We have been gardening with wildlife in mind now for four decades.We have endeavoured to include a wildlife pond in each of our 4 gardens in that time. Each year the frogs attracted to the ponds gather together towards the end of February to croak loudly day and night, to mate and leave piles of spawn. They have been so consistent up till now – whatever the weather the spawn appears in the same weeks of the year. If there is snow on the ground or if a mild spell gives bonus sunshine and blue skies they still perform in late February.
But this year they have waited until the first few days of March! I wonder why? We can’t complain about their lateness though as all this spawn will provide lots more frogs to live in the garden and act as natural pest controllers.
We enjoy pieces of sculpture around the garden, some we buy, some are pieces of interesting “found objects” from the beach or countryside, but more special are the ones we receive as presents and the most special of all are those created by the person giving them as presents.
This piece was made by our daughter, Jo, from copper sheet and copper piping, and inspired by the work of a fellow student. The piece is based on the leaves of the Stagshorn Fern. It always looks colourful with the colours changing as the day moves on and as the weather changes.
We “planted” the sculpture alongside a bronze leaved Phormium, to both compliment and enhance the sculpture and the plant.
Recently we explored the nature reserve, Brandon Marshes, run by the Warwickshire Wildlife Trust, and as the light began to drop the sun shone through the old leaves of a coppiced oak and the effect it presented was so similar to our sculpture. the colour, texture and shape. Amazing coincidence.
We visited the Winter Garden at the National Trust’s Dunham Massey just after it opened, so we returned this week to see how things had developed. Wow! This is some Winter Garden. The National Trust enlisted Roy Lancaster, one of my gardening heroes, to help with its design so there is some interesting planting. We wandered around it for hours trying different routes through it which afforded us the opportunity of seeing each bit of planting in a different light. This is a garden for all the senses, our eyes, noses, fingers and ears enjoyed every moment. It was busy but the design and quality of planting seemed to make everyone remain quiet. Quiet enough to hear the birds, bees and insects at work.
A winding path lead us through an area of mature trees underplanted with miniature daffodils, an area where the trees’ long shadows cut across the Daffodils, beautifully lit by the low sun and shining like gold, and soon we glimpsed the massed planting of white barked Birches.
There were two distinct areas of Birch trees, single stemmed specimens one side of a path and multi-stemmed on the other. Betula utilis “Doorenbos” was the chosen variety and their trunks were a clear crisp white.
As well as the usual winter flowering bulbs such as crocus, snowdrops and daffodils there were several different coloured varieties of Iris reticulata those tiny bulbous plants with over-sized flowers in shades of purple and blue, all with yellow beards.
In some areas of lawn these diminutive Irises have been naturalised under trees. We had never seen this done before and have to say it was very effective.
It was so heartening to see and hear bees, hoverflies and other insects at work around the flowering shrubs, Lonicera fragrans, Cornus mas, Daphne mezereum “Alba”, Viburnum bodnantense and Viburnum tinus.
Lovely as the flowers of winter are, sometimes the colours, textures and shapes of leaves can be just as impressive – Bergenias, Liriope and variegated Ilex for example in their many colours.
We cannot ignore the snowdrops though, and here at Dunham Massey they have been so thoughtfully placed, at the bases of trees or shrubs.
The textures and colours of bark add another dimension to this winter garden, peeling bark, shining bark, bark like snake-skin, red stems, contorted stems, curling stems, shimmering stems.
In the photo below the ginger-coloured shining bark of Prunus serrula shoot upwards from the golden leaves of Liriope.
With all the new season’s flowers, the colourful stems and bark, and the scents it would be too easy to miss the effect the winter light can have as it plays across the seed heads of last year’s flowers and stems. Giant lilly stems with their huge seed pods towering up above a sea of desiccated flower heads of a variety of Hydrangeas stopped us in our tracks.
When the wind blew these seed heads rustled gently, temporarily drowning out the sound of the Blackbirds turning over the mulch of bark and throwing the dried leaves fallen from trees last Autumn over their shoulders. The gentlest breeze set the bamboos swaying and rustling but it took a stronger wind to move the conifers overhead and start their music making. Over our heads in the mature tree canopy we could hear the calls and songs of Goldcrests, Nuthatches, Coal Tits and Blue Tits occasionally drowned out by the drumming of Great Spotted Woodpecker, all proclaiming their territorial rights in their own unique way.
