veg 030720

Veg aplenty

It was so lovely to greet our first visitors to the Gardens since lockdown eased and to have a good selection of veg on offer for them. Our volunteers enjoyed the opportunity to chat to the visitors as they explored the Gardens. Maybe the sun will also sh ...

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The battle against box moths

Box tree caterpillars can eat their way through all the leaves on box bushes/trees and there can be 2 or 3 caterpillar hatchings a year. The moths were first reported in Britain in 2007 and are now widespread in London and the South East, so we have been ...

20200611_135526

Trims all round this week!

The prunus lusitanica (Portuguese laurel) in the Italian garden were simultaneously trimmed today by Steve, John, Martin and Sam. I don’t think Sue gave marks out of ten for their efforts at clipping to umbrella shape!! After a little light rain, th ...

bdr

Next up: pseudo acacias

The trees in the Gardens are looking beautiful and not yet suffering from the drought. We have three or four white and pink Robinia pseudoacacias, which don’t always flower but are this year. The indian horsechestnut is also in flower, while the ran ...

bty

Hot, hot, hot

It was 28 degrees at times on Thursday and it felt it! We had volunteers back working in the Gardens, with a full set of Covid 19 risk mitigation measures in place. So we spread out across the Gardens to start getting back on top of more of the basic main ...

rhododendron 1 May 2020

A beautiful invasive species!

The Rhododendrons are flowering prolifically in the Japanese garden under development. Our volunteers are progressively cutting them back into shape, so not letting them be the menace they can be when left untended. In large parts of the UK they have take ...

bty

Into the pink

Pink roses, lupins and campion are adding to the range of colours in the Italian garden, as well as orange helianthemums and purple alliums. They contrast beautifully with the fresh greens of the euphorbia and the trees and the silver of the yukka, phlomi ...

laburnam April 2020

The stunning laburnam walk

The laburnum walk is looking fabulous, with cow parsley wafting along the edge of the path. These are common laburnums. Unfortunately the Gardens’ county champion Laburnam Alpinum, which used to tower over the archive building, fell last year – ...

rosa

Our first rose of the year

The Countess of Warwick loved her roses. She planted a roserie at Stone Hall, her hideaway cottage the other side of her estate, and each rose had a Tudor rose shaped label, with a relevant quote from a poem. An 1886 magazine article says that at Easton L ...

RAS 1 April 2020 1

New leaves

Spring is really evident now, with the euphorbia looking lovely, the perennials coming up and the lavender greening. Fortunately the weeds are not yet rampant and our local Trustees are looking after the Gardens well. The daffodils throughout the Gardens ...

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Planting and weeding continues!

Volunteers worked across the Gardens, at a distance, getting lots of planting and weeding done. The new yews to replace the diseased yew hedge, were healed in and will be planted when the soil has dried out further. Lovely to see the daffodils and blossom ...