This month in the garden

Each month we will bring to you our Gardeners' favourite flowers and wildlife from around the Glyndebourne gardens.

May 2012

Plant of the Month: Camassia

The gardeners have one of the best views of the gardens with, in the foreground, the orchard meadow.  The meadow wakes slowly at the beginning of the year with the first tentative primroses and early daffodils.  Now, in May, the area is punctuated by the tall blue spires of Camassia.  Even before the flowers appear the glaucous spears of the foliage are a handsome sight. 

The first of the Cammassias to flower are the dark blue forms, followed by those with china-blue flowers and, finally, the pure white cultivars. Each plant consists of 100 or so star-like flowers that open from the bottom of the stem upwards to form a dense column of flowers.  The bulbs are perfect for naturalising in grass and soon form large colonies.  The foliage dies away by midsummer.

Camassias are indigenous to North America and the bulbs were once a staple of native Americans. 

April 2012

Plant of the Month: Narcissus Tête à Tête

This is probably Europe’s most popular dwarf daffodil.   Millions are produced each year to be forced into early-flowering and sold for temporary planting in patio containers or for decorating the house.  Most of them will never see another spring, thrown away as soon as they have finished flowering.

That is a real waste because the plant is tough, easy-to-grow and quickly forms large groups.  At Glyndebourne there are colonies of Narcissus ‘Tête à Tête’ in the rough grass around the lake and on the edge of the orchard.  There are many other varieties of daffodil that have naturalised in the gardens but this is one of the first to flower and its diminutive stature (only six inches high) and clear buttercup-yellow flowers make it one of the most attractive. Most daffodils have a single flower at the top of each stem, this one has several flowers so you get more flower power per bulb.

If you are planting bulbs that have been grown in a pot and have finished flowering, plant them with about two inches of the stem buried under the soil. 

March 2012

Plant of the Month: Cornus mas
Sometimes it pays to ignore the gardening books.  Read about Cornus mas, the winter-flowering cornelian cherry, and you will learn that they need to grown away from cold, drying winds, out of frost pockets and in well-drained soil.    Whoever planted the Cornus mas in the gardens at Glyndebourne had not been reading the right books, because here the shrubs thrive. 

In a cold, windy spot frost pocket in boggy soil near the lake the golden flowers glow in the spring sunlight.

It is a slow-growing shrub that, even after fifteen years years, will only get to about ten feet tall.  The flowers are small and by themselves not significant but, together, they smother the shrub and create the glowing effect that has made the plant a popular spring flowering shrub.

After a hot summer, the shrub will produce red, cherry-like berries that look good against the autumn foliage.  Again, according to the books, they can be used to make a tasty preserve.  None of the gardeners have ever had time to make it, so we can’t verify how tasty (or otherwise) it actually is.

February 2012

Plant of the Month: Algerian Iris
As in most gardens, at Glyndebourne, the traditional heralds of spring are snowdrops, crocuses and the occasional primrose. Tucked at the base of the walls around the house, though, is an unsung plant that has been in flower for weeks.

Iris unguicularis, commonly known as the the Algerian iris, has lavender-blue flowers that are sweetly scented. Seeing it flower in the middle of winter is always a surprise, as is where it grows. To thrive, this iris needs poor, dry soil that gets baked by the summer sun. To grow it in your own garden, plant it in the worst, stoniest soil you have and keep it dry. The flowers can be picked and last for days in a vase.

Not even this iris’s most ardent fan would say that the foliage is attractive. To describe it as untidy is being kind. But it is worth tolerating the mess of leaves for the beauty of the flowers. In the summer, when we are drowning it beautiful flowers, this flower would still be a treasure. In the middle of winter, it is worth more than rubies.

January 2012

Plant of the Month: Willow Tree
Even common-or-garden varieties of plants play an important role in the Glyndebourne gardens. It would be easy to take for granted the willow trees (Salix alba) that fringe the banks at the bottom of the lake but they form a crucial part of the garden’s treescape. During the summer the curtains that the trees form provide shade along the lakeside path. In spring, the catkins that cloak the trees are an important early source of nectar for bees and insects. But for many of the people who work at Glyndebourne, the joy of the willows is their winter colouring. The new stems that the tree has produced in the previous season are brightly coloured in bright sunlight seem to set the whole tree ablaze. Even on dull days the trees have a coppery-red sheen that makes a dramatic contrast with the sky.