There was so much to appreciate in the Winter Garden at Dunham Massey that it is hard to leave. But it had another surprise around another corner, a beautifully woven willow den, created from many coloured stems. Jude, the Undergardener, as usual could not resist, so a quick exploration was called for before coffee and cakes called even louder from the restaurant!
As part of the development of the shared community spaces at Bowbrook Allotment Community we have created “Gardens of the Four Seasons”. We did this with the support of “The Peoples Postcode Trust” who awarded us a generous grant for the purchase of plants. In early 2011 we began work on the Winter Garden and now we are beginning to see some results of our labours. The work was carried out by allotment holders who attend regular working parties (look out for future blog about our working parties) and the gardens are maintained by members. Much work is also done outside working parties by individuals or small groups.
I designed the garden and presented the plan to the management committee and informed other members by e-mail, asking for comments, further suggestions and ideas. The basic idea was to create a garden full of trees, shrubs, grasses, bulbs and perennials that looked good in the winter, for their stem colour, bark colour and texture, their flowers, their scents. Movement and sound was also considered so we included many grasses and some trees with rustling stems.
It is now a year since we began the groundwork. The preparation was completed by the end of February 2011 and the main framework of planting by the end of March.
The first step was to rotovate the land, almost triangular in shape, in the corner of the site furthest from the huts, about 10 x 20 metres. We then added manure and rotovated once more. We dug out a path shaped as a serpentine curve, which cut the border in two, edged it with logs and gave it a deep layer of bark. It proved soft and comfortable to walk on. A thick layer of compost was added to the planting areas and raked level and we were prepared for planting.
Our Winter Garden is situated in a corner of the site. A water-butt is ready to be placed conveniently for watering in dry periods. In front is one of our wildlife banks.
Trees and shrubs were delivered by The Dingle Nursery from Welshpool, who had proved so helpful in helping us to select the best when we visited them to place our order. Unloading the truck and unpacking the plants was an exciting time, full of anticipation. Transporting them across the site took longer than expected involving three plot-holders with wheelbarrows. Some of the trees were just too long to stay put. After an hour of laughter and regular rescuing of dropped goods, we finally began planting. It was to take a few days.
Trees in place.
Bulbs and herbaceous plants arrived by post and were added to our structural planting of trees and shrubs. a selection of grasses was added later. We now had trees with coloured bark, shrubs with coloured stems and a winter flowering time, perennials such as Hellebores and Pulmonaria and grasses to give movement and beautiful seed heads.
Plot holder Pete busy planting.
In pride of place are our three silver-barked Birches, Betula utilis “Jacquemontii” planted as 3 metre tall specimens, along with similarly sized Prunus serrula with its shining gingery-bronze bark. Smaller specimens of Acer davidii (a snake bark maple), Acer griseum appreciated for its peeling red bark and a selection of variegated Hollies completed the structural planting.
Key plants in place.
For bark colour we planted dozens of Cornus, Salix and Rubus tibeticanus to give an airy network of colour all winter and early spring. We interplanted these with patches of Lavender to give some summer interest, to attract butterflies, bees and hoverflies and to provide gentle bluish foliage colour all year. For winter flowering interest and scent we planted Cornus mas and Viburnum bodnantense “Dawn”.
In order to maintain all year interest with greatest emphasis of interest we added evergreens. As well as the Hollies we included Viburnum tinus and several conifers chosen for the variety of foliage colour, texture and habit of growth – Picea pungens Procumbens, Pinus sylvestris, Chamaecyparis “Boulevard” and to top it off John, our committee’s chairman donated a lovely specimen of Cedrus atlantica glauca. As a contrast we also planted a Larix decidua a conifer that is deciduous.
When we planted the trees and shrubs, following the allotment site’s organic policy, we gave them a sprinkling of bonemeal in the planting holes and top-dressed with blood fish and bone fertiliser before mulching with manure. We plan to give the bed regular mulching of compost and manure to give a slow-release nutrient regime.
