Special Plants: A Final Winter's View

Back in February when Derry Watkins was my VIP, I promised you a return to Special Plants to show the garden and nursery during winter time. As the world is currently turning golden yellow with the arrival of the daffodils and there's the suspicion of a fuzzy green appearing on some trees, I think today's my last chance to show you before all this becomes history for another year.

When I visited last September, it coincided with an article appearing in The English Garden. Just like this winter view from the back door of the house, the magazine's photos looked completely different to the one on view. That's because the garden was photographed the previous year so pictures relevant to the month of publication could be used. As Derry likes to change things around each year, the garden will look different again when you make your own visit.

A winter's visit not only meant I got the chance to see the garden at a time not usually seen by visitors, I was also able to appreciate the garden's structural elements such as this Beech circle called The Empty Quarter, introduced by Derry's architect husband Peter (he designed the garden, Derry planted it).

We also admired this view over Peter's Shapes in Landscape for several reasons: it's practical because the hedges disguise the water pump and sewage tank, plus the structures stop the garden running down the steep hill. I also thought they acted like a windowsill, underlining the view over the fields and hills beyond the garden. We joked about the garden having two halves: the structural, but planted half being Derry's and this more architectural side belonging to her husband. She also pointed out how the variable colouring of the Yew hedge was (shown in the middle of the picture): this was something I'd not noticed before, but winter brings out this kind of detail for us to appreciate.

In the summer I'd remarked to Threadspider about the unusual grass hedge, but didn't take a photo. It was still going strong in January. Derry likes the idea of the succession of the short grass of her garden, then the long grass of the Miscanthus forming a boundary, followed by the short grass of the fields beyond. The cut down area in the foreground is where she's using Pictorial Meadows seed mixes for a long lasting border of successional annuals.

The pond area still looked inviting and the plants within it showed the water quality to be extremely good. There was plenty of watercress growing at the point where the spring flows into the pond to the right of the picture.

Derry's nursery specialises in tender perennials many of which are also planted out in her garden. I was therefore surprised at how little the garden was wrapped up for winter protection. Instead lots of cuttings of favourite plants had been taken ready to plant up the borders anew come spring. Anything not surviving the winter is seen as an opportunity to try something else.

The garden and nursery have a spring fed water supply. Here, one of the springs splashes into the top of the garden at one side of the house. Threadspider and I thought this part of the garden wasn't working that well when we visited last year, so I was cheered when Derry told me this area is one of her projects for 2010: a new bog garden.

After my interview and tour, I was allowed to wander freely around the nursery and garden. I must be one of the few people around who can get excited over a relatively empty nursery! However, I viewed it as part of winter's renewal: a time to clear out old stock and to clean and prepare the nursery for 2010.

After all, there was plenty of life elsewhere: here's the greenhouse stuffed with plants as usual and with quite a few unusual Pelargoniums in flower. Derry confessed at her talk to Bath University Gardening Club last week that she had to start her nursery so she could make room for more plants in her greenhouse!

At the top of the nursery there's plenty of cuttings being given the tough love they need to provide good, strong healthy plants for 2010's gardening season. By now garden tidying and seed sowing will be in full swing and both the nursery and garden will have started their transformation into what this year's visitors and customers will see. Opening times can be found here which also includes details about this year's Special Tuesdays: Derry's series of short weekly talks about various aspects of gardening and plant care.