Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2024 i The English Garden

After spring’s wet start, the slug and snail plague, and the disappointing performance of my dahlias (thanks to both of the above), I am now pinning my hopes on autumn to deliver something in the way of spectacle in my garden this year. Unfortunately, I haven’t put quite as much thought into planting for autumn as I have the other seasons and, as it approaches, I realise I need to put that right. A scarlet Euonymus alatus would give things a much-needed boost, as at The Sir Harold Hillier Gardens in Hampshire, or an Acer palmatum ‘Sango-kaku’ like the perfect golden specimen at Devon’s Regency House. I did, however, plant a beautiful cherry two years ago: my Prunus ‘Kanzan’ has super orange and red autumn leaf colour and not only…

Dr Olivia Chapple The founder and chair of trustees at Horatio’s Garden on the life-affirming powers of nature and the expansion of this unique charity project My son Horatio sparked the idea for Horatio’s Garden. He wanted to be a doctor, like me, and as a teenager he worked summers at a spinal unit in Salisbury. The idea of making a garden so patients, families and staff had somewhere to enjoy nature on site was his idea. We’d done some fundraising and had a rough plan before he was killed. At that point, the fundraising really took off. People were so moved by his story and the fact that this idea had come from someone so young. We realised we could do something extraordinary with the funds. Cleve West agreed…

Jenny Parsons is a gardener who enjoys a good laugh. The roughly sketched map of her five-acre garden in East Devon handed to visitors on open days includes areas named ‘Nomansland’, ‘Back of Beyond’, and a bed labelled ‘Lost Sock’ where Wagtail the Jack Russell terrier once buried a Merino wool sock. But as well as being a lot of fun, this exuberant garden is chock full of plants, from the commonplace to the rare, as Jenny’s spreadsheet of over 1,000 entries testifies – something she jokingly refers to as “an external hard drive for my dwindling brain. And if I didn’t like a plant there’s likely to be a sniping comment next to it!” Jenny and her partner, Matt Boyd, moved to Regency House, a large former rectory surrounded…

TOP 10 PLANTS The gardens at Chatsworth in Derbyshire are home to Arcadia: a 15-acre garden of meadow-like glades connected by woodland walks. Planted during 2019 and 2020, it is part of a collaboration between the 12th Duke and Duchess of Devonshire, Tom Stuart-Smith, Dan Pearson and James Hitchmough, which resulted in the most significant garden renovation to take place here in 200 years – some 80,000 specimens were planted. Steve Porter is the head of gardens and landscape at Chatsworth and has overall responsibility for Arcadia. Here he suggests ten excellent woodland plants that will provide interest in the garden throughout the year. Chatsworth, Bakewell, Derbyshire DE45 1PP. Tel: 01246 565300; chatsworth.org 1 Camellia x williamsii ‘Donation’ “Camellias work in any woodland area, especially when sheltered from cold, dry winds,…

Temperatures are dropping, nights are drawing in and our attention is turning to colour-shifting leaves in the garden, with entire shrubs and trees seeming to ignite overnight. “Autumn is a second spring, when every leaf is a flower,” wrote Albert Camus in his 1943 play, The Misunderstanding. It’s true – as summer flowers wane, vibrant foliage is a welcome distraction from grey skies and claggy soil. Spotlit by the low autumn sun, their saturated colours mesmerise; it’s no wonder that the Japanese, celebrators of blossom viewing in spring (hanami) have turned autumn leaf watching (momiji-gari) into a pastime too. It’s the perfect seasonal bookend. The colour change occurs in all deciduous plants as they prepare to shed their leaves for winter. Part of a damage-limitation strategy, leaf shedding helps plants…

Clive Nichols Clive is one of the UK’s foremost garden photographers and his book, Brilliant English Gardens, features 27 superb gardens. His photos of The Old Rectory in Quinton, Northamptonshire, are on page 24. Nicola Stocken Nicola is an award-winning photographer and writer who conveys the beauty of remarkable gardens and plant collections through images and words. Her feature about Minterne House is on page 51. Carole Drake Carole is an award-winning photographer and writer living in South Somerset. Regency House in Devon, on page 35, particularly appealed to her because of its combination of fine horticulture and fun.…

SHOPPING ALL PRICES ARE CORRECT AT THE TIME OF GOING TO PRESS. November brings the first sparkle of morning frost on the lawn. Temperatures dip, blankets are pulled around shoulders, boots are donned and toasty gloves, socks and hats are retrieved from the cupboard. There’s still plenty to enjoy in the garden, but a little more preparation is required. Willow log holder, £225. coxandcox.co.uk…