Working parties and individual volunteers worked throughout the year to keep weeds at bay.
Volunteers at work tidying and weeding.
By late summer the garden was showing lots of healthy growth and we could see much promise for the future.
Full of promise.
In the autumn we gave the garden a mulch of chipped bark to protect it from the ravages of winter and to slowly break down releasing nutrients and improving humus levels ans soil texture.
This week three of us weeded the bed over, tidied, pruned and loosened up the soil. It was amazing to look at progress and realise how the garden had developed in less than a year. Bulbs were flowering, the trees and shrubs have made good growth and in particular the willows and dogwoods are showing strongly coloured stems.
Winter sunlight through Miscanthus and Cornus.Stripes of fence shadows fall across a variegated holly.Blood red dogwood stems.Peeling bark like brittle toffee.Green flowered hellebore with striped shadows.Premature bud burst on Viburnum.Striped snake bark maple.
With so much to see after such a short time, we can but wonder at what our Winter Garden will bring us in the future. It was great fun creating it and judging from comments from plot holders it is already bringing much joy!
A bright sunny day! And mild too! We just had to spend it in the garden clearing away old leaves and flower stems of perennials, finishing pruning the climbing roses and as the grass was dry giving it a quick skim over with the mower. A bit of early Spring cleaning. As we worked our way around we sere periodically stopped in our tracks by the sight of colourful flowers.
A good clump of pale mauve crocus in the Rill Garden.Hidden inside is a rich deep yellow.A classic February pairing of snowdrops and winter aconite.Primrose yellow hellebore.Close up the hellbore shows hints of green.Speckled pink hellebore.Perfect cup shaped hellebore bloom.Dark secrets inside a bud.The delicate pale Ipheon.Tiny flowers - powerful scent!Perennial Wallflower "Bowles Mauve" - always in flower?Cornus mas - acid yellow scented flowers.Looking for the magic inside a Snowdrop!Out of season Ribes speciosum - flowers like red droplets.White and green - a most subtle hellebore.
My blog reporting on “A January Wander around the Allotments” was all about the cold, as my wander then was on a bright, sunny but cold day with the thermometer registering minus five. Today my wander was a real treat, with temperatures of plus seven, it felt so mild. The sky however was grey and produced the occasional bout of drizzle. The bird life definitely appreciated the improvement, with so many to see and hear.
My walk over to our plot was halted by the whoosh of wings and the sight of a Kestrel in full hunting mode, its grey and rufus back curling low through the plots in search of its favourite prey, Field Voles. In a matter of a few minutes it had covered half the site, stopping occasionally to peer from a post or shed roof. The birdsong didn’t diminish with its presence but later when a Sparrow Hawk appeared, in threatening mode over the plots, silence reigned.
As I went to open up the shed I noticed how the recent freezing weather had shattered the little orange glazed dish I keep shells in on our coffee table, exposing the white china below its glaze.
The feeders on our plot needed topping up before I set to work. My first task was to prune the Autumn fruiting raspberries, so pulled back their hay mulch and cut each stem down to just a few inches above the ground. Then their warm mulch blanket was replaced ready for the next cold spell.
After tidying the edge of the plot where Calendulas had died down messily, I cut down perennials in the “Bug Border” alongside our central path, Sedum spectabile “Autumn Joy”, Linaria and several different Marjoram, all grown for the butterflies and hoverflies. As I pruned down the Sedum a few “slips” came away which I popped into my trug to be potted up at home.
A coffee break was called for to rest an aching back. A chance to do some bird spotting and listening out for their calls and songs. It was noticeable how some had moved on from calls to songs with the changing light of February. The Great Tit was giving a good performance repeatedly calling out “Teacher Teacher” just as it says in the books, but I often think it sounds more like the squeak of a tyre foot pump in need of lubrication. Its smaller cousin the Blue Tit sang gently from all around the site.
