April 2022

It may look lovely but April can only be described as a month of destruction in our garden…

It began with the apple step-overs.  One of the first things we planted when we arrived at Crofton over 20 years ago, this is an old espaliering technique where you cut out the leader at the first pair of lateral branches so it is low enough to step over (hence the name).  It is only small garden area, one we walk past daily and yet had slipped beneath our view over the years, until now…

To be honest the makeover was fuelled by an idea that had been brewing for a while. When you own a larger property, whether you like it or not, you start to accumulate things and because you have more room, these things may not be necessarily small.  You also tend to leave things lying around the place.  Our garden is always transforming, we’re constantly trialling out different garden sculptures, bits of sandstone, pots in any areas we are working on.  If they don’t work we tend to discard them nearby always with the thought that we will put it away later.  So, with that in mind, I had been seeing a lone sandstone (for lack of a better word) pillar near our Big Shed.  I knew we had more laying around but they were of a style that is difficult to use – flat on the back, we suspect they had been placed against a building in relief style.  A second was spotted a couple of months back over on the far side of the garden, a third was hiding in plain site in Jenny’s small potting area.  Four would have been the preferred number but three would do. 

The three pillars formed the corners of the area, giving it definition and structure, the step overs weren’t enough on their own.  To give it more focus we used (and stole from other areas, our usual trick) flat sandstone bricks to line between the pillars.  The difference it made was huge, and once you fix one bit, you start to look at the surrounding area.  Our water taps for the garden are located behind the area, so we needed a path to access it.  More sandstone scrounging (with some sandstone looking concrete thrown in for good luck) and we had a paved area and a pathway.  We finished off the area by adding little finials to the pillars and planting a gorgeous weeping Camellia ‘Snow’.

Next up in our trail of destruction was the Middle Bed. 

Jenny still laments the day we decided to make such a huge bed smack bang in the middle of the garden but there it is.  One side is shady, one side is sunny, plants get thrown in there and forgotten about, it’s just a schmozzle.  The best thing we ever did was plant a Gleditzia ‘Sunburst’.  When we could grow no other trees, she rose to the challenge and stretched her golden arms up to the sky.  We have been forever grateful to her since.

Unfortunately, our half-hearted effort with the rest of the bed had created a bit of a hodge podge effect.  An impulsive mass purchase of Rhodendrons last year by Jenny in a pique of hating everything in the Middle Bed was also interesting, including her regretful disgust at herself with the purchase but they are there and they are going to stay for now. No. The main victim of this ‘restructure’ was going to be the Melianthus Major.  A wonderful, structural plant, it can also be a thug, which is the role it was playing here.  It’s removal showed how it had been encroaching on other plants, which were also removed due to massive die back and because we simply don’t have time to molly coddle too many plants in a garden the size of ours.

Along with all this destruction, April is the month where we start to work over the box hedges and espaliers.  Trim them back to a manageable size, and, if we remember, a sprinkle of Urea to promote green foliage growth.  It works a treat, when we cut back our Lonicera hedge by half last year, we gave it a feed and by October she was lovely and green (We would say luscious but that’s probably taking it too far) .

Now, to be completely honest, I’m exhausted just writing about all this chaos so we will leave you with some pleasant images of the garden …