Crossword

Put down your trowel, pick up a pen and exercise those brain muscles instead…

ACROSS

1 Plot staples that may need protection from cabbage root fly (9) 7 Fibre from coconut husks, used in potting compost (4) 8 This genus of cottage plants includes the colourful ‘Band of Nobles’ series (7) 9 Sprinkle fertiliser around these showy spring bulbs (6) 10 Common name for trees of the picea genus (7) 11 Now is a good time to sow new __ (5) 13 An icon of spring with showy, scented cup- or star-shaped blooms (8) 15 Latin name meaning stinging, as in Urtica __ (5) 17 ‘Warm __ ‘ is a hybrid tea rose with peachy coral petals (6) 20 Refers to a flower that cannot produce seeds (7) 21 Drape __ over fruit trees on frosty nights to protect fragile blossom (6) 22 Herb with grey-green leaves used in cooking (4)

DOWN

1 Pick off dead flowerheads from spring __ (5) 2 Plant new beds of this delicacy, eaten for its tender young shoots (9) 3 Huge genus of plants including ragworts and groundsel (7) 4 Worm __ can be a nuisance on 11 across (5) 5 __ siberica ‘Spring Beauty’ is aptly named (6) 6 Popular dessert apple, ‘Cox’s Orange __’ (6) 11 Ideal evergreen hedging plants with dark-green, glossy leaves (7) 12 Keep doing this to root out bindweed, couch grass and other invaders (7) 13 __ the lawn if the grass is growing too long (3) 14 Vinca minor is better known as __ periwinkle (6) 16 The structure that develops from an ovule after it has been fertilised (4) 18 ‘__ of Jura’ is an easy-togrow maincrop potato (4) 19 Type of cutting that is pulled away with a piece of stem (4)