October is a great month for colour. What probably springs to mind is the bronze foliage that will cover our landscape. Leaves of many popular trees and shrubs such as Acers, Hamamelis and Cornus go through what can be described as the traffic light sequence ending in red. However, we shouldn't forget the golden colours of so many ornamental grasses and the bright colours of Dahlia's and stylish berries of Callicarpa and Pyrocantha.
The plant which is the focus for this month is special to both my wife and I as it is the tree is had in the church at our wedding this summer. We wanted to be a little different instead of the usual flowers. We visited several local garden centres so we could both get a feel of what we would like at our wedding. We had in our mind a tree in flower. However; my concern was that it might not be in flower on the day. So we decided to go for something that had bold green foliage with an ornamental quality to it. We chose the tree Liquidambar or more commonly Sweet Gum'. Liquidamber is a deciduous tree native to warm temperate Eastern North America. The tree makes a cone shape to a size approximately 15m x 10m. It flowers in March but more distinguishingly has striking green foliage from April to late August. This is followed by the traffic light transition ending in hot autumn red before it drops its leaves. The great thing about this tree is that it can tolerate a range of soil in sun or light shade. This tree would be quite at home in anything but a small garden. If you do have a small garden and you would like your patch of ground to resemble a landscape on fire then Euonymus Europaeus Red Cascade' may be the plant for you.
Liquidamber styraciflua (above)
Things to do this month I find it's a good time to give conifer hedges a final trim; this will neaten their appearance till at least April. It is now time to take tender plants into the greenhouse before it turns cold and in the vegetable garden sow sweet peas in pots and over winter in a cold frame.