Once I bought and read this book I became immediately hooked on the drought proof plants and garden design that Chatto describes so beautifully across its many pages. Since then I have read and re-read this book many times. Her philosophy of ‘right plant – right place’ whereby we use plants that are naturally suited to our garden conditions has never seemed more timely in  these days of water shortages, global warming and climate change.

In May of last year I was lucky enough to visit the garden and met Beth Chatto and had a short walk around the garden with her. What a treat! It was my first time to visit the garden and it was stunning. Equally beautiful was the nursery which was chock-a-block with very beautiful plants lots of which were used in the garden. The garden itself is a mixture of woodland gardens, poolside planting, rich lawns and very nice perennial planting. The Gravel garden for which she is best known occupies space around the nursery and main entrance and is the ‘entrance’ to the rest of the garden. What I loved about it was how fresh everything looked, spring bulbs were just fading back and being covered by emergent foliage – every planting was so well-considered and composed of tough, beautiful plants each playing their part. The gravel walks around each planting gave good access to each planting and also softened the edges of t he beds – plants were seeding into the gravel which made for a wonderful hazy picture in some parts of the garden. Just last month I got the 2010 Beth Chatto catalogue in the post – this year is the fiftieth year of the nursery – pretty impressive by anyones standards. So, to mark this special celebration I’ll share some happy memories of my visit to this special garden – I have lots more to share in a later post – happy gardening.

www.bethchatto.co.uk

Gravel garden detail at Beth Chatto Gardens

A selection of grasses and Euphorbia at Beth Chatto Gardens, Essex UK

Beth Chatto Gardens - Fifty Years of gardening

Nectaroscordum Siculum ssp bulgaricum in May at Beth Chatto Gardens

Summer growth at Beth Chatto Gardens

Daphnes are quite particular  shrubs, often coming from very well drained mountain-sides where they thrive in the free draining soil and special conditions provided by this environment. I’m only just feeling my way through this group of plants but I am really getting to like them. One of my favourites is Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postill‘- this beautiful winter flowering shub grows slowly – sometimes to about four metres if conditions are good. In January it starts to flower and presents a mass of very beautiful shell pink flowers – whch emerge from little clusters and stay for weeks, even in freezing cold. But the big hit is the fragrance – it is a heady and heavy perfume which never fails to encourage a second, longer engagement! I have my plant beside my front door when I can smell its perfume when I am coming home in the late evening. Even this years cold did nothing to stop the flowers – the plant lost many of its leaves but the flowers persisted and now we are enjoying their heady frangrance in the middle of the cold winter. See this article for a good overview of daphnes – http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/howtogrow/4968614/Follow-the-fragrance.html

The winter flowers of Daphne bholua 'Jacqueline Postill'

Why write about gardens or plants? Because we are entering a new era of engagement with the natural world – the realisation of how interdependent and related we are to our environment is becoming more apparent and obvious with each passing year. As habitats are destroyed it is up to us to save plants that once existed in the wild, to grow them, treasure them and raise awareness of them so that we can all enjoy them in the future.

I have gained so much enjoyment in my short gardening career of discovering new plants, learing of the inguenity of nature and how natures design has helped plants evolve and flourish. I want to share my excitment of discovering new plants and growing plants with others. I’m an avid blog reader but this is my first effort – so , so much to write about.I hope you enjoy it.

First, a little about my garden; I garden in the South East of Ireland which is really (despite the rain, wind and cold) a fantastic place to garden – we never get too much frost (except for this year…) and get lots of rain and its never too hot. I have to say even on the rainy days I like looking out at my plants. I am really lucky to have enough space try a wide variety of plants in several different kinds of conditions.

I am lucky to have a north facing courtyard with high, old walls which protect the small space behind my house. Here I can grow all my shade loving plants; ferns, primulas, climbers (some very special clematis from Crug Farm Plants in Wales) and other things I have picked up along the way. This year I grew my first arisemia (arisaema concinnum) see below. I have just got more of these plants as I loved watching it emerge in spring. It was pretty simple to grow – I planted it in a deep, rich leaf mold which was semi- shaded and  pretty moist. I was rewarded with a beautiful spathe which died back slowly in early autumn and has now gone dormant.