Galanthus Events - Snowdrop Days etc 2013

[KentGardener]

Thanks to John and JohnW for the advice about the RHS show. Train tickets booked for the first day! I'll keep my fingers crossed that something will be before Joint Rock this year and hope to see some of you there.

Anthony

Hi Anthony

I might be hard to spot as I will be in camo.     If you spot me please come and say hi.     I usually arrive just after midday as will have to do a few hours work in the morning.

[Tim Ingram]

A sunny February day and snowdrop time. Carolyn and John Millen, who run the Mid-Kent Group of the AGS, always open their garden in early February for the NGS, and visitors come as much for the hot homemade soup as for the amazing collection of Galanthus that Carolyn and her daughter have amassed in a relatively short time. They are mostly grown in lattice pots in raised beds to ensure that named varieties are kept segregated and they can be easily lifted and divided or twin-scaled.

A year or two ago there were some 200 plus varieties; this year over 400(!), and like many snowdrop gardens the interest just grows and grows. Visitors vary; many just love seeing these plants so early in the year, but would have no idea that some might cost £20 or £30 a bulb. Others, sad to say, have been just as bitten by the bug and enviously look at the latest and most fashionable variety. It makes little difference, the plants look great either way - and what else would bring out so many gardeners in the coldest days of the year?

Just a few of this remarkable collection: 'Benhall Beauty' - an old rather lax variety but historically important as coming from John Gray's garden; 'Fenstead End' - an elegant little plant from Chris Grey-Wilson's  previous garden; 'John Tomlinson' - this has a striking flower, named for the plantsman by Chris Brickell (who has a pretty good eye for snowdrops!); and 'Rogers Rough' - this is a good vigorous Kentish variety named for Richard Bird's garden at Kilndown near to Goudhurst. Carolyn and her daughter have amassed very many fascinating varieties - has anyone heard of 'Hercule'? (Quite a good name for a snowdrop somehow, but not as good as some others I have seen such as 'Long Tall Sally').

[Tim Ingram]

Carolyn grows many of these, along with smaller plants derived by twin-scaling, in a series of raised beds just outside the back door of the house. For the afficiando excitement can come just by seeing a name on a label(!) - even more when you can see ‘Diggory’ or ‘Lapwing’ flowering in small groups. Many of these choice and special varieties are best displayed in this way - they would be lost and overlooked in woodland borders and not so easily compared, which is after all what makes them so intriguing and often controversial. At the side of the house the growing collection has requiried a series of sleeper beds - these contain a host of Galanthus completely new to me, such as ‘Hercule’, but also the nice species rizenhensis which can do nicely in the garden. ‘Round the back’ are greenhouses and frames where young twin-scales are grown on and new plants collected (like the most fascinating parts of alpine nurseries where all the real action goes on).

John may be as bemused as many, such as my wife, that a gardener can be keen to grow so many snowdrops, but when they fill the garden with flowers in winter their charm is captivating. However, in the alpine house is a nice collection of saxifrages, oxalis and other small alpine cushions, which start flowering not long after the snowdrops have finished.

A nice day out for the alpine gardener in February!

[RichardW]

Really like those terraced sleeper beds, look very smart, hope to visit the garden one day.

[Brian Ellis]

Thanks for this report Tim, the more I see it the more I would like to visit!

[mark smyth]

Gala week and traditionally snow covers the ground. Have you got snow?

[annew]

Yep!

[ChrisD]

Not in this part of the world

[chasw]

Nor here but a very strong biting wind,was hoping to be out in the garden today ..................but the sun is shining

[KentGardener]

Gala week and traditionally snow covers the ground. Have you got snow?

Not here Mark.  Bright sunshine - but bloody freezing and overnight was so windy it blew over the really big bamboo pot out front.  I woke to find hanging it over the pavement with people having to step into the road to avoid it! 

[Mavers]

Yes VERY windy & cold here in Somerset, frequent hailstorms & sleet with bright periods...............I sound like a weatherman

[emma T]

Wintry showers on and off all day, no snow has settled 

[Gail]

Snow currently settling here in mid-Suffolk.

[mark smyth]

Couple of Eranthis with a tipping for snow

[Brian Ellis]

Managed to get in a full day of gardening after a shower overnight.