2020 – CHW

The Prime Minister announces at 8.30pm last night that ‘we all have to stay at home’. Lockdown finally so I rush down to Burncoose with Michael Gove’s announcement this morning that building sites could stay open (with social distancing). KPK have already decided to close completely and we ‘furlough’ our 13 fulltime staff and lay off a similar number of subcontractors who will have to fend for themselves with a government handout. All the builders merchants are shut so work on sites cannot continue and our customers on sites have asked us to leave. Not what I had expected from meetings only last Thursday.

Burncoose Nurseries is now shut to the public as of this morning. However mail order orders continue to arrive on the internet faster than we have ever experienced before. Some have gone home but most staff remain picking and packing orders. The couriers are adamant that home deliveries will carry on so we carry on for as long as we can to fulfil them. Internet mail order businesses are having a bonanza which will no doubt engender a public backlash soon. If we do have to shut down totally we will still have four staff doing the watering who live on site with Andrew supervising and Steve manning a phone from home if need be.

The end of ‘freedom’ but have we ended up with fascism or communism? Not much difference perhaps but state control is state control. Boris would argue he has, so far, avoided anything other than pleading with us to ‘obey’. The Chinese saw it rather differently with armed authority and the Italians are showing that dictatorial powers are alive and well in a former fascist state. Will ‘normality’ as we have known it ever completely return?

A few fleeting plants on show to nobody in the nursery sales point.

Prunus incisa ‘The Bride’

2019 – CHW
Some nice things along Sinogrande Walk.

Acer x conspicuum ‘Red Flamingo’ with its new leaves emerging.

Magnolia ‘Purpurascens’ – second flowering. This is very good too as I thought last year. Should the name really be M. denudata var. purpurascens. I assume so.

Carpinus laxiflora with reddish catkins. Ten years old tree. Not seen before.

Magnolia ‘Blushing Belle’ – I do not quite get the name when it is so dark? Second flowering.

Athrotaxus cupressoides with its peculiar foliage.

This elderly camellia has not flowered for several years after it split apart leaving only one shoot. White flowers. We have always called it Camellia taliensis but this does not fit with the Chinese book on camellia species.

Magnolia ‘Avocet’ – first single flower in the Isla Rose Plantation. Nothing startling as yet.

First flowering here of Magnolia ‘Phelan Bright’ which I first saw at Windsor. Huge flowers. An excellent magnolia which I think they bred and named although not in Jim Gardiner’s magnolia book? Who was Phelan Bright?

2018 – CHW
A garden tour with shooting friends and clients in the rain. The gator for the 89 year old who very much enjoyed it and had a proper Cornish accent! The cold damage which we saw is now sadly far more evident.Leaf drop from frost damage on the evergreen Hoheria populnea ‘Variegata’. The tree is almost completely defoliated although it looked fine 10 days ago. I had feared the worst for these variegated Hoherias.

Hoheria sextylosa ‘Pendula’ hardly has a leaf left on it either. I doubt it will survive but the twigs remain alive so there is hope.

Hoheria angustifolia is a semi-evergreen and looks in better shape. No real harm here I suspect although no leaves remain.

Hoheria populnea ‘Alba Variegata’ has started a leaf drop too. I suspect not all will drop. In a previous very cold spell in March 2012 it fared better than Hoheria populnea ‘Variegata’. Silver variegation hardier than the yellow variegated form? Anyway we can show that Hoheria populnea is the most tender species of the Hoherias. H. populnea itself is however not an evergreen and should be fine. It is well hidden in shelter too.

In the lee of the east wind Michelia doltsopa is fine. On the other side of the tree total leaf drop now. The flowers seem to be intact still on one side and I am not worried yet about the plant surviving as we have seen this on a lesser scale before.

Magnolia x loebneri ‘Merrill’ is just coming out and thankfully more or less undamaged.

The evergreen Michelia ‘Touch of Pink’ has also now dropped most of its leaves but the buds are fine and I think that when the sap rises and they open the new growth will then appear perfectly fit and well on this young plant.

Cubby following the gator rather than the party on foot.

The leader has been blown or snapped out of Catalpa x erubescens ‘Purpurea’.

2017 – CHW
A Burncoose day to decide how to cope with a 34% increase in internet order numbers over last March and to prepare emergency measures if the packing sheds do get swamped. Still time for a few more new website pictures though.

