Visit to Beth Chatto's Garden October 11th

So much for resolutions. I resolved to keep this blog up to date, but found I’ve been too busy actually doing rather than writing about doing. When we were on holiday I kept notes which I hope to turn into articles when I have the time. We had a great holiday, then came back to problems which needed resolving immediately. The weeks have slipped past and I realised that I haven’t made as good use of my yearly ticket to Beth Chatto’s as I might have done.

Whilst on holiday I read several books on photography because I’m still not getting the results I want. I feel a bit weak in landscapes, an important part of garden photography. This became apparent when I was at Wickham Place Farm trying to photograph the cyclamen in the woods. Many of the photos I took are just not as crisp as I hoped. This was partly due to camera shake, which has been cured by using a remote, and partly due to incorrect aperture setting. I decided that a day at Beth Chatto’s practicing landscape shots would be a good idea.

I got there early, first visitor of the day. I wondered if I would be able to capture pristine dew on the lawns, but of course, the gardeners were already hard at work, so there were footprints in the dew. I was also excited about the angle of the sun first thing in the morning. I knew the shadows would be quite harsh in the sunshine, and digital photography is unforgiving of shadows, but I thought shafts of sunlight in the woods would be worth trying to capture. Besides which, there is a lovely silver birch tree at Beth Chatto’s which looks wonderful when the low angled sunlight falls on it.

A mischievous wind yesterday put paid to hopes of close up photography and often frustrated the landscape shots.

Every time I go to Beth Chatto’s I am reminded of why I like the gardens so much. The beds have a certain rhythm which makes a poem of the whole. The gardens are at ease with the landscape. A visitor said to me yesterday that everywhere you look there’s something new to see, and he thought that if you went back the next day you would see things you’ve missed the day before. I told him I had done just that (a benefit of a yearly ticket).

I took a lot of photos, and I think the best way to convey why I hold these gardens in such high regard is to post some photos with a few remarks under them.

Beth Chatto’s garden works well in every dimension, including time. The shadows, albeit rather harsh on the photographs, add to the tapestry of colour and movement. When I arrived there was dew on the grass and the shadows were long. This added to the sense of mystery and movement. The shadows emphasised where the sun was lighting up the borders.



As the day unfolds, more plantings come under the spotlight.



The brilliant sunshine picks out the bark on the eucalyptus.




The lakes are beautiful in all their moods.



I love the multi-branched silver birch. Here it is lit by the low angled sun, and reflected in the lake.



I found this view utterly intoxicating. Beth Chatto happened past with a professional photographer (judging by the size of his camera) and I burbled ecstatically about the light on the tree. If the kids had been with me they’d have been cringing with embarrassment at this point. (Sigh.)

Across the lake Beth Chatto has a bench perfectly placed to admire this tree. You can see the spot where I took the first photograph.



There is clever use of trees and bark throughout the garden. This eucalyptus has grown massively since my first visit ten years ago.



Some trees have gone, like the Paulonia (which I wept over). It had become dangerous. But three small ones are growing well near a Ginko Biloba. The leaves on the Ginko go butter yellow in autumn, but I was too early for that. Likewise there is a Liquidamber which goes glorious red, but again, I was a little too early.

Looking up gives another dimension often overlooked. This is part of an ancient oak tree at the entrance of the gardens.


There is a “secret” sitting place near the lakes under the Liquidamber. I love sitting here looking out.


There is so much texture and form with the different leaf shapes and colours.

The grasses are wonderful, often lit up by the low sun. The grasses add movement in the wind, and ever-changing pattern of texture and form.


Although the shadows may seem harsh, the contrast lights up the grasses in this shot.

The pampas grass looks dated when plonked in the middle of a 1960s lawn. Here it has room to show itself off.





The Miscanthus is still in its pink stage. Later in the year this will become fluffy and white, giving winter interest. I have one in a pot as my garden is too small to allow it to grow the way it should.





I have just bought some Hakonecloea (Japanese Forest Grass) because this moves beautifully in the wind and isn’t so big. I have planted mine in my thug-bed.


