March 2024 Update - Garden

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March 2024 Update - Garden

 

 

 

What a wet February we have had!  This has not deterred us gardeners one jot though, we have used boards on the beds where necessary and taken advantage of any dry intervals to complete all the tasks necessary so that the Garden looked suitably fantastic for you all to see when we opened last Wednesday. 

Bates Green Garden - Middle garden

We have added a ‘Looking Good’ section to the website batesgreengarden.co.uk so that you can see at a glance what is of particular interest in the Garden on any given week.

For those of you that cannot get here on a Wednesday, then please make a note of our first National Garden Scheme date for 2024 - Sunday March 17th with refreshments being supplied by Cancer Research UK.  Please book in advance HERE and you can be sure of a warm welcome whatever the weather throws at us.

   National Garden Scheme logo
Cancer Research UK logo

A group of plants looking particularly good this month are the hellebores.  We always remove the leaves at the end of the calendar year, they look so tatty, and we have found that mice like to shelter beneath them nibbling at the emerging fat juicy buds. We then give the plants a generous mulch making sure the organic matter doesn’t rest on the crown of the plant. Other than that, it is all about location. Hellebores like a shady spot that doesn’t dry out too much over the summer. Ideally, you can increase your stock by careful division in August, but this has not been possible the last couple of summers due to drought. 

Hellebores in Bates Green Garden 2024

If you enjoy the coloured stems of dogwood and Salix in the Garden, then please do visit soon before we prune them down.  This procedure should happen just at or before bud break, and the warm weather is hastening the leaves on the stems.  They look particularly good when the sun breaks through the clouds and we all marvel at the bright contrasting colours.

Dogwood in Bates Green Garden 2024

One of our most historically important shrubs is the Chaenomeles that grows next to the hawthorn by the Lych Gate. This was given to John’s mother by his father when they married in 1936 and has grown in the garden on the same spot ever since. It flowered beautifully this year, and this was captured by John Glover when he visited in February.

Chaenomeles by the lych gate at Bates Green Farm

 

I hope that March brings good gardening weather for us all.  We look forward to seeing you in the Garden.

 

Emma Reece - Head Gardener

 

This message was added on Sunday 3rd March 2024

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