The Gardens at Barnsley House

Box is an enigmatic plant in the garden, surrounded by myth, legend and uncertainty….box blight, box moth, when to clip; when not to clip; ooops! Derby Day was yesterday, the cut-off benchmark...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/06/sunday-2-nd-june-2019.html

Since passing the Barnsley House Head Gardener baton to Jen Danbury, I’ve had some time to sort through my notes and reflect on ‘seasons past’ in the garden. Here are some spring notes I�...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/05/blog-post.html

It's with great pleasure we share the above photograph of our newest Garden Team gearing up for the summer ahead at Barnsley House. With Jen Danbury (far right) as Head Gardener and Ellie D...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/03/meet-gardeners.html

Summer Snowflake, Summer Snowdrop, St Agnes’ Flower, St George’s Violet, Loddon Lily: but more often than not it’s botanical name is used…… LEUCOJUM AESTIVUM.  A plant of the moment...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/03/summer-snowflake.html

Despite being at Barnsley House for quite a while and a gardener, before this for quite a while longer; it’s only since I left my post of Head Gardener that I have seen something totally new t...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/03/the-female-flowers-of-hazel.html

Friday was a good day for the Aconites, glorious sunshine flexed their blooms, offering pollen ‘on a plate’ to the bees that hummed and buzzed; the most transient of scents cupped by the mil...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/02/eranthis-crocus-and-galanthus-merlin.html

The 30th of January, last Wednesday, was my last day as Head Gardener of Barnsley House. It could have been an emotional affair; but I’d been through that in the three months and more leading ...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/02/its-not-goodbye-just-see-you-later.html

The Wintersweet has serendipitously wriggled and wiggled it’s way up the wall and put on a scented display outside the open window of suite 1. Normally grown as a shrub, previous gardeners h...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2019/01/garden-scent-pruning-juniper-and.html

If ever there was a plant that represents the importance of seasonality in the garden at Barnsley House then Pulmonaria rubra 'Redstart' is it. A long term resident of Barnsley House, this unas...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2018/12/seasonal-interest.html

We grow a strip bed of Parsnips for Christmas; just a strip bed, they take up so much room and have a long season of growth, sitting around until the Christmas weeks. This week Morgan and I lift...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2018/11/parsnips-christmas-voles-mice-and.html

GINGKO NEAR THE POTAGER. It's pointed out many times that gathering leaves is a tedious business; but I like to think of it as a harvest  of a valuable resource. Leaf mould is a valuable ...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2018/11/leaves.html

Galanthus reginae olgae  in the Broad Border this week. ";but if anyone should have so perverted a taste as to desire the sight of a Snowdrop in Autumn, there is Galanthus olgae, which com...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2018/10/snowdrops.html

30th September 2018 Often, these days, a milky mist associates with the course of the Thames as it oxbows and meanders through the dewy cobweb festooned water meadows of Buscot and Radcot.  ...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2018/10/dew.html

20th September 2018 Photo: Morgan James Probably my favourite season; especially the start. Lots of lovely things to look forward to....perfumed fruit, amber days, wet dogs, golden stubbl...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2018/09/autumn.html

Fieldfares lift off stubble and grass or decorate iron grey hawthorn hedges, perfectly colour coordinated, often accompanied by Redwings, that dapper little Thrush. These are the birds of open ...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2017/02/fieldfares-lift-off-stubble-and-grass.html

We've had a lot of rain over the last few weeks or you would think that? The pond at the top of the field is still very low and although I got loamy hands planting Tulips in Beds 1& 2 the other...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/11/weve-had-lot-of-rain-over-last-few-days.html

Flickering Field Maple leaves amidst scarlet Spindle line the route through the Hairy Hedge, an elderly track that ends prematurely.  I have a hunch that it used to slip into the Welsh Way be...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/11/flickering-field-maple-leaves-amidst.html

A fiery Euonymus on the Ribbon Beds. The gnaw of the Maize harvester is the sound of October in the countryside and then you realise that the year is into it's fourth quarter! How did that h...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/10/a-fiery-euonymus-on-ribbon-beds.html

A great afternoon, on Saturday, spent mooching around friend Julie Dolphin's Miserden Nursery. She's obviously been hard at work with vineries cleared out  and healthy stock now holding court o...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/09/a-great-afternoon-on-saturday-mooching.html

Summer is over now with dewy mornings; but days still capable of producing a warm glow on exposed limbs. Early Autumn could, quite possibly, be my favourite time of the year, comfortable tempera...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/09/summer-is-over-now-with-dewy-mornings.html

A busy bank holiday weekend with vegetables going to both House and Pub. Barba di Frate (Monk's Beard), a terrestrial Samphiresque Italian greens, tastes quite salty and we'll definitely gro...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/08/a-busy-bank-holiday-weekend-with.html

Bed 1.....yellows, whites and blues. A rampagous Gourd strapped to the rib of a polytunnel ....what will it become? Bed 2.....blues, pinks and purples.

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/08/bed-1.html

Bed 1.....yellows, whites and blues. A rampagous Gourd strapped to the rib of a polytunnel ....what will it become? Bed 2.....blues, pinks and purples.

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/08/bed-1_7.html

Allium christophii. May and June are relentless months for the gardener with dusty July forcing an extra gear and an even quicker turn of speed. Some one once said "you've got to move quick ...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/07/allium-christophii.html

The beginning of last week saw me chopping some of the Geraniums to the ground, fed up of having them peek early and then looking sad from late July, the only option a late cut back to reveal a ...

http://thegardensatbarnsleyhouse.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-beginning-of-last-week-saw-me.html