Programme 2019

Thursday 17^th January

Annual General Meeting at 7.00 followed by

a talk by Nigel Phillips on the Somerset Coast

Thursday 21^st February

Gardeners Question Time : guest panel Nick Rigden, Katherine Crouch, Annie Shoosmith, Chris Yates and chaired by Juliet Harkness

Thursday21^st March

Stephanie Hafferty – ‘Organic Kitchen Gardener’

Thursday 18^th April

Andrew Tolman - ‘Stumperies and Ferns

Tuesday 30th April

Car visit Elworthy Cottage Plants, Elworthy, Taunton TA4 3PX

Thursday 16^th May

Mike Smith - ‘Gardens of the Hague’

Thursday 13^th June

Members 30th Anniversary Summer Garden Party

Tuesday 9th July

Car visit to The Old Rectory, Limington

Church St, Limington, Yeovil BA22 8EQ

Thursday 18^th July

Adam Alexander -‘Seed Detective Travels the World’

Tuesday 3rd September

Car visit to Forde Abbey and Gardens, Chard TA20 4LU

Thursday 19^th September

Sally Gregson -‘Hydrangeas’

Thursday 17^th October

Nick Bailey ( BBC celebrity speaker)

365 Days of Colour in your Garden

NICK BAILEY is a garden designer, best-selling author, columnist and presenter on BBC Two's Gardeners' World.

Thursday 21^st November

Ross Barbour- ‘ The Garden in January’

Friday 13^th December

Members Christmas Party

January

At the well attended AGM on 17th January, our Chairman reported on Stowey Gardeners' activities in 2018:

It’s been a year of dramatic contrasts for gardeners. We started with the Beast from the East and being snowed up for a couple of weeks – many of us had survival stories didn’t we? -I remember wrapping echiums and agapanthus in bubble wrap and trying to rescue plants from my greenhouse through the drifts. But we coped OK although it meant a late spring and difficult start to the growing season. I found germination was patchy and everything seemed to start very reluctantly but then the blossom burgeoned as June came and the sunny days started: the roses seemed to be better than ever- or do I say that every year? But we are never satisfied are we ? Once the heat wave persisted then we’d had enough and Nurserymen suffered and gardeners and farmers all over the country only had one topic of conversation.

Luckily we were entertained by a great year of talks planned skillfully by Jackie again. At the last AGM Chris Sperring ‘re-wilded’ us - an inspiring talk about flora and fauna and how important our gardens in villages and towns are as havens for wild life when farm land can be so bereft. Two interesting talks followed- ‘from Plant to Plate by Sue Applegate ‘New tricks for Old gardeners’ by Katherine Crouch and then we had a demonstration of Hanging baskets which many of us found most informative.

Our first car visit to Watcombe Gardens in May was a delight. The cold spring meant that many of the shrubs and roses were not in flower. However that didn’t spoil us enjoying the stunning hard landscaping and treasurers within the different ‘rooms’ in this compact garden. Some of us went a little mad on plant purchases and others on the delicious drizzle cake.

Claire Greenslade came from Hestercombe Gardens to enthuse about the restoration and progress of this local treasure. I went a couple of times after her talk and was very impressed by developments both outside and in the new gallery indoors. It’s Well worth another visit.

The Committee decided to go a little ‘off piste’ with our Members garden party this year. Suki and Richard from Parsonage Farm generously opened their garden for us and also fired up the pizza oven. It was a lovely sunny evening and after a Pimms and walk round their beautiful walled plot admiring their organic veg and flowers we enjoyed yummy slices of pizza and other delicacies planned and prepared by the hard-working Committee.

Our two other car visits in July and August to JW Blooms and Picketts Nursery were defintely affected adversely by drought. I felt particularly sorry for JW Blooms as one could see how the hot weather had decimated Jan’s flower beds - what a glorious sight it must be in better years. She was very generous with her distribution of seed (from the compost heap!) and I will certainly be returning there another time. The trip to Picketts Nursery was a disappointment mostly due to the weather and long journey. However Neil Lovesay who runs it redeemed his reputation a hundredfold by coming to talk to us about Propagation- one of the highlights in the Autumn speakers- both practical and hugely knowledgeable, he was generous in sharing his skills and tips with members. I’m sure we will be asking him back again as he has so much helpful advice to give anyone wanting to propagate.