The purchases (mainly acers) from the Lees & Co closing down sale have arrived in good order.

Some bought in Leucospermum cordifolium ‘Copper Carnival’ were in full flower.

Leucadendron salignum x discolor ‘Sixteen Candles’ also just coming out but already put aside as sold!

Cercis chinensis ‘Arondale’ with more flowers than I have ever seen on a small tree.

Akebia x pentaphylla now full out rather than just in bud as we saw 10 days ago.

Epimedium x warleyense – first flowers with old leaves still present.

Pinus strobus with delicate small needles.

We have been trying to get Edgewarthia chrysantha ‘Red Dragon’ for several years with many promises from Holland and Italy. At last we have some very small plants. Much better colour than the normal yellow one.

Parriotopsis jacquemontiana is not an evergreen and the flowers are a great improvement on Sycopsis sinensis which is the same cross the other way around and photographed last week

2016 – CHW
One of the finest things in the garden today after a mild winter is the very tender Rhododendron stenaulum (now renamed Rhododendron moulmainense) from Moulmein in Burma. The plant with its very attractive peeling bark is about 15-20ft tall. We used to have a white form above the wall which once got Dr Davidian, the great rhodo expert and author from The Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh, into a huge state of excitement. We have grown this ourselves from seed but never from cuttings as yet.

Camellia ‘Nightrider’ has its first almost black flowers in the greenhouse. It looks very tender. The plant came from a French nursery and is too small to go out for a while yet.

Sorting out the next batches of magnolias and a few other climbers with Asia for planting out in Old Park (fifteen) and Penvergate (five) after Easter. A soothing light rain and no wind to spoil the magnolias. This just leaves the rhododendrons in the frames and the nursery beds to deal with to complete this year’s planting out. Around 80 new named magnolias already sorted and in place. Quite a full on year as usual.

Tilia endochrysea is further into leaf in the greenhouse and what a stunning plant this is a fortnight on from when the first buds broke.

Maurice Foster gave us Magnolia ‘Chindit’ which is a good new plant for us and this is safely potted on for planting out in 2017 or 2018. Tom Hudson gave us a new neolitsea species and two plants of a new camellia species whose names I forget. Bluebells popping out everywhere before the primroses are at their best. Who has ever seen this before?

2015 – CHW

Off to Monica Dance’s funeral in Camborne with a bad hangover.  Monica’s husband, Arnold Dance, ran Burncoose Gardens for 42 years until his retirement in about 2002. Monica’s son, Steve Dance, was born at Burncoose Lodge and currently runs the Burncoose office.

Her coffin was covered with a huge spray of Camellia x williamsii ‘Monica Dance’ which Arnold bred at Burncoose.

1993 – FJW
Very little rain for 8 weeks – garden very early – most of the Magnolias are over. Visited Marwood Hill.

1980 – FJW
Flower still out on Lanarth seedling above crino hedge.

1979 – FJW
First flower spotted on Magnolia ‘Mr Garden’.

1978 – FJW
Still wet and windy Caerhays Belle excellent – best new USA Camellia Kramer’s Supreme. Poor flowers on Lanarth seedlings above crino hedge.

1976 – FJW
F/M Monygomery died. Frost knocked out Magnolias except in Rookery; the Diva, – Rogers Quarry – all above frosted.

1962 – FJW
Killed Moorhen marked by Copenhagen Zoo.

1960 – FJW
The east wind stopped after a week. The Diva at its best as is the Robusta above E.R’s Quarry. Calophytum sutchuenense hybrids best rhodo in the garden.

1952 – CW
Old Magnolia robusta no buds – 3 out of 5 young out, one fully (Donkey Shoe), Campbellii at best. Also old Mollicomata ¼ out, rest not including ten young with buds. Salicifolia one good. Diva a few flowers. Reticulatas and St Ewe at best. Saluenensis past best. Daffodils mid stream. Barbatum at best.

1941 – CW
Magnolia sargenteana fully out – Mollicomata beginning – Campbellii been out some days. Salicifolia below Engine House good. Denudata not ¼ out. Rhodo Blood Reds at their best also Sutchuenense hybrids, Daffs nearly at their best. Barbatum perfect – Cam reticulata species at their best – Reticulata not out.

1914 – JCW
Blackthorn well out under the drive, picked 3 buds of seedling Poet.