Magnolia ‘Snow Blood’ much improved on last year. 2022 planted.

Magnolia ‘Vulcan’s Forge’ also much better. 2022 planted.

Magnolia ‘Black Tulip’ x M. ‘Darjeeling’. 2017 planted.

Magnolia ‘Romance’ is very nice. 2022 planted.

Magnolia ‘Brombeer’ which is not in the Magnolia register. 2017 planted.

Magnolia ‘Vulcan’ x M. ‘Black Tulip’ – outstanding! 2017 planted.

Magnolia ‘Summer Rose’. 2022 planted.

2024 – CHW
The review of younger newer magnolias continues (now in Area 24).

This is Magnolia ‘Atlas’ x M. ‘Vulcan’ planted in 2013. Lunaplant (today) call a cross by this name Magnolia ‘Nelly’ which looks much the same.

Magnolia ‘Black Tulip’ x M. x soulangeana ‘Deep Purple Dream’ also 2013 planted. I think this is now called ‘Antje Zandee’ but ‘Aphrodite’ and ‘Pink Fruity’ are different named plants from the same cross on the Lunaplant website today. Confusing! Our plant originally from Magnoliastore and only named later.

Magnolia ‘Sweet Valentine – not bad and now performing better.

Magnolia ‘Pichard’s Ruby’ x M.’J.C. Williams’- again I can find no name attributed to this one as yet (Magnoliastore). In Tin Garden.

Magnolia sprengari ‘Marwood Spring’ – only one superb flower as yet. In Tin Garden.

Magnolia ‘J.C.Williams’ x M. ‘Apollo’ – no name attributed yet (Magnoliastore). In Tin Garden.

Ilex chapaensis with a few berries.

Magnolia ‘Star Wars’ x M. ‘Vulcano’ – again no name I can yet find. (It might be ‘Vairano’ I suppose and our spelling error?)

Magnolia ‘Cleopatra’ x M. ‘J.C.Williams’ – no name either.

Magnolia ‘Aurora’ is spectacular. 2010 planted.

Magnolia ‘Pickard’s Ruby’ x M. campbelli subsp mollicomata ‘Werrington’ – this appears to now be called ‘Avalon’.

Magnolia cylindrica x M. campbelli’Darjeeling’ – no name but excellent.

Magnolia dawsoniana ‘Valley Splendour’ starting to flower well and excellent.

Prunus ‘Collingwood Ingram’ is nearly as good a dark colour as ‘Felix Jury’.

Magnolia ‘Black Tulip’ x M. liliiflora ‘Holland Red’ – this appears now to be called Olav Kalleberg. Above Crinodendron Hedge.

Magnolia ‘Black Tulip’ x M. ‘Caerhays Surprise’ is now call Magnolia ‘Black Swan’. Also above Crinodendron Hedge.

So we have found (unconfirmed) names for 4 of our young plants but there are several other good new things needing a proper identity.

2023 – CHW
A cold night and a few magnolias below Kitchen Garden have caught the frost high up. Still remarkably dry for the time of the year.Magnolia ‘Caerhays Belle’ is starting to open by the arch.

Placing out large rhododendrons from Rookery Nursery bed into an area cleared of laurel in Old Park last summer. Dappled shade from oak trees but still a coldish spot in a N.E. wind as its was today. A good inch or two of rain will settle this lot into the ground but no hint of rain yet in the forecast.

One of the two Magnolia ‘Lanarth’ seedlings on the top ride in Old Park is a good colour and still unfrosted. The other still in tight bud. Planted in 1957 and now both are huge trees.

Also on the top ride is a huge M. sargentiana var. robusta seedling. The first to show of several mature trees above the path which show up well from the drive.

A flower of Magnolia ‘Delia Williams’, which, oddly, has come out right beside the main trunk.

Daphne bholua ‘Mary Rose’ now scenting the Rockery. Outstanding.

A pure white lapageria ready to plant by the front door. There used to be one in this bed 30 years ago but it got smothered by a camellia.

2022 – CHW

More piles of new plants to be placed out and planted soon.

The sales point is well stocked up with Burncoose plants and 40 camellias sold in the last three weeks.

Erica lusitanica and Rhododendron praecox.

Is Erica lusitanica really any different from the Erica arborea which self-seeds itself here around and about?

Magnolia ‘Caerhays Belle’ and Camellia x williamsii ‘Donation’ outside the back yard. I am a day or two late for the best picture of these two.

