June 2013

It's been a busy and confusing couple of months since our last report.

Many of the rhododendrons are still out, which brings a lovely splash of colour to the reserve – very welcome at this time of year for what is otherwise mostly a spring garden.  They will be followed by foxgloves, rather late but there in abundance.

 

The bamboo has done well too – unfortunately!  Many days have been spent digging it up to reduce it back to a manageable area and extending the trench to help to stop it spreading again.  It's a back breaking job and it made me quite tired watching Annabel, Mick and others attacking it with mattocks and spades!  Unfortunately it's the wrong bamboo for canes, otherwise we could make money selling them.

 

The grass has grown well during the recent mixture of sun and rain, so our latest batch of friendly and inquisitive cows will enjoy both meadows and save us a job.

 

You may have noticed recently a group of about 20 people wandering about carrying photographs and inspecting things.  The Essex Gardens Trust had organized a Historic Gardens Research day and they were trying to find items that had been photographed by Ellen Willmott, as practice for working on other less well documented gardens.  The distractions of such an interesting site proved too much at times, but it ended up as a very successful day.

 

Soon after that a group of 8 visitors arrived from France.  We do get visitors from all over the world, but these were special.  They were from Tresserve, which is where Ellen Willmott's old chateau still stands and is used as the Mairie for the town.  In fact one of them, Geneviève, has written a book about the Mairie and Ellen Willmott.  It is in French, but has comprehensive summaries in English, is well illustrated (including old photographs by Ellen Willmott herself) and contains a considerable amount of new information gleaned from original sources.  La Mairie de Tresserve is a little expensive at 35 euros plus postage, but in my opinion well worth the money.  If you are thinking about buying it you can look at my copy first.  I have just three here, thus saving postage if you get in quickly.

 

John