Breaking records!

Wednesday 19 March 2014

Fourteen volunteers today, a record for Mount Stewart. Jonathan didn’t panic. Does this mean we might get the odd bit of a Zzzzzzzz behind a tree in the sun or will we be expected to get lots more work done? Mmmmm…

Endless work in the Shamrock Garden and the Lily Wood. Working in the bamboo bed, thinning out bamboos, stripping leaves from the straightest ones and storing for future use. Clearing beds trying not to step on the thousands of bulbs coming up, cutting down herbaceous plants, raking leaves and doing all the spring-cleaning necessary at this time of the year. Fourteen people can get an enormous amount of work done, a great buzz of activity with laden wheelbarrows being brought to the dump for recycling. Lovely warm spring day, no coats.

Nursery day next Wednesday. How will fourteen people fit into the nursery? Alan won’t panic.

Jill

Spring cleaning and hunting for squirrels

Wednesday 10 April 2013

Erythronium. In the Lily Wood. I think it is Erythronium tuolumnense. If it’s not, I’m sure the Plant Police will soon let me know.

Lovely to be working in the warm sun in the Lily Wood. The usual Spring clean of one of the large beds, trying not to step on the bluebells and hundreds of bulbs just showing above the ground. We have a new volunteer, Ruth, who LOVES digging so she got a great welcome from Team Wednesday. She spent all afternoon digging out barrow loads of Ground Elder. Welcome, Ruth.

I have been trying, for years, to get a good photograph of one of our red squirrels, after all Mount Stewart is a Red Squirrel sanctuary. There are lots to be seen but are so quick that it is almost impossible to get a good picture. William, one of Mount Stewart’s gardeners, brought me to a clearing in the woods (that sounds like an opening line to a murder story) where squirrels feed quite tamely on nuts and seeds and don’t seem to mind people being around. I sat on a log for an hour in the sun, camera poised, but no squirrels. So back to the drawing board. Maybe it will need an early morning start, but I will get one eventually.

Jill

Re-turfing in the Italian Garden

Wednesday 3 April 2013

Italian Garden – Removing all the turf.

When I heard the plans for the complete re-turfing of the Italian Garden I was expecting a very disrupted garden. But as you can see everything was done very neatly with the minimum of disruption. It is such a big job that an external contractor, Sam Thompson, was brought in. All the turf has now been removed and stacked away for compost and most of the ground has been levelled. Drains have been put in with soak-aways going into the Peace Garden and the Lily Wood and on down to the stream. Pop-up sprinklers have been put in as the grass can get very dry with so many visitors. So come torrential rain or scorching sun the Italian Garden will be well covered.

It is going to take about two weeks to lay all the turf, all 2,800 sq metres of it. When it is finished it will be rolled, after a few days, to smooth out any bumps in the ground. Knowing Sam there won’t be a single bump to smooth out. It will take three to four weeks to settle and for the roots to take before visitors will be able to walk around. It is fascinating to watch experts at work and visitors can see what is going on from the Dodo Terrace, the Spanish Garden and the Lily Wood. Well worth a wander around.

Rhododendron ‘Shilsonii Group’

After work I took a walk around the lake and spotted this rhododendron shimmering in the sun.

Jill

Lisa and Wilf – The shredders

Wednesday 8 February 2012

Doing a lot of pruning with Ian and Lisa near the Stag area – Hydrangeas, Fuschias, Roses, Philadelphus and Buddleja (which I always thought was spelt Buddleia but not according to the RHS). All the prunings and branches were put through the shredder and blown out onto the beds as mulch. We all had to have very detailed safety instructions to use the shredder, we were supplied with eye and ear protection plus a mask for our faces. Zorro was mentioned a few times but we got a lot of work done.

Jill

Quercus x hispanica ‘Lucombeana’ (Lucombe Oak)

Wednesday 11 January 2012

It was lovely being back to work at Mount Stewart after a long Christmas break but this is what we saw on the lawn at the front of the House.

Lucombe Oak Tree (c) Neil Porteous, Head of Gardens, Northern Ireland

This oak tree blew down during the high winds on 3^rd Jan 2012. The Lucombe Oak was originally raised in a nursery in Exeter by Mr Lucombe in 1762 and this specimen was 190 years old. It is unusual in that it keeps its leaves over winter and the fact that it is evergreen would have made it more vulnerable to the gusts of high wind. It is quite shocking to see a tree that has been there for 190 years lying on the ground. This is going to be replaced with the same Lucombe Oak in the Spring.

The good news is that it is planned that the bulk of the wood will be used by woodcarver and wood turner Geoff Tulip of Tulipwood Crafts to make items for the gift shop at Mount Stewart.

Jill

Preparing for the Winter

Wednesday 2 November 2011

The Gardens are now closed to the public so the winter work has begun. We were taking out all the pelargoniums from the pots on the Dodo Terrace and bringing them up to the Nursery along with Artemesia from the Spanish Garden. Doreen and Wilf were working with Danielle in the Nursery pricking out Dianthus barbatus, grown from seed by Danielle in the summer. These will be kept in the greenhouse overwinter and some of them will be planted out in the Gardens and some will be sold in the Plant shop.