Rhododendron ‘Ginny Gee’ just coming out in the Rockery. ‘Wee Bee’ nowhere near out yet.

A solitary flower on a dying clump of Rhododendron campylogynum. These plants live only 20 or so years with us before expiring. Another species to start again for the second or third time in my lifetime.

Dr Chris Millard visits with a ‘new’ magnolia which he believes may be worthy of registration by the Magnolia Society International (MSI) with whom he has already been in touch. It was an unnamed plant originally from a clear out sale at Wyevale Garden Centres and is now a tree of 12-15ft. The flower shape obviously has M. soulangeana parentage and the first thought is M. soulangeana ‘Rustica Rubra’ but the inside of the tepals is not white. The next guess is M. ‘Plum Pudding’ or M. ‘Cleopatra’. It is not far off our ‘Plum Pudding’ but our plant does not have an erect upright habit. M. ‘Cleopatra’ (M. soulangeana ‘Sweet Simplicity’ x M. ‘Black Tulip’) looks, at first glance at the reference books, to be closer. We work out the RHS colour chart scores of the flower and I will see how this marries up to the MSI website colour chart scores. With this provenance I do not think an application for registration as a ‘new’ variety will be accepted.

Spanish bluebells showing colour.

Hydrangeas coming into full leaf already.

2021 – CHW
Driving through Carnon Downs I stopped to photograph two large Camellia x williamsii ‘Donation’ which had been kept clipped into rounded balls. This might strike you as an odd way to treat a camellia particularly as you would be clipping out most of its potential to flower. However, as you see here, the flowers that do emerge within the sphere open flat and are really rather an effective display. A very pale flowering form of ‘Donation’ but none the worse for that. The house has changed hands a couple of times over the years, but the clipping has continued. I wonder if this would work as well with other varieties? An interesting idea for any grower with the time to experiment.

Could not resist Daphne bholua ‘Mary Rose’ yet again!

New growth coming already on the old Rhododendron mucronulatum with just the odd flower left.

Rhododendron siderophyllum (white form) just out through the arch.

Rhododendron oreodoxa var. fargesii is pink in bud opening white. Planted three or four years ago.

Garrya elliptica ‘James Roof’ was scorched to brown in the recent east wind but will probably recover as it has before.

Euphorbia mellifera in flower already all over this huge bush. Quite pretty when you look closely.

A good set of layers set last year on our best Rhododendron niveum tucked away above Orchid House Nursery bed. Easy to forget these are here.

Camellia ‘Morning Mist’ is nearly over. Not that exciting a recent introduction to the garden.

A 1991 planted Azara microphylla ‘Variegata’ has toppled over by Georges Hut.

Karol videoing the Camellia ‘Cornish Snow Michael’ which is still at its best long after the more normal ‘Cornish Snow’ has almost finished flowering. Named after Charles Michael, a former head gardener until 1955, this plant has slightly larger leaves and larger flowers as well as flowering much later. Asia needs to propagate this so it can be included in the catalogue. It might be easier from cuttings and as a small plant than ‘Cornish Snow’ can be to grow?

This Quercus engleriana came from Kew in the 1920s according to the records. This species has just arrived onto the Burncoose website as a new introduction. I fear the tree is dying of old age and the bark on its trunk is fracturing and beginning to crack off on one side. A semi evergreen species but no leaves at all today. Better get a replacement planted.

2020 – CHW
Nothing about raw sewage effluent today – back to flowers!We always get angry at people who leave the garden saying ‘the primroses were lovely’. This implies they never went into the garden at all or saw a magnolia, camellia etc. However, outside the front door on the bank, they are lovely! Lots of interbreeding from the cultivated forms in the former borders over the years so white, pinkish-mauve and red ones with some primula characteristics in amongst them. Look up as you go around the garden as Dad always said!

I cannot resist photographing the young, first time flowering, grafted Magnolia ‘Caerhays Splendour’ (primroses or not) on the middle bank again. What a plant! Just a pity that Jeremy Peter-Hoblyn, who grafted all five in the row there for us, is not here to see the end result. The colour has faded with the ageing flowers but still an opening bud or two.

Clematis armandii ‘Apple Blossom’ on the wall below the greenhouse shows the pink buds and early opening flowers which turn to white. Quite a show today.

Asia had been telling me how good Camellia reticulata ‘Valentine Day’ was below Rookery Path. Here is the proof. It is an American cross between Camellia saluenensis and Camellia reticulata ‘Buddha’. Quite some cross but I have missed the flowers opening