Willow can be cut down to the ground every two or three years to keep the small. Left alone they will soon reach 15 metres tall, so are only suitable for very large gardens and parks. They are easily propagated from cuttings and often a branch that touches the ground will take root.

December 2011

Plant of the Month: Mahonia
Even on the dullest winter day there is always a sparkle in the Glyndebourne gardens. There are few shrubs that flower at this time of year but most that do share the common characteristic of strongly-scented flowers. Any winter-flowering plant has to work hard to attract the few pollinating insects that are around. And there is no better way for a plant to grab attention than by pumping out a strong perfume. Shrubby honeysuckles, winter viburnums and winter daphnes are all sweetening the Glyndebourne air. One of the strongest scents is the lily-of-the-valley fragrance from the flowers of Mahonia x media ‘Charity’. The long, sulphur-yellow flower spikes last well in water and are always part of the gardeners’ winter flower-arrangements that are used in the Glyndebourne house.

The Mahonia grows in the Bourne garden, shaded in the summer by Paulownia and Ailanthus trees. It will grow in full sun provided the soil does not dry out. Plant low-growing shrubs or perennials around the base to hide its straggly stems.

November 2011

Plant of the Month: Jimi's Good Red
Every year the Glyndebourne Gardeners hope for an Indian Summer to show off the garden’s late-flowering shrubs and perennials. This year they were rewarded with weather that kept the gardens looking exuberant for weeks longer than usual.

Visitors to the gardens during the Tour have had the opportunity to admire many late-season plants. Among the common-or-garden, reliable varieties of plants we have always grown rare and unusual species and are always on the look out for new cultivars. This year a new member of the humble sage family, Salvia ‘Jimi’s Good Red’ has been attracting a lot of attention on the border next to the main lawn.

A seedling from a species plant, Salvia splendes, ‘Jimi’s Good Red’ is covered with velvet-textured deep red flowers from June to October. It thrives in shade and has been lighting up the borders on the main lawn, underneath the large yew tree. The plant is a recent introduction and may be hard to find in nurseries and garden centres. But we are taking cuttings and will be planting lots in the gardens for you to enjoy at Glyndebourne next year.

October 2011

Plant of the Month: Iris Immortality
Nursery catalogues are full of promises for perennial plants that flower twice in the year but experienced gardeners know to be wary of such claims. While oriental poppies, hardy geraniums and other herbaceous perennials often do re-flower, the second flush is usually a feeble, nostalgic reminder of what the plant was like earlier in the year.

Occasionally plants do live up to expectations. In the crescent border the sparkling white flowers of Iris 'Immortality' were dancing in the crescent border at the start of the Festival in May. They have made a re-appearance, as they do every year, during the rehearsals for the Tour. They are just as vigorous and their scent just as sweet as they were back in May. Botanically, these irises are known as 'remontant' and most were bred in America and the South of France.

September 2011

Plant of the Month: Clereodendron
The air at the end of the long bar is filled with a fragrance so sweet that heads are turning to find the source. But the perfume is not the product of a master perfumer. It is wafting in from a shrub planted close to the opera house.

Clereodendron trichotomum var. fargesii has white, waxy flowers with red bracts that are so delicate they could have been created by Fabergé. In its native China the shrub can grow to 20 feet tall but here at Glyndbourne ours our half that height. To grow well it needs fertile soil and dappled shade.

If you are attending Glyndebourne for a performance of the Tour during October take a look at the fruits that the shrub produces once the flowers are over: they are a striking combination of a bright blue berry surrounded by a dark red seed pod.

August 2011

Plant of the Month: Torch 
This month, Head Gardener Kevin Martin has selected Tithonia rotundifolia 'Torch', commonly known as the Mexican Sunflower, as his plant of the month.

It is an eye-catching annual with luminous orange daisy-like flowers. The seeds are sown in the greenhouse in May and two months later the plant is six feet tall. It is planted out in the borders of the main lawn. This area was originally conceived by Lady Christie and the late Christopher Lloyd as a bed of hot colours that would be noticed from afar. The Mexican Sunflower certainly adds spice to the border.

Feathered friends
Flocks of goldfiches have been spotted in the wild meadow collecting seeds. They are most commonly seen in the early afternoon, just as the audience arrives for the opera!

The green woodpecker, commonly know as a Yaffle has been heard laughing across the Glyndebourne gardens. If you want to see one, look out for them collecting ants at the base of our fruit trees.