Polly organised a superb coach trip to Rococo gardens and Miserden- two wonderfully contrasting gardens- one a fanciful stage set in a natural amphitheatre with an extensive vegetable garden and all sorts of follies and viewpoints.

Here we also enjoyed a good lunch before carrying on to a wonderful old garden with long, deep herbaceous borders around Miserden house. The nursery was extremely well stocked and good value so the coach was well filled on the return journey.

Two other great talks – one on Kitchen remedies about Herbs and spices from Helen Kearney and another from Timothy Walker from Oxford Botanic Gardens – both very informative and entertaining- completed our year apart, of course, from the Christmas Party which I hope you agree was a lovely way to gather together for some fun and great food. Not the least of the pleasures of our club is the social aspect of our meetings. Yes, we have some great talks from which we learn wonderful things and are inspired by trips out to fabulous gardens. But I for one really look forward to our monthly get-togethers and chatting with members.

None of this would happen if you didn’t all turn up so I’m really pleased you do and I hope you will keep coming and keeping finding new members to join us. The committee hope that we can increase our membership this year so if you are aware of a new neighbour or perhaps a newly retired couple coming to the area- do ask them along to try us out. We now have a website (thanks to Lucy & Polly) and a great new venue so there’s space for more members and visitors.

I want to thank our Committee on your behalf for running everything so smoothly throughout the year.They are a fantastic team ready to lend a hand to anything. We do need more on the Committee so if you want to join our team please don’t hesitate- we all have to take turns so that the club continues to flourish.

This leads me on to some important Thankyous and sadly some Farewells.

As you will have noticed, Teresa, your secretary, isn’t able to be here tonight but I want to say a huge thankyou to her for years of enthusiastic involvement in the club and also for being a great secretary despite her incredibly busy working and social life. When she (eventually?!) moves away we wish her and Rick (Question Master extraordinaire) all the very best in their new home (and big garden).

Two other Committee members are leaving after long service on the Committee. Jane and Polly – what can I say? Both diving in with such enthusiasm & generosity to fill any and many roles from organising coach tours – visits to gardens, baking amazing cakes/puddings – making table decorations- writing articles/publicity/greenfingers and SO much more than I haven’t time to mention .We are all so grateful.

So where from here? This year is the 30th Anniversay of Stowey gardeners so we have much to celebrate. We’re Springing into action with our GQT next month so please bring a friend to that and of course your questions! (there are forms to fill in to leave or bring in February) Then a wonderful programme of talks and visits to look forward to: from organic veg gardening to Stumperies ,seed detectives to our special guest speaker Nick Bailey to name a few.

We’ll also be having a very special 30th Anniversary Members garden Tea Party on June 13th to be held at Marsh Mills, thanks to the McWilliams’. More details of those events will be available with your printed Programmes next month but for now my thanks for your support to me in my first year as Chair and I look forward to welcoming you in the coming months.

Juliet Harkness Jan 2019

After the AGM Nigel Philips gave us another of his excellent talks on our local wildlife on the Somerset Coast. This really was a local talk, looking at our coast from many angles, and illustrated by truly stupendous photographs taken by Nigel himself, many in the preceding couple of weeks. Who knew there were spoonbills at Steart, let alone observed one eating a toad? We were shown clouds of lapwings and golden plover, sunfish and porpoises in Porlock bay, and 5 types of limpet at Dunster. Several sites for botanising, from Cheddar and its pinks, to rock roses on Brean Down and orchids at Berrow were described, enthusing members to plan a possible expedition later in the year.