In the gravel garden the sun lights up this grass.


This is the gravel garden in its autumn raiment.


Grasses, as well as giving movement to a garden, are semi-see-through, which adds another layer of interest. They catch the low light and make the garden come alive with golden fire.



The grasses here contrast well with the lovely blues and purples of the Michaelmas daisies in the bed next to the woods. This bed is also next to the nursery beds which act as a beautiful backdrop.



The wood is very pretty in the dappled sunlight. I had hoped there might be mysterious mist but there wasn’t.



I must, I really must go back soon when the leaves have turned.

Crops

This heat has caused my pots of lettuce to bolt. They are Little Gem, but are still palatable even though they are beginning to bolt. I have had my first tomato from one of the Maskota in the tomatoes in pots by the back door, and the courgettes in pots are doing better than I expected, but they are in big pots, some of which are placed on pots with manure in them, so perhaps that’s why.





However, one mysteriously wilted and died, just like the melon did. I have had a few failures like that. I am suspicious of the compost which is recycled, should be sterile from the composting, but I wonder if sometimes these composts are a little too fresh. I’m beginning to wonder if leaf mould and soil is the answer; back to old-fashioned ways.

I have managed to pick some cherries despite the blackbirds, and they are delicious. The Tayberries are like warm bombs of wine when picked and eaten straight off the cane, but the loganberries are not so sweet. I have sufficient summer vegetables for myself from this garden, so perhaps I don’t need an allotment… do I? (Yes. Maybe. But think of all the work, just to produce more food than I need.) I haven’t grown any carrots, potatoes and the pumpkins aren’t doing too well. There’s a limit to the amount someone can eat, though. The rest of the family don’t like courgettes or beans, but my argument is that these are much better fresh from the garden, so when space is a premium, that’s what should be grown.

I tend to view only the edible produce as crops, but it recently occurred to me that the flowers and plants are a crop, too, especially if I use them as subjects for my photography. It’s as if my garden is my studio.




Agapanthus bud burst
One of my favourite flowers.




Anthemis tinctoria... I think. This is one of those real good-value plants, and I love it.

Gardens

I’m very lucky here because I have a choice of several famous local gardens to visit. When we moved to Essex I knew I wanted to visit Beth Chatto’s garden because we used to live on heavy clay soil and I wasn’t used to gardening on gravel. I’d seen magazine articles about Beth Chatto’s gravel garden, had been smitten at the time, and thought it would be a good place to visit. I bought a season ticket and spent the whole year (and the next) visiting frequently, even in the winter. I like gardens in winter because you can see the bare bones, and Beth Chatto’s garden has very fine bones indeed. I particularly liked the silver birch which lights up the garden in winter.

I found a booklet about Hyde Hall in a charity shop, which described the place as it was when the Robinsons owned it. It sounded lovely so visited on my birthday one year. Matthew Wilson was curator at the time, and perhaps it was his influence I admired so much. There was a field of sunflowers, and a wild flower meadow and cornfield ablaze with colour because this was June. The garden was still redolent of the owners, still had a personal feel to it. I loved the Alpine House, but also loved the dry garden with its massive boulders... a Matthew Wilson project, I believe. So I joined the RHS so I could enjoy it in the same way as I enjoyed Beth Chatto’s. But things have changed. The Alpine House was deemed unsafe for the public and was removed. Hermione’s garden was also deemed unsafe and was out of bounds. That suited its air of mystery. Now it also has fallen victim to this “Improvement” or Doing-things-the-RHS-Way, with gabions of stone. All very architectural, but I fear Hermione has fled. I don’t like it, and I don’t feel so comfortable in Hyde Hall garden now. It has lost the personal touch, and the Matthew Wilson Effect is fading, to the garden’s detriment.

Glen Chantry is another superb garden, but has now closed to the public. I enjoyed that very much when it was open, particularly the rockery.