In the list of requisites for a garden, sculpture is often fairly far down the page. Trees and shrubs, herbaceous plants, hard landscaping, lighting and furniture are all likely to take precedence over a piece of garden art, and this is often where the difficulty begins. Garden sculpture can complete a space, providing something you didn’t know was missing, but because it is also often an afterthought, a nice-to-have rather than an essential, it can be a bit hit or miss. Rather than delighting the viewer, it can seem at odds with its surrounds – and frustratingly tricky to get right. Garden designers will sometimes suggest that the starting point for a garden is how you would like to feel in a space, and a sculpture will go a long…

“I have plants that remember the last ice age – isn’t that wonderful!” exclaims Judy Barker, enthusiastically talking about her Plant Heritage National Collection of Hardy Chrysanthemums. She has discovered that their resilience stems from being crossed in the 1900s with extremely cold-tolerant subspecies that had survived from the last glacial period. Judy’s interest in chrysanthemums began in 2000. “I thought I would try them, then I started looking at the research, all the different types and their history, and they have since taken me on a fascinating journey,” she recalls. Chrysanthemums are native to China where they have been grown as a medicinal herb for over 3,000 years. In Chinese culture, they are one of the Sì Junzi, or ‘Four Gentlemen’, and together with plum, bamboo and orchid they…

GROW YOUR OWN Putting the garden to bed for winter is one way to view what seems like the end of the gardening year. It’s a mistake though to think that life in the vegetable garden ends in November. There is still plenty to grow to take you through winter, and even if you aren’t growing hardy vegetables this is a time to foster the quiet but critical workings of soil life. All these things are on the mind of head gardener Duana Pearson as the walled garden at Tresillian shifts from autumn into winter. “Gardening is a long-term hobby, but if you’ve had a bad year at least it’s over. Make time for a little review, and remember: you get to start afresh next year. It’s quite nice because…

This is the season of the leaves and they’re everywhere: on the trees, underfoot and swirling around in the wind as I try to rake them up. Never do I look at leaves so much as I do in November. For one thing I’m always on the lookout for good autumn colour, and sometimes the most unexpected things have such a moment: a beech hedge smouldering on a roadside; a stand of Cornus alba on fire; ginkgo leaves turning butter-yellow against the tree’s dark bark. Once the leaves have fallen I’m a child again, kicking up a flurry along the pavement, while the gardener in me identifies different species as I go. But day to day it’s a constant round of raking, blowing and gathering. Over the years I’ve come…

Neither pictures nor words can adequately capture the spirit that for several centuries now has pervaded Minterne Gardens, filling the ancient wooded valley with a feeling of absolute peace, silent save for birdsong, cascading water and the scrunching of fallen leaves underfoot. “The first whispering days of autumn coolness in the Cerne Valley bring with them a shimmering wash of leaves, and clear, bright mornings,” says Lord Henry Digby, whose family have owned the Minterne Estate for 250 years. With the unfolding of autumn, Minterne is not only hard to beat for its stunning array of colours from berries, barks and leaves, but also for seasonal smells such as the delicious toffee fragrance of the katsura tree. However, it is a collection of glorious mature acers that light up the…

Look at Chelsea Flower Show gardens or in-vogue garden designers’ planting schemes, and you’ll find they often have something in common: multistem trees. These days, it’s just as likely you’ll find trees with multiple stems as those with a single trunk, especially where the trees are an integral part of the planting. It hasn’t always been this way though: 20 years ago, when Philip Nieuwoudt first came to the UK from South Africa to work at a tree nursery, single-trunked trees were the norm. Known in the tree trade as standards, trees on a single trunk are grown in a pretty regimental way. “You take off all the side branches, get one stem, clip it onto a cane – it’s like a factory for trees. I thought ‘where’s the fun…

TO CONCLUDE As we walk over the scree we tip-toe between the most exquisite jewel-coloured gardens Just a few months ago, I returned from a botanising trip in the French Alps. The Col de l’Iseran is cold and windy. At 2,770m it is a bleak, black-and-white world – even at the end of June. Convoys of Porsches purr past and leather-clad motorbike riders crowd around the famous stone signpost for photographs that prove they have been here. Suddenly I spot the sweet fried-egg flowers of Ranunculus glacialis, the glacier crowfoot, in the rubble: a little valiant cluster. Once you start looking, there are brightly coloured mountain flowers everywhere. As we walk over the scree we find ourselves tip-toeing between the most exquisite jewel-coloured gardens: dancing arrangements of Snowdon lily and…