February

Members gathered to glean tips from our Gardeners Question Time panel on 21st February. Katherine Crouch, Chris Yates, Annie Shoosmith and Nick Rigden, ably herded by our chairman Juliet, fielded questions on such diverse topics as encouraging Amaryllis to persist beyond Christmas, coaxing tree peonies to flower more frequently, and Nerine at all, when to divide Crocosmia, beating walnut trees, suitable plants for a stream garden, preventing pools and fissured mud deserts in the lawn, choosing useful culinary herbs (the 3 requested just didn't seem to be anywhere near enough), getting the best colour from Cornus, the ideal garden location (the Channel islands, Scotland, Nether Stowey??) and more. Discussion ranged widely and the audience were heartened to hear that even the experts had their betes noires and blind spots, but ended the evening enlightened and enthused for the coming gardening year.

March

Stephanie Hafferty came and talked about her gardening experiences at our meeting on 21st March. Motivated by brewing home made wines, Stephanie grew vegetables and later graduated to back garden and allotment cultivation of vegetables to feed her family, espousing the no dig methods of Charles Dowding (and their creator). She has worked for some famous names and currently cultivates vegetables for Hauser and Wirth at Bruton, as well as entirely filling her own garden with a polytunnel. She feeds hordes of gardeners who attend courses and has published books, copies of which several members took the opportunity to buy on Thursday. They are packed with recipes for culinary and household uses for her wonderful looking garden produce. Most notably she talked about the practicalities of no dig gardening and answered members questions on it: many will be inspired to apply what they've learnt to their own gardens.

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If anyone is interested in Specialist Charity Plant Fairs, we have been sent details of their 2019 programme, which can be found at www.plantfairs.com. . Later in the year venues will include Hestercombe and Midney, and they promise a wide variety of nursery plant stalls and support a range of charities.

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Somerset's St Margaret's Hospice have written to us about gardens open to raise money for them. Their brochure will be published shortly.

'You may also like to know that we have a season ticket available for our gardens, priced £25, giving entry to all of the gardens in the brochure (there are over 50 gardens included, some opening as part of village days ). This would make a lovely gift, while supporting your local hospice. They can be purchased by phone -01935 709182, or online here : https://www.st-margarets-hospice.org.uk/shop/gsg-season-ticket '

April

On Thursday 18th April, our speaker was Andrew Tolman, who talked about 'Stumperies and Ferns'. Andrew, from Alcombe, describes himself as a self employed provider of professional garden services, and is uniquely qualified to enlighten us on this subject, having spent 10 years looking after the iconic stumpery and great collection of ferns and other plants at Highgrove. Since then he has become an experienced lecturer ( he talked to us inspiringly about lesser known west country gardens a couple of years ago) and teaches and advises on stumperies and woodland gardens, and also pruning and pleaching, topiary and ornamental hedges. He has a passion for ferns and snowdrops. and also runs a company selling garden tools.

Once again Andrew gave an interesting talk, with insights into stumpery construction. He inspired us to look for plants to enhance these dramatic garden features, especially shade-lovers like Trilliums, many white flowered plants and shrubs, and numerous tongue-twisting ferns which I can hardly pronounce, let alone spell! He cited nurseries where we might buy them, including Ashwood Nuseries, W Midlands, and provided excellent illustrations from gardens where we might see them, such as High Cherubeer, Winkleigh, Andrews Corner, Belstone, Hanham Court, Bristol, and Marwood Hill, Barnstaple.

On Tuesday 30th April a group of 20 Stowey Gardeners congregated at Elworthy Cottage for a sunny afternoon visit. We were welcomed by Mike and Jenny Spiller, who have opened their garden on a gentle eastern slope of the Brendon hills for NGS, other charities and gardening groups for over 30 years. The fritillaries in a meadow area were sadly past their best, but there were plenty of traditional cottage garden plants, as well as interesting less usual cultivars packed in the many island flowerbeds, and for sale in the well stocked nursery. We explored, sought advice, succumbed to the temptation of buying additions for our own gardens, and finally enjoyed the essential tea and cake on the lawn.