Aeonium ‘Zwartkop’. These tender plants were taken out of the pots in the Spanish Garden to overwinter in a frost-free place in the Nursery.

After lunch we planted 100 lilies, Lilium speciosum album in the Lily Wood, white flowers with purple stems, flowering late summer. These were planted 4” deep and about 12” apart. The large bed had been newly manured and mulched so it will be stunning. This is the exciting time of the year for the volunteers and we all love it.

Jill

Lily Wood – Memorial Glade

1 September 2011

We have just completed a long drain in the Lily Wood which I hope will prevent the area flooding, which it has ruinously for the last two or three winters. As a result, many of the more sensitive plants, not least of all Lilies and Meconopsis have become impossible to grow in those inundated areas. More alarmingly, many of the exotic trees which form that crucial shelter-belt between the garden and Strangford Lough have been killed. Douglas Fir, Giant Redwoods as well as native Oak and Beech.

We will in the process upgrade a service track, sowing the stony surface with a shade-bearing mix, which will form a circuit walk, running from the Memorial Glade back around back to the middle of the Lily Wood. We will replant as much as possible the shelter-belt with Oak, Ash, Western Hemlock and under-plant with Holly and Hazel. I want to work in a few more sturdy exotics and natives: Small-leaved Lime, Walnut, North American Walnut, Hungarian Oak, Wild Service Tree and Field Maple especially on the leeward edge.

Next year, as funds allow, we will put a further lateral drain obliquely across the Memorial Glade to capture the run-off from the drive and Mc Comb’s Hill. This will empty into this year’s main drain. While we are disrupting the Memorial Glade, we might as well create an “eye-catcher” down there to induce visitors to make the effort.

The Cromlech moved to make way for a landing strip in the 1930s will be moved and reconstructed as is, to the end of the Memorial Glade. I will be replanting and re-shaping the lawns of the Memorial Glade this autumn and replanting in late winter. From the Cromlech, visitors can then meander back through the new planting and grassy path back to the Lily Wood.

I will be planting many bold ribbons of Lilies again in Lily Wood this autumn and Danielle has sown many blue Meconopsis from Averil at Rowallane which will not move down to Lily Wood until late winter 2013.

NP       01.09.2011

Click on the names of the trees and plants mentioned in this post to learn more about them:

Lilies, Meconopsis, Douglas Fir, Giant Redwood, Oak, Beech, Ash, Western Hemlock, Holly, Hazel, Small-leaved Lime, Walnut, Hungarian Oak, Wild Service Tree, Field Maple

New drainage system in the Lily Wood

Wednesday 24 August 2011

The start of a new drainage system being developed at Mount Stewart at the edge of the Lily Wood.

The ground in the Lily Wood has become very impacted over the years and this new drainage system will help to stop the flooding that is now a big problem. The area was cleared by Ian Marshall, the Monday volunteers and two of the “Steps to Work” people last week. Sam Thompson then brought in a digger to make the drain. It is going to be about 200 metres long with 80 metres of it being filled with quarry stones and perforated drainage pipes and covered over. The other 120 metres will be filled with quarry stones and left open and looked at again next year.

Thanks to Ian and Sam for details.

Workwise eight of us were on the East terrace. We were cutting back the hundreds of lavender plants which have finished flowering, each plant had to be cut with secateurs and shaped into a mound. Time consuming but the scent of the lavender sent us into a bit of a stupor. Lovely. We were also tidying up all the beds, dead-heading roses, clearing weeds and leaves. A lot of visitors really enjoying the warm balmy day.

Jill

Cercidiphyllum japonicum – Cercidiphyllaceae (Katsura Tree)

30 August 2011

Cercidiphyllum japonicum – Cercidiphyllaceae

Katsura Tree

Tir na nOg / Lily Wood

One of the first trees to offer any promise of autumn colour is the Katsura Tree – Warm orange and yellow and a fine toffee scent to its foliage. Grown in the UK since 1881, this huge tree, (reaching 130ft/40m), in the wild is considered totally hardy. The best specimen I have ever found is up at Sizergh Castle (NT) in the Lake District.  It can however, suffer from late frosts, but if it is nipped back, it will send out a new batch of leaves. On the 2000 Red List, but at lower risk, The Katsura is a rare tree in the temperate Beech forests of Japan and even more rare in the broad-leaved woodland of China. It is found either in full sun or dappled shade in rich, but well drained soils of neutral or acid pH. It will tolerate some lime, but will not colour so well in autumn.

Katsura timber is prized in Japan and this and the fact that it regenerates poorly in its natural habitat has caused it to decline. The height of its range was back in the Tertiary period.

In the spring, the young leaves emerge red and rapidly fade to green. The round, toothed leaves are grey green beneath and tiny red flowers accompany the unfurling leaves. Seed is the best method of propagation.

NP

Find out more about the Katsura Tree by clicking here