Young ducks near a side stream.

Here we are looking inland and away from the sea.

An osprey nest platform has been built in one of the two conifers on top of the hill.

A very smart public footpath across what was a 1920-1970 rubbish dump in the estuary. The dump has been sealed off but was too expensive to move.

A bird watching area but, deliberately, not a hide as vandalism has been an issue.

Thousands of trees now cover the dump. A few are alive.

The tide was soon coming in again.

A new £2m clubhouse and cricket ground for Budleigh Salterton to replace the one previously very prone to flooding near the estuary.

Camera operated parking and another bird hide.

2023 – CHW
All rather strange and sad without the company of Nicky on my garden wonderings to take the Diary pictures. After ‘yesterdays’ rain everything looks much better.

Magnolia grandiflora ‘Kay Parris’ is one of the best named clones of M. grandiflora both in term of its flowers and the attractive indumentum on the undersides of its leaves.

Hydrangea paniculata ‘Vanille Fraise’ has tiny flowers in this years drought and they are turning pink almost immediately. No big September show this year.

Rhododendron ‘Harrow Hybrids’ now full out on Hovel Cart Road.

Calycanthus ‘Aphrodite’ looking spot on in Tin Garden.

Callicarpa bodinieri ‘Profusion’ just out into flower and a really good show.

The rather rarer Callicarpa shirasawana nearby not yet out and nowhere as impressive although the berries are.

Carpinus japonicus seed cones starting to turn colour in the heat. The best show yet from this species. It was planted in 2010 and must have 300 flower/ seed cones now.

2022 – CHW

Hampton Court show underway. I get a text as I return to Cornwall asking for a plant identification which I hope that I get correct (Carmichaelia australis). Fuel protestors block the M5 and A30 so only the very slow coastal route home via Dorchester and Honiton.

Marwood Hill Garden have just won a Gold Medal at Hampton Court for a display of their national collection of astilbe. Wonderful! A great leap forward for a garden usually famous only for its camellias and woody plant collection. A credit to Head Gardener Malcolm Pharoah who is now retired but it was very probably his creation.

2021 – CHW
Eddington’s nursery was fully stocked with a sale ongoing. COVID has not been kind to them. They have reorganised the nursery a bit and dropped most of their shrub lines. New things seen included:Two new and good agapanthus – most not yet out:
Agapanthus ‘Ever Sapphire’

Agapanthus ‘Lapis Lazuli’

An excellent Geranium too:
Geranium ‘Azure Rush’

Also Sisyrinchium ‘E K Balls’

Then on to Busy Bee Garden Centre which had less stock in variety than usual but was busy.

Photinia serratifolia ‘Crispy Pink’ was looking very attractive even if much of the pink had faded.

Some good new double flowered Osteospermum:

‘Blackberry Shake’

‘Double Orange Centre’

‘Double Rose’

2020 – CHW
So out of lockdown we go!

Vean, holiday lets all open for business again under all the new rules and, hopefully, full from the outset. Between the two, plus weddings we have lost over £150k of income so far this year plus £30-50k on the café (reopened in part 4th June) and car park and at least £120k on garden visitors, group tours, the shop and events. These are by no means the only estate income losses from COVID but let us look on the bright side and hope to catch up a bit now (all being well).

Wonderful to see the grandchildren here at last after about 18 weeks. Well pre lockdown John & Katie turned back on the M5 one weekend as both children were sick in the car and we have not seen them all since.

Little Beatrice (aged one year and three weeks) crawled to the top of the stairs in the front hall – no problem!

Isla rather liked going in Dad’s ‘tractor’ as she calls it. We visit chicks and find a couple of pheasants’ nests on the lawn – one without a mummy and a snail’s shell with the eggs. Isla concerned at this.

Picnic on the lawn with dogs enjoying the romp without them observing the (now) one meter distancing. Tut, tut.

Isla nearly throwing a strop in the Tregavarras cliff fields looking towards the Dodman Point. We saw a large fox on the way there.

One forgets quite what mess and chaos two small children can create in a very short space of time and quite how many tantrums per day there are. How the parents coped in 14 weeks of lockdown in Bristol I shudder to think about.

2019 – CHW
Hydrangea seemanii making a fine display over the back arch.

The huge flower heads on Meliosma oldhamii are still not actually out although they are so massive that branches are being bent over.

