2026 – CHW
A 9½ hour drive from Cornwall to Knockinaam Lodge in Galloway. Almost 3 hours on from the turn off on the M6 into one of the most deserted parts of the UK countryside. Plenty of local election posters and not much from the Scottish Nationalists but this is a very rural area.
Knockinaam Lodge was built in about 1860 as a ‘hunting’ lodge (i.e. shooting). Sleeps about 16-18 and is similar to The Vean in some ways.
Literally overlooking the sea and facing west.
A rather unattractive new chalet above the rather obtrusive new car park with 3 electric chargers that were unused during our 5 night stay.
Oyster catchers and Curlew on the beach. About 20-30 miles in the distance is Northern Ireland. The westerly wind and the rabbit population mean that there is little gardening here. Plenty of swallows and a sighting of a gannet.
A 5 star hotel and restaurant and well worth the enormous journey. Half a dozen good gardens in easy striking distance.
The naval connections with Knockinaam Lodge.
A corgi outside the hotel front door.
2025 – CHW
A quick trip to Burncoose to collect gifts for our trip.
A quick trip to Burncoose to collect gifts for our trip.
Rhododendron ‘Veryan Bay’ very fine on the Burncoose drive. Our old plants have are nearly dead and need starting again.
A large oak branch has fallen just where we had finished clearing the Thuja hedges.
Enkianthus campanulatus ‘Prettycoat’ out already. This set me off to look at ours here.
Enkianthus campanulatus ‘Vesta’ was the only one properly out on Hovel Cart Road.
Magnolia ‘Pinkie’ looking good.
Sorbus megalocarpa about to flower.
Rhododendron wadanum – our clump of 3 is down to only 2.
Staphylea colchica ‘Black Beauty’ – the leaves darken with age.
Euonymus clivicola has tiny flowers and should, apparently, be grown against a wall which this one is not.
Young new leaves on Quercus stenophylloides glow in the sun.
A young Abies delavayi.
Abies forrestii var. georgei.
Still good flowers on Camellia x williamsii ‘Elsie Jury’ – a very late season flowerer.
2024 – CHW
Azalea ‘Babeuff’ outside the Back Yard is one of the very first deciduous azaleas to perform.
Azalea ‘Blushing Bride’ is one we should propagate more. One pure white flower showing.
This is really Azalea yedoense or very close to it but not quite the plant by the lodge at Burncoose which is called ‘Tebotan’.
The very last flower on Magnolia x loebneri ‘Leonard Messel’ outside the Back Yard. I was asked if all the pink stellatas and loebneris had been a very pale colour this year? Not as I had noticed but thinking about the pink stellatas this may well be right. Most flowers smashed in the hail and rain anyway.
Azalea ‘Vuyk’s Rosy Red’ amid a bed of Sarcococca hookeriana var. digyna.
Pink new leaves appearing on Quercus bushii ‘Seattle Trident’.
Flowers almost out on Rhododendron fortunei.
New growth on Lithocarpus corneus (CMBS 64J 2003-1122).
Look at the colour changes in the flowers of Rhododendron hodgsonii below Lower Quarry Nursery.
Magnolia – need to check label as not on the plan.
I cut the ivy on this Record Prunus pilosiuscula last autumn but only now is it starting to die off. Rainfall has sustained it through the winter.
In 1991 I planted Sequoia sempervirens and Sequoiadendron giganteum side by side at Bramble Field Corner. No question which is the winner. Sequoiadendrons do not like our high rainfall. We have only 1 decent tree out of several attempts.
Schefflera taiwaniana with its attractive new growth just starting.
Camellia ‘Alpen Glo’ with its last flowers.
Camellia ‘Scentuous’ still has a good show and still scented by George’s Hut.
Last flower on Camellia ‘Cornish Snow’ below Donkey Shoe.
Attractive new growth on Diplopanax stachyanthus (WWJ 12110).
The dwarf Rhododendron luteiflorum.
2023 – CHW
Jaimie discovered a nest in the field beside his house containing both pheasant and partridge eggs.
Jaimie discovered a nest in the field beside his house containing both pheasant and partridge eggs.
Malus ‘Evereste.’
The cut rhododendron and magnolias for the Rosemoor Show sitting in the sheds prior to loading for the trip.
