Rebuilding a nursery - Copton Ash

[ian mcdonald]

Keep taking "before and after" photos Tim. How large is the garden? Perhaps the younger gardeners could be invited to get some hands on experience towards their CVs?

[Tim Ingram]

Having got the bit between my teeth Ian I am quite excited about how this part of the garden might develop. It gives the opportunity to move plants from elsewhere that need more space, and divide established clumps of snowdrops, anemones, epimediums etc. I will certainly keep a photographic record, and hope this can also become a subject for talks because though we often have travelogues and detailed looks at individual plants we don't so much (very rarely actually) have more practical examples of 'making' a garden in the sort of ongoing way Ian describes in his Bulb Log. When the Alpine Garden Society was somewhat in the doldrums at a previous time one of the stimulants was 'A Handbook of Rock Gardening' (this was published in 1964, edited by Roy Elliott) - everyone was given a copy of this when they joined the Society and plenty more were sold. I don't suppose most people when they first join grow perfect specimens of Dionysias or dream of Farrer Medals (many never will); far more will come into the Society fascinated by 'gardening' with alpines. So it seems hardly surprising that the AGS in particular has rather lost any connection with a younger generation.

Our garden is an acre and a half with perhaps a third of this devoted to the nursery area. Plenty big enough! And we have in the past had some wonderful students helping in the garden, but that was when the nursery was going full pitch and more resources were available to employ them. Hopefully next year will see a consolidation of the growing area and nursery which will make it more viable to employ help.

*****

Maggi, the ambience of the garden here has certainly changed hugely, and yes it does become a habitat - I think that is very real and personal for anyone who makes a garden (so very different to how gardens are often presented). We've always opened the garden, especially through the winter and spring - which is quite a discipline - and most people who come enjoy the cakes at least  , I think they enjoy the atmosphere too. Gardening has always worked for my soul ever since I used to mow my parents lawn and propagate plants for the local market - it just becomes ingrained. And I do remember it when we started... and digging out this incongruous swimming pool!

[johnralphcarpenter]

Gosh, when was that?

[Tim Ingram]

That was Spring 1979 Ralph! I was finishing my degree at Queen Mary College, London, and we (as a family) were just beginning to plant the garden in Kent after my father moved down to become Director of the Fruit Trials and Collection at Brogdale. The swimming pool was a (carbuncle) surrounded by weeds. Along with this the other major excavation was to dig a trench right round the garden for a rabbit fence. I was young and fit! Not that long after we started opening the garden for charity and have done so almost every year since. It just seems the thing to do... In this present drought the view looks brown and sere  .

[Tim Ingram]

A few pictures from the 'Plant Fairs Roadshow' (http://www.plant-fairs.co.uk/events/) at Knowle Hill Farm last Sunday, which sits up on the escarpment looking down over the Weald of Kent. A warm day - not such a good time to buy plants or think of planting but in other ways 'the time of the perennial', and sometime soon, when we do have prolonged rain down in the south, will be a good time to plant.

[Tim Ingram]

And a few more intimate pictures of plants. The Sphaeralcea (6 & 7) is one to beg cuttings from, perfect for our present weather!

[Tim Ingram]

Some prolonged rain at last - only an inch or so but enough to begin to soak into the parched ground and make weeding much easier and the prospect of planting this autumn rather closer. The first really significant rainfall for nearly two months.

[Matt T]

Glad to see you've got some rain at last, Tim! Speaking to my parents last week when it was 34o in Essex it was sounding pretty dire - everything in the garden wilting and looking very sorry. Good summer baking will be appreciated by some plants though. Lucky you only had an inch as Essex was under a deluge and suffering from flooding at the weekend. At least the drop in temperature will spur on the autumn bloomers!

[Tim Ingram]

Making progress step by step, negotiating B****t with the brambles. From in front and behind. And a few of the plants that have survived in the wilderness: Galanthus reginae-olgae with hellebores; Cyclamen coum; and Ophiopogon planiscarpus (which with its fleshy water-storing roots will make good ground-cover here in the future).

[Tim Ingram]

And beginning to plant up this area as the days cool and we have had a little more rain, though the soil is still very dry. A big need to mulch as we go to keep control over weed regrowth, and reliance on more ground-cover species in the brighter areas, ferns in the shadier.

[Hoy]

You make progress, Tim!

[Tim Ingram]

More the result of the garden slowing down than me speeding up Trond! But yes, I hope so.

[Yann]

What a nice evolution of the family garden for 83', lawn was certainly less work than your actual woodland?

[Tim Ingram]

You are right Yann! But a lawn is not a garden. I think the most significant thing is that we have opened the garden for over 30 years and met many interesting gardeners and generally enjoyed the process over that time. But in terms of the economy and contribution to GDP a garden has no particular value so may not be a feature of B****t negotiations  . You will understand from this that I value our connection to Europe for the ways it makes us consider the environment and shared scientific understanding of ecology and evolution, and making a garden contributes to this as far as I can see - it opens up an outlook on the world that is so obvious on this Forum. I really hope politics comes to its senses; it is an uncomfortable time at present in the UK.

[astragalus]

Really nice to have been watching the progression of your garden, Tim. All gardens tell a story and often the plot (not meant as a pun) of the story doesn't follow a straight line. You have weather and plant growth changing the story line all the time. Added to these, the expansion of the gardener's knowledge and his introduction to new plants are constantly in the mix. It's wonderful that you are documenting your garden's story.