-mas: 'Cristata' has curly-ended fronds. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Rodgersia: massive leaves like a bronzed horse-chestnut 30cm across erupt from the ground, followed by stately plumes of white or pink flowers 
.</li>
<li>Foxgloves: living wild in woodland, foxgloves love dappled shade. Grow common foxglove in purple or white, or an eyecatching modern multicoloured hybrid. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Epimediums: among the prettiest spring woodlanders, the young emerging leaves in shades of copper are almost as lovely as the dancing flowers. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Pachysandra terminalis: a really useful ground-cover plant with a dense covering of evergreen leaves that grow even in the deepest shade. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Euonymus: choose from silver-and-green 'Silver Queen' or gold-and-green 'Emerald 'n' Gold' for an easy, evergreen, low-maintenance shrub that sings out from a shady spot. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Brunnera: with broad, ground-smothering leaves (in 'Jack Frost' they're silvery-green), it's the flowers which really steal the show, powder-blue and prolific throughout spring. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Hardy geraniums: among the easiest plants to grow, geraniums flower profusely in shade: choose pale-coloured varieties like Geranium sanguineum 'Album' to glow in low light. 
&nbsp;</li>
<li>Heucheras: heuchera leaves are every bit as colourful as flowers, from rich plum 'Palace Purple' to 'Amber Waves', the colour of butterscotch. They're evergreen, too.</li>
</ul>
Please ask the staff in our %locations%&nbsp;garden centre for more information and advice about choosing plants for shade.

Annuals at Ashtead Park

A selection of Annuals at Ashtead Park

Plant Support

Annuals at Ashtead Park

A selection of Annuals at Ashtead Park

Sweet Peas

Petunia Surfina

Cosmos

Viola