bdr

The joys of Spring

Sunshine, flowers, company, a bit of manual work and coffee and cake – the joys of spring for our volunteers! Ruth, Valerie and Maggie got to enjoy it in the Italian garden where the autumn planted tulips are looking great. Others worked on the stum ...

bty

The waterlilies are back in the pond!

The pond is nearly full again and looked fabulous today in bright sunshine. Terry, Jane and Valerie returned the waterlilies to their planters, while Christine worked on putting back the oxygenator plants to the pond.  Sue will be sourcing a range of marg ...

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Japanese area is taking shape

Jacqueline and crew planted bamboo today, having planted shrubs and trees last week, and showed visitors from the U3A a detailed drawing of how the Japanese area will look when it matures. Peto’s inspiration is alive and well – but our moss ro ...

bty

Cherry plum jam this year perhaps?

Hopefully a few jars of jam. But it will take some time before this cherry plum tree gives us the 10 bushels of cherry plums that the September 1886 Journal of Horticulture and Cottage Gardening reported had been picked in a year in our walled Garden! Tha ...

bty

Undeterred by torrential rain!

There was torrential rain and high winds both before and after this lovely photo of potential new volunteers being shown round the Gardens! When the sun was shining the Gardens looked fabulous – with the honey bees buzzing around the peach blossom; ...

bty

We are blossoming!

It was a cold, windy day but there were sunny spells when it was warm in the Italian Garden and in other sheltered spots. And the early blossom on the trees shows spring is here! As we are returning more Japanese features to the Gardens, is there a case f ...

bty

All ready for action

The big pond clean up has started…. the men manned the pump and took care of the fish, while Christine pretty much single handed barrowed away old weed for composting. As I write the pump is still whirring away and we hope that on Saturday we will b ...

bty

Looking beautiful

Come and see for yourself – the weather is set fair! For this Sunday’s Open Day the snowdrops are perfect; we have lots of snowdrops in the green ready and our beautiful snowdrop mugs and vases for sale; and of course Carolyn has stocked up on ...

bty

More snowdrops revealed!

The new fence at the top of the walled kitchen garden looks so much better than the scrappy red and white “keep out” tape! And the clearance work at the top end of the garden has also revealed how many snowdrops there are in among the rubble o ...

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Winter in the gardens

With the thermometer barely reaching three degrees above freezing an incredible 18 volunteers came to the Gardens this Thursday.  There could almost have been a competition for  the greatest  number of layers of clothing everyone was wearing to keep the c ...

sdr

Closed season jobs continue

David has been creating this fabulous chessboard. Meanwhile the transformation of the walled kitchen garden continues. Sam is continuing his herculean task of clearing bracken from the top end, carefully lifting and replanting snowdrops and daffodils as h ...