The peace was shattered as soon as the Rooks from the rookery on the northern boundary lifted as one and poured overhead, a cacophony of “cawing” and “rarking”. They are busy now restructuring last year’s nests. When one returned to the tree tops with twig in beak all its neighbours objected vocally craning their necks threatening and warning others to keep their distance. They live together in huge nesting groups but argue all the time! Their little corvid cousins, the Jackdaw, are quieter and more social. They pass overhead without any argument.
Signs of things to come! New growth is appearing at the base of perennials and the Globe Artichoke plants. Disappointingly the green manures have grown very little but just manage to cover the bare soil.
Buds are fattening on the Black Currants and the Blackberries. Promises of autumn bounty.
So once the work on our Plot 37 was completed I wandered off around the site, with wheelbarrow loaded – secateurs for pruning the roses in the Summer Garden, camera to take shots, surgical gloves and step-ladder to clear out nest boxes. As I walked along the established hedgerows flocks of chattering finches moved away, keeping close top the hedge and to each other – Goldfinches, Linnets and Greenfinches. A surprise sighting was a flock of about 15 Yellow Hammers, the first time they have been seen here. Unfortunately one of the loudest noises was the dry screech of my wheelbarrow’s wheel! A quick detour to the shed for a squirt of penetrating oil cured it.
Where the hedge has been left uncut for several years (where the council flailing machines can’t reach) the bushes are tall and busy with finches and tits. A Song Thrush was throwing leaves and under-hedge debris out onto the path searching for its lunch. The calls of Nuthatches and Great Spotted Woodpeckers echoed around the allotments all the time I was on site, but one call was unexpected. It stopped me in my tracks. I had never heard the piping call of a Bullfinch up here before. It wasn’t hard to find – a male with its pink, almost cerise breast glowing from a tall Hawthorn.
Nestbox cleaning can be a painful business if the nests have been colonised by nest fleas, hence the surgical gloves. Luckily none in residence today! Four of the five tit boxes had been used last year. The open-fronted Robin boxes were ignored by our population of redbreasts.
This photo shows how the Great Tits who nested here used their tails for added balance when feeding their young through the hole. The wood stain has been worn away.
The box in the photo below was used three times in 2011, but the third attempt was thwarted by cold wet weather in the early autumn, so the clutch of eggs remains. When I emptied out the nesting materials I could see the three layers of nesting material. When I had emptied all the boxes the old nests were put in the compost heap.
In the meadow areas seedlings cover the ground, so our plan for self seeding meadows seems to be working out. In one meadow area a lone cornflower continues to throw up an odd bloom of the most beautiful blue.
It felt oh so good today to be sowing the first seeds of the year! And to make things even better it was warm and cosy in the greenhouse. There are so many seeds waiting in my tin all organised in sowing date order.
So today I sowed seeds of tomatoes, peppers (sweet, cayenne and hot), basil, parsley and leeks.
We always sow a variety of tomatoes to ensure lots of different colours, textures and flavours, so for 2012 we have Gardeners Delight, Moneymaker, Red Cherry, Black Cherry, Harbinger and a heritage variety called Potentate. Of course to go with tomatoes we need basil so we have sown Basil Sweet Genovase.
All the seeds sown today need warmth to germinate so we have put them in my home-made propagator which gives bottom heat and maintains an average 20 degrees celsius. Here they are in their special warm environment waiting for the lid to be closed.
And the seed potatoes are “chitting” away in their egg trays. So the allotment year has been launched and it feels good!!
Today as the weather has warmed up and the sun is seeping through a thin cloud layer, we decided to take a twenty-minute drive out to Attingham Park for a walk through the woodlands where snowdrops are the stars in February. It was half-term so the woods were colourful, bright coloured anoraks, scarves and hats as families took to the paths. Every child seemed to have found a suitable rustic walking stick from the undergrowth. It was great to see young families out enjoying the natural world.
As we passed through the stable block the sound of vigorous hammering filled the air echoing around us. A noisy coffee break but we enjoyed watching youngsters wielding hammers busily constructing nest boxes. A great idea from the National Trust. Every family leaving Attingham today has at least one child clutching proudly a newly built nest box.
Once into the wood itself we seemed to be guided along by Robins who entertained us with their songs.