Wickham Place Farm is somewhere I should visit more often. In the spring it’s famous for its wisteria, and in the autumn there are masses of cyclamen in the woods. I used to work on Fridays when it’s open, and found it hard to get to, but this year I’ve managed to get there a couple of times, once to photograph the wisteria and bluebells, and once to photograph the paeonies, which were late due to the cold spring. Alas, that cold spring also ruined the wisteria flowers this year, which was a real shame. But hopefully next year the display will be of its usual stunning standard.



Paeonies at Wickham Place Farm





Rose at Wickham Place farm. This rose is growing on a wall and over an archway through that wall, so it's possible to look up at the roses. They are delightfully scented.



This April I went to Harrogate for a friend’s book launch, and while I was there I visited Harlow Carr for the first time. This was where Matthew Wilson had gone to when he left Hyde hall (lucky Harlow Carr) and I was amused to see his fingerprints on the garden. One item was a gazebo with an overcoat of cut logs, and another with dry stone cladding and a green roof. I just knew that was his handiwork. I think he has a creative and somewhat maverick genius for these things, and I really like his influence. Perhaps it’s just because his way of doing things vindicates my own approach and my own eccentric ways. Or maybe it’s a childlike pleasure of dens in the woods.








It was early in a late-starting season, so the garden was just burgeoning. The most spectacular plants, to my mind, were the skunk cabbages (Lysichiton americana). I have seen these at Beth Chatto’s (I even tried to grown one in my tiny garden.) But they need to be seen en masse and in context, ie waterside, to really appreciate them. And even then, I’m not sure the word “beautiful” can be applied.




My visits to Beth Chatto’s petered out because of lack of time, especially in the summer, and until this year I restricted my visits to the winter months when she allows RHS members in for free. I nearly cried when I found that the foxglove tree (Paulonia tormentosa) had had to be felled as it had become unstable. I loved that tree. That was a couple of years ago now.

I decided to make more effort to visit Beth Chatto's gardens again this year, and rejoined for the year in June. Not only was this for the gardens, but I wanted to do some photography, and since she runs a competition for photographs taken in her garden, I thought I would feel welcome with my camera. I am acutely aware that photographers can be a pain in gardens, especially with tripod and other paraphernalia, so I asked if it was OK to use the tripod. In fact, I find the monopod of great value because it’s easier to get in close with just one foot to place carefully, though it has its drawbacks too.


Beth's island beds are bigger than my entire garden.




Golden Hop



In my own garden I can deadhead, tweak, push and prod things around to get the shot the way I want it (though sometimes I don’t notice that ugly dead leaf until afterwards. I couldn’t possibly do this in someone else’s garden. It can be frustrating not being able to get in close, but respecting someone else’s garden is paramount.



I love the eryngiums as a family, they look so metalic. Beth has some really interesting plants... look at this bud. Pity it's quite a sprawling plant because I would love this in my garden. I just don't have the room.






I had such a good day’s photography when I went, I returned the next day to take more shots of the flowers which I knew would be over before the week’s end. The weather forecast had promised some cloud cover, but it was rather sunny and the shadows harsh. However, the clouds came over from time to time, softening the light… I must have been the only one hoping for cloud.

I must go again. But then, I ought to photograph some of the flowers in my own garden. I have some super anthemis and jasione which are rapidly going over in this heat.

Photogallery

All rights reserved. Please do not copy these images without contacting me first.

These are some photographs taken in my garden.



Spider on Foxglove






Medusa Pulsatilla





Opium Poppy




Opium Bud Burst






Poppy Petals






Geranium Bud





Elsa Spath






Star and Stripes





Shadows





Damsel

A Summary to Date

It's too hot to work outside just now, and housework, as ever, holds no appeal, so I thought I'd try and summarise my work over the spring.

Spring is my most frantic time in the garden, exacerbated this year by the need to catch up with all the jobs I neglected since I started writing. The raised beds I made with supposedly preserved timber ten years ago had rotted, so I replaced some with old slate tiles , some with excess breezeblocks from the greenhouse project, and some with bits of feather-board from a previous project.