This is our original and totally deciduous Magnolia virginiana just out.

Magnolia yuyuanensis two days further out.

One of the three magnolias outside the back yard is laden with seed already. The other two which flowered slightly earlier have none.

Tropaeolum ciliatum is growing through a Camellia sasanqua and now full out. Worth Asia trying some cuttings or wait for the seeds which I have not noticed before?

Now off to the Isle of Wight with a few new gardens to visit over the next two weeks.

2018 – CHW
A trip around Bonython garden after rather too good a lunch!Stipa gigantea inside a water feature. Most effective in this South African themed garden which really works well.

Miscanthus zebrinus as a great contrast to the stipa and other grasses.

Cornus controversa ‘Variegata’ and Clematis ‘General Sikorski’ is one of those nice but unusual plant combinations of ‘this grows nicely with this’. Pittosporum tenuifolium ‘Tom Thumb’ likewise with the cornus.

First flower buds on Japanese anemones contrast nicely too with nearly over nepeta. Clever colour and seasonal matches to continue interest through the summer.

Cynara scotomus ready for picking.

Cynara cardunculus with its purple thistle heads also ripe for the table. Home grown beans for lunch too.

Dierama ‘Cosmos’ absolutely superb in a South African planting.

Aruncus dioecius just going over. We must list this in our catalogue for next year.

Ligularia dentata ‘Desdemona’ at its best in semi shade. A carpet of flower and a great weed suppressor.

Juglans nigra with fruit forming very much earlier in the year than I would have expected. The current heatwave has side benefits!

A garden with every reason to be one of the Great Gardens of Cornwall and much expanded since I last visited three years ago. The new bamboo glade with many little-known species is taking hold. Yes there is a spring section to the garden here but the South African plantings are outstanding June/July and Cornwall has few gardens with an unusual herbaceous element to match this show.

2017 – CHW
A happy day with Paul from Roundabarrow nurseries who are going to graft some odd things for us and try to grow a few of the small trees from cuttings which are easyish to root now but very hard to overwinter. Sadly we are a month too late for the enkianthus cuttings which are too hard.Paul was staggered by Schefflera macrophylla and its amazing orange indumentum on the new growth. No cuttings here sadly unless we cut gashes in the stem by the leaf nodes to encourage side shoots. Much too precious for that!

The very late flowering ‘Harrod Hybrid’ rhododendrons are just coming out by Georges Hut and on Hovel Cart Road. A great show.

I have never seen Lomatia ferruginea quite so plastered in flower as this year. The tree is 20ft plus tall and every twig has a cluster of lobster claw flowers.

Ligustrum confusum is a record tree. Rather a fine flowering truss for a privet although most of the flowers are already over. Not a hedging privet!

Rather splendid new growth on Acer fabri which emerges as a bronzy-red before turning green. This tender plant is evergreen with us. It is tucked away in a small microclimate of its own with shelter on all sides.

A newly planted Quercus insignis has been wind scorched I think rather than suffering from drought.

Lithocarpus variolosus is absolutely plastered in inflorescences. Far more than in any previous years. Perhaps it will now produce some clusters of fertile acorns? Small clusters have formed before but never swollen up.

Quercus crassifolia seems to be getting away quite nicely.

2016 – CHW
Hydrangea serrata ‘Shichidanka’ is full out well before the nearby lacecaps and mopheads. Dwarf growing but pretty with blue florets turning pinker later. One of the better and more floriferous serrata forms.Rubus lineatus is growing into an attractive shrub with nice bark developing. This ought to be more widely grown and propagated but I see no raspberries yet or even flowers. The new growth curling over itself is attractive.

Hydrangea involucrata ‘Viridescens’ has been ringbarked today by the strimmer so this may be the last you see of this rare-ish variety.

Hydrangea ‘Fireworks Blue’ is just coming out ahead of the pink and white forms. There have been many supposedly ‘new’ hydrangeas in recent years but this one is vigorous and different as well as standing the test of time.

Hydrangea serrata ‘Bluebird’ is also out early and a good blue. Perhaps the best hydrangea on the drive today.

2015 – CHW

Next door is a rather fine plant of Solanum crispum ‘Glasnevin’ which Burncoose supplied. The garden had a makeover some 10 years ago when it got trashed during construction of a swimming pool over the boundary.

Despite the heat the village is pleasantly free of ‘yachties’!