The snowdrops are small this year and very slow to develop. Many are just at the early bud stage and those that have come our sport small blooms. The swathes under the tall bare deciduous trees were far less vibrant than expected so the beauty was to be found in the little clumps hidden away deeper into the woods.
But there was far more to the woods than Snowdrops and the temptation to photograph the textures and patterns found there was easily given in to.
The earliest of woodland shade loving plants are beginning to appear taking advantage of the light filtering through the veil of bare branches above them. The arrow shaped leaves of the Cuckoo Pint are glossy and shine out amongst in the monochrome leaf litter.
Leaving the woodland we took a track across the Deer Park. A warden appeared on a mini tractor closely followed by herds of excited deer. The tractor was pulling a trailer full of feed! This was an unexpected opportunity to see the park’s deer close up.
The deer may be the biggest and most obvious creatures here but the littlest are also of equal importance. Where the trust have been clearing dead and damaged trees they have taken the opportunity of creating habitats such as log piles, brash stacks etc to attract insects and invertebrates and small mammals. The woods here are now well-known for the population of Lesser Stag Beetles. In some places fallen branches and larger trunks are left to rot away to become hosts to fungi and multitudes of minibeasts.
This fungus seems to be leaking from the cracks in the dead bark, like woodworker’s glue seeping from a joint.
This dead tree left standing for fungi, invertebrates and insects looks dramatic alone in a clear area of parkland. Woodpeckers will enjoy attacking the peeling bark and rotting wood in search of tasty morsels.
One of the highlights of enjoying your garden in winter is noticing things that you take for granted the rest of the year. Little special details. Lichen, mosses and algae.
In our Japanese Garden the low rays of the winter sun brighten up lichen, mosses and algae on the lanterns. The greens and greys create a mosaic of soft textures.
Tints of green add interest to the greys of our specimen slate stones.
Even the Buddha is given a splattering of green emphasising the shapes of the fabric folds of the robe and curls of hair.
Lush green mosses find perfect conditions to flourish in side a terra-cotta flower-pot.
We love the humble Houseleeks. We grow them in pots, on the slate scree bed, in alpine troughs, on our old oak stump and even on an old brick. They are so simple, really just spiky little cabbages, but they have something special about them. Is it the subtle nature of their colours? Is it their reliability? Is it because they are there to delight the eye all year round? Or is it simply the variety? It certainly isn’t the flowers which grow up on oversized stalks and then make the plant fall over. They are called Houseleeks because people grew them on the roofs of their outside privies as they will tolerate such dry growing conditions. Perhaps the extra insulation helped too!
Just like the first Ford cars which you could buy in any colour as along as it was black, so with the Houseleeks you can have them in any colour as long as it is green. Green with varying depths and hints of red, black, purple or blue. And of course we mustn’t forget brown! Being succulents they like it dry and their colours seem richer in late summer when it is often at its driest in the garden.
The correct name for the Houseleek is Sempervivum and they originate from Europe and Asia. There are hundreds of named varieties but we choose them for their interesting colour or texture, not by name, as so many of them are so similar. We buy what we fancy. Some we choose because of their colours but others for their white spider’s web covering or fringing of bristles. Favourites are those with dark colours towards the points of the leaves.
All the pictures in this blog were taken in February which shows how useful an addition to the winter garden these little plants are. There can’t be many succulents that are useful plants with winter interest. The first couple of photos show the Sempervivums growing on our stump, the first enjoying the company of an icy green lichen and the second with the dead brown fronds of a fern.
When a Sempervivum flowers, sending the tall stem from the centre of a rosette, it dies, but the dead rosette is soon replaced with new offsets. This plant on the slate scree bed is still holding on to its flower stem surging from the now-dead rosette. Soon we shall pull it out and in the spring new rosettes will fill the gap. We leave late flower stems on the plants as they provide interesting structure. The subtle colouring of its rosettes work beautifully with its slate grey background.
Now we take a photographic journey around the garden in search of more Houseleeks.
Awaiting planting, still in their pots, sit four new varieties. Will we ever stop being tempted?
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