Programme 2024

Meetings every third Thursday of the month at 7.30pm, St Mary's Church Centre,   Nether Stowey 

Tea and cake, raffle, plant table

January

On Thursday 18th January we  held our 2024 AGM at 7pm in the Church Centre, Nether Stowey. 

After the meeting, at 7.30, we had a talk on Hostas by Peter Savage from Bowdens nursery at Okehampton, who have an impressive history of growing and showing hostas. Peter explained and illustrated the large variety of hostas, emphasising how easy they are to care for, and even providing a recipe so that we could devour our hostas before the slugs did! A lucky member won a plant, and many were inspired to visit Bowden's in future to fill our gardens with these attractive plants.

February

Sally Leaney, prize-winning local garden designer,  talked to us about 'Garden Design' on Thursday 15th February. Visitors to the Taunton Flower Show may be familiar with Sally's work - she has exhibited her imaginative creations  there over several years. She brings a lively, practical approach to her designs, and demonstrated principles and tricks that could be applied to optimize the space available in a garden. Many of us will be inspired to apply what we learnt to our gardens, great or small, and can better appreciate gardens we visit too.

March

' Organic Gardening, including Pest Control' by Paul Hending, was our talk, on Thursday 21st March.  Paul has been a science teacher, is a published author, garden contractor and lecturer. His talk was very entertaining, and included principles of compost making and pest control, which included use of grandchildren as slug collectors (physical violence, vigilance), biological warfare, barriers, crop rotation and avoidance among others.

April

John Addison, a former Cannington College lecturer, and an active judge at  RHS  shows  spoke to us about 'Vegetable Growing' on Thursday 18th April. He gave general tips on growing, such as on the advantages ( or not) of raised beds, and no dig methods, answered queries, and went through a comprehensive range of particular vegetables, leaving us eager to apply his advice on our plots.

May

Our first garden visit of the year was  to Postbox Cottage, West Bagborough on Tuesday 7th May. Having enjoyed the garden so much last September, we felt it needed to be seen in spring! There were spring flowering shrubs such as Viburnum plicatus, Cornus contraversa, Choysia and Oleria, also rhododendrons, some early clematis, Camassia in the field, and spring pots of tulips, as well as irises, Alliums and Libertia starting in the borders. Jill Lones accompanied the group and answered their many questions about the plants.  And a lovely tea was enjoyed by 18 Stowey Gardeners.

May's talk on Thursday 16th May was by Jenny Short, on 'Fragrance in the Garden'.  Jenny originally had a background in ceramic sculpture, but has  been a professional designer of gardens in all sorts of settings for over 20 years.  She enjoys passing on her enthusiasm for creating attractive outdoor spaces in talks to gardeners on various aspects of her craft.  She had useful tips on using enclosed spaces and thoughtful siting of plants to enhance fragrance. She presented a seasonal guide to particularly useful fragrant plants with a useful handout of information.

On Saturday 18th May our bring and buy Plant Sale was held at the Thomas Poole Library, Nether Stowey.  We're most grateful to the many members who generously brought a wide variety of plants, which were eagerly snapped up by a small crowd! We successfully raised funds for the club, which will enable us to keep engaging  excellent speakers. 

June

 Sunday 23rd June saw our coach trip to Rosemoor RHS Gardens. We'd been able to offer a very reasonable ticket price thanks to a grant from Hinkley Point C, and the club's affiliation with the RHS.  That weekend Rosemoor had a rose weekend, and craft and food market, so we  had a busy time!  50 of us enjoyed exploring the gardens, which were at their summer best, especially the roses. The weather was not blisteringly hot, for which we were thankful. Everywhere there were unfamiliar or exotic plants and interesting trees such as a wonderfully fragrant Aesculus, and many different Cornus varieties. People picniced or visited the various cafes, shopped at the craft fair and finally descended on the plant sales area, inspired to add to their own gardens by everything they'd seen.

Felicity Down  talked to us on Thursday 20th June about Climbing and Wall Shrubs.  Felicity started her career in floristry, and has, with her husband, run Cleeve Nursery near Bristol for over 35years. She presented 'Garden Calendar' on HTV for 6 years, speaks to many garden groups, has delivered regional RHS lectures, and is widely travelled.  She presented an interesting selection of plants, many of which most of us were unfamiliar with, and there was something for every aspect or site.  Unusual forms of clematis, and different ways of training  honeysuckle and wisteria were illustrated, We gained lots of ideas for enhancing our gardens and will be seeking out all sorts of new plants!

Model Farm at Perry Green, Wembdon was the site of our  visit on Wednesday 5th June.  The garden has 4 acres of  gardens to the south of a Victorian country house. Created from a flat rectangular field in the last 14 yrs, it is still being developed and includes a dozen large mixed flower beds planted in cottage garden style with wildlife in mind, wooded areas, mixed orchard, lawns, wildflower meadows and wildlife and swimming  ponds. We were given an introduction by the garden's creator, David Young, who has done a lot of the work, though he now has at least one full time gardener helping. It was fascinating seeing how much had been achieved, how the trees had grown, and how the site had been developed. Plants were bought and tea enjoyed in the orangery.