May

On Thursday 16th May our meeting featured a talk by Mike Smith on 'Gardens of the Hague' . Mike is an experienced gardener who has worked in garden centres, latterly managing the Houseplant section at Cadbury Garden centre. He has been on the RHS Guest Speaker Panel for several years, has done radio and TV work, and has been on panels answering gardening questions at flower shows. He worked at Keukenhof gardens for 2 years and was able to enlighten us about bulb growing and exhibiting on the vast scale they achieve there, illustrating his talk with some good photographs. One of his messages was that how you plant bulbs, giving them adequate drainage, is more important than anything in producing flowers year after year: we'll all be trying harder to do this!

June

Summer Garden Party, Thursday 13th June

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The Somerset Federation of Gardening Clubs recently held their AGM at Drympton, Dorset. The meeting wasn't attended by any committee members but if you're interested in the SFGC's report, there's a link to their website on our Contacts page

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Party in the Park, Nether Stowey, June 8th

July

At the July meeting on Thursday 18th July we were fortunate to hear a fascinating and inspiring talk by Adam Alexander about his experiences seed collecting around the world. Inspired by delicious red peppers from Oman, Adam has collected seeds of edible vegetables which he has grown at home and exchanged with fellow enthusiasts, and contributed to the Heritage Seed Library. Stories about peas in Spain, Ireland and America, and beans that have travelled from Mexico to Myanmar illustrated how people have traded seeds around the world and developed varieties which thrive in their own localities and provide sustainable and versatile sources of food. Many members were inspired to try some of the unusual varieties Adam had grown. Who knows, we may be able to swap some of the products next year!

On Tuesday 9th July, a dozen Stowey Gardeners visited the Old Rectory, Limington near Yeovil, where we were shown the garden in which there were many unusual plants, a wild flower meadow and a pond,cream teas and even dogs to delight us. A tour of the church, once the living of Thomas Wolsey completed our visit.

August

On Saturday 17th August, Nether Stowey Flower Show took place at the village hall, and Stowey Gardeners were well represented among the entrants. Prizes were won by Mary Reece, Juliet Harkness and Polly Triggol among others, with Polly Triggol carrying off the cup for the most points won by a Stowey Gardener across the classes.

September

At our September meeting on Thursday 19th, we welcomed Sally Gregson, who talked about Hydrangeas. Based at Henley Mill, Wookey, where she runs a nursery specialising in Hydrangeas, Epimediums and plants for damp and shade, Sally is an experienced lecturer and author. She explained the various different types of hydrangea, how conditions change their colours, how and where to grow them all, and illustrated her talk with excellent slides. Many of us also appreciated her suggestions for plants to complement them, and she'd brought some tempting specimens for us to buy, though we might also be inspired to visit her nursery for an even wider choice of these impressive and versatile flowers.

Visit to Forde Abbey

A small group of our membership made a visit to this fabulous Somerset House and Garden on September 3^rd. Although quite late in the flower season we were very impressed at the huge variety of plants still looking magnificent both in the walled gardens (cutting flowers for the house) and in the vast herbaceous beds. This beautiful monastery, founded in the 12^th Century stands in 30 acres of wooded parkland and includes about 350,000 trees, lakes, a bog garden, a rock garden, spring and late summer wild flower meadows. The walled vegetable garden was bursting with produce from giant pumpkins to 12foot high bean pyramids. Everything in the garden is obviously much cared for by the 6 full time gardeners (judging from the 6” deep compost mulch around the plants) which made their specimens spectacularly gargantuan!

Our members were very impressed by the whole place, from the multicoloured gourds dangling in the greenhouses, to the wild flower spirals in the lawns and the Centenary Fountain, celebrating 100 years that the Roper Family have lived there. Powered by a pump from the strawberry farm on the estate it reaches a mighty 160 feet. We were fortunate that the weather was sunny and we were upwind of its spray as we even got sprinkled from 100 yards away!

We enjoyed some delicious produce from the garden for lunch and browsed the plant nursery, some of us unable to leave without buying some treasures grown on the estate.