Malus ‘Van Eseltine’.
Malus ‘Admiration’.
The Malus planting in its first year of flowering.
Malus ‘Jelly King’.
Malus ‘Brandy Wine’.
Malus brevipes ‘Wedding Bouquet’.
Malus ‘Royalty’.
Malus ‘Butterball’.
Malus ‘Indian Magic’.
Malus ‘Dr. Campbells’.
Malus ‘Royalty’ and daffodils.
Malus ‘Louisa’.
Malus ‘Pink Glow’.
Malus ‘Crimson Cascade’.
Malus ‘Paul Hauber’.
Malus ‘Royal Beauty’.
2022 – CHW
I thought I heard a cuckoo earlier this week but I definitely did in Old Park last night at the top of the wood undeterred by a post banger erecting the new pen above Kitchen Garden.
x Sorbonaria fallax ‘Likjornaja’ in bud still (Sorbus x Aronia). A peculiar bi-generic hybrid but not as dull or uninteresting as you might think in flower in a week or two. Bi-generic hybrids are scarce and unusual in nature.
Prunus incisa, the Fuji cherry, is becoming a small tree rather than a shrub and is now flowering properly. Previously flowers were sparse and a bit hidden in the mass of interlocking branches.
Magnolia ‘Carlos’ nearly over. A pretty poor yellow here today in comparison to many others and sparse flowering with us in recent years.
First colour showing this year on Magnolia ‘Daphne’. M. ‘Lois’ has been out for two weeks or so. Daphne will not be ready for the Rosemoor RHS rhododendron show this weekend.
Tilia mongolica ‘Harvest Gold’ with its attractive (and early by Tilia standards) new leaves. Most other Tilias still have to leaf up but this one is already quite a spectacle.
This is Cleyera japonica ‘Fortunei’. The variegated form of what we saw yesterday. In John Marston’s recent Gorwell garden video he showed the variegated form in his garden in a very tatty state in an exposed spot. This 40 year old shrub is in deep shelter and shade so you do not get much of the attractive red markings on the leaves in winter.
Preparation for the flower show at Rosemoor this weekend. Three days work for three or four people to prepare. Some cut stuff needs sun to bring it on and some needs cold and shade to hold it back. Showing is expensive but, when you enter, the desire to ‘win’ is as strong as it was 100 years ago.
The climber tunnel in the nursery is as neat and tidy as I have ever seen it with superb growing plants.
And the lavender/agapanthus tunnel is spot on too with the plants leaping into growth. The lavenders are just about ready for sale and I have even seen a flower or two on one of the agapanthus varieties.
Kitchen Garden clearance now nearly complete and at the tidying up stage. Frankie has moved all the timber up into the field for collection by lorry when it is (even) drier in the summer.
2021 – CHW
Cold drying east winds – rain desperate but none in the next week’s forecast.The pure white sport on Azalea ‘Greenway’ which Asia has propagated well in the greenhouse.
Cold drying east winds – rain desperate but none in the next week’s forecast.The pure white sport on Azalea ‘Greenway’ which Asia has propagated well in the greenhouse.
My father’s Rhododendron ‘Red Centurion’ just about out.
Rhododendron veitchianum Cubittii Group just coming out.
Rhododendron edgeworthii x leucaspis and Rhododendron augustinii together – scent beyond belief.
Magnolia ‘Daphne’ is just coming out. The best yellow as usual.
This is Alan Clark’s collection number 5663 which we have labelled as Rhododendron mengtszense aff. Tom Hudson says it is definitely Rhododendron onii collected in North Vietnam by Mr On (pronounced Mr Erm) who was a botanist based in Hanoi in the 1990s.
Rhododendron araiophyllum (C & N 5796) nearby in the Rirei Opening. It looks true to name to me in the pocket rhodo handbook.
Michelia ‘Touch of Pink’ coming out properly now.
Michelia ‘Mixed up Miss’ also just opening.
Magnolia ‘Daybreak’ looks a better colour here than Magnolia ‘Peachy’ has faded to elsewhere. We purport to have several ‘Peachy’, but I suspect the plant outside the front gate is in fact wrongly labelled and is also a ‘Daybreak’.
Dipteronia sinensis just in leaf with a yellowish/bronzy tone.