I planted the greenhouse bed up, and plants are growing reasonably well. My misgivings about the light levels due to shading have been confirmed, though, and everything looks a little wan and etiolated. One melon died, which was annoying. I have had some beans and some courgettes.

The Balcony Yellow tomatoes are the right size for pots and baskets, being compact and sturdy plants. The Maskota are supposed to be suitable for tubs, but are laxer and tend to sprawl. They do have the advantage over many tomatoes of being bush rather than cordon. This means I don't have to pick out sideshoots, a job I often neglect.

I have had a few mangetout peas from a tub. The courgettes are doing well enough in the tubs, but we’ll see low long the season lasts. I have had one or two wild strawberries (ie wild British native, not alpine). These produce runners and look rather dainty when trailing down.





I had a problem with the banana plants. There were encroaching on the miniature railway, and there would have been serious sulks if they had broken up the track bed, so I had to move them. I won’t go into detail as I might try an article about them, moving them etc. Suffice to say it was very, very hard work.


I decided the Spanish Bluebells have to go, the thugs. I much prefer the English bluebell anyway, and these invaders have been quietly taking over my garden. I had intended to plant some of my agapanthus in their stead, but they proved so awkward to dig up I’m not entirely sure I’ve got them all. So I put membrane down and put the agapanthus in pots on top. Agapanthus do well in pots, some say they flower better, but here they do well in the soil as well. A major advantage of pots in colder areas is you can move them into shelter.

A serious problem with Spanish Bluebells is they readily hybridise with English bluyebells, causing crosses and genetic contamination. I boutght some English bulbs once, but when they came up they were obviously hybrids. I wasn’t best pleased because I already had Spanish plus hybrids.

English bluebells are a darker, inky colour, and flop over daintily at the top. Spanish bluebells are very pretty but don’t have the delicacy or that wonderful blue haze. I remember seeing Scottish hillsides covered in them, and in Wales the hedgerows are dotted with that intense blue. I don’t trust any bluebells local to me to not be contaminated, which is a shame. I will leave the “English types” in my garden, knowing they’re probably not pure.

Here are a couple of photographs comparing the two (Not my best photos, but please don’t steal them. If you want to use them please ask.)




Note the colour of the anthers.






I had intended to go to the woods to capture some bluebell images. I went to Wickham Place Farm instead, because I wanted to photograph Judith’s amazing wisterias. Alas, a late frost had done for the wisteria blooms, but the bluebells were lovely.




The parts of my olive tree which had leaves on in the winter have died, but it’s sprouting further down. So much for my careful cultivation of a pompom shape. Another ball which I lost was the myrtle, which burned in the heavy frosts and snow. I cut it hard back and then nothing happened. I thought I had lost it, but it has started to sprout. Hopefully it will be hardened off come winter.

One of the problems with the past winter was that everything was still growing in the mild autumn and when it suddenly turned cold a lot of growth was too soft to cope.

Feeling Guilty

I'm feeling a bit guilty over starting this blog, then failing to post anything recently. I have been very busy in the garden, and any writing time has been spent on Womag and novels.

I have also been doing a lot more photography. I went to the IGPOTY competition feedback day at Kew Gardens 8th May, and had my enthusiasm rekindled. I still have problems coping with the actual technology of the camera, but am getting better at taking the photographs I want to take rather than pointing the camera and hoping for the best.

I would post some of my photos here, but I an always worried about them being stolen, whiich is why I don't (generally) post my best photos.

I will try and post more frequently, but first I have some other jobs to do.

Post for Old Kitty re mystery plant

This is agapanthus, an photo I took in Madeira last year.



These grow along the sides of the road and look stunning. I might not leave this post up for long because I may want to use this photo in an article which I'm about to write.

These broader leaved agapanthus are more susceptible to frost in this country. Kitty, you say your mystery plants were bulbs, so I'm not totally convinced they are agapanthus, though they look like agapanthus, and the blooming time is right. Agapanthus have thick fleshy roots rather than bulbs like daffodils.

I don't think they are alliums because their leaves tend to be going over by the time they flower.

Hope this helps.