The house and garden are open seven days a week and we can recommend it to anyone as a special day out. I’m sure Stowey Gardeners will go again and don’t forget, if you join our club you will get much reduced prices to all the places we visit either by car or by coach.

Juliet Harkness (chair)

October

Stowey Gardeners’ Celebrity Speaker

Stowey Gardeners pride themselves on providing their members with a wide range of informative and entertaining talks throughout the year. Our last meeting on October 17^th , when we welcomed Nick Bailey -TV presenter and award-winning garden designer - was no exception.

With his fluent and relaxed style, Nick gave us a fascinating overview of achieving Colour in the garden throughout the year. He gave us pointers on how to use the colour wheel to match flowers of complimentary colours ‘to make them zing’ and also how to use companion colours of different hues from the blue/purple range or red/pinks through to the qualities of whites when used against a darker background..

His talk was packed with ideas on how to extend the flowering seasons with biennial pruning and ‘Chelsea chopping’. Many of these schemes are elaborated in his 2015 book “ 365 days of Colour in your garden” copies of which he signed for the lucky few who managed to buy one –( there’s only a limited number of books one can stuff into an overnight bag when travelling by train! )

The Committee were delighted with the response from the public to this talk as 108 garden enthusiasts attended. Clearly the audience enjoyed the speaker and also the raffle, plant table and delicious homemade cakes and good company too. We always welcome visitors to any talks but also want to encourage people to be members. Newcomers to the Stoweys and beyond are most welcome to join the club in 2020. We always meet on the 3^rd Thursday of the month so do drop in and try us out. Juliet Harkness, chair

Stowey Gardeners President Nick Rigden, Chairman Juliet Harkness and speaker Nick Bailey

Nick Rigden, Stowey Gardeners President writes:

Can you really achieve colour all the year round? Nick made an excellent case for doing just that with a subtle combination of flower, foliage and stem colour. The initial part of his talk centred around understanding plant colour and the use of the colour wheel. His slides illustrated how as gardeners we can use different combinations of colour, contrasting and complimentary combinations and how tones of colour can alter due to the different colours of surrounding plants and environment.

The challenge of having 365 days of colour can be promoted by using techniques to extend the season and choosing plants that provide longer periods of display rather than ‘one day wonders’. Moving through the twelve months season by season he highlighted key plants and techniques that promote longer display not only with flowers but also foliage such as ferns. Very useful was his section pairing plants for particular purposes such as brightness in dappled shade, colour and texture and year-round display. A specific example he used was Cyclamen hederifolium and Convallaria majalis which when planted together provide continuity of display one taking over from the other as one comes to the end of its season. Finally, Nick illustrated his talk with plants that really perform such as those offering up to six and even eight months display – does Rosa x oderata ‘Bengal Crimson’ really flower all the year round!?

Fundamental to the title of the talk is the necessity to carefully research and plan your borders and containers taking carefully considering the individual environments that are our gardens.

After a most enjoyable and well-illustrated talk we all went home thinking of our own gardens and what we can do to increase the period of colourful display.

November

On November 21st we welcomed Ross Barbour from the Picton Garden in Herefordshire; his talk on ' Winter - the Garden in January' was full of interest and ideas for what could be dismissed as a dead time of year. He showed us numerous Betula and Cornus and more varieties of tree and shrub whose coloured trunks or stems can bring brightness and contrast to the garden. Then there were the scented plants - Daphne, Sarcococca, Chimonanthus for example, which tempt us to brave the cold and enjoy their often surprisingly potent scents for what in some cases are insignificant-looking flowers. Altogether there was a wealth of inspiration, from pots to borders and beyond.

December

We have received the following offer from Greg and Sandra Smith if anyone is interested :

Equisorb horse bedding : this is a flax based bio-degradeable bedding which is mucked out every day, just taking out the flax shavings and horse manure. It takes about 6-8 weeks to break down and then is an excellent compost for the garden. We bag it in small manageable plastic bags and it is free if anyone would like to collect from us. We are at 28, Friarn, Over Stowey tel: 07885 575563.

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The winning corsage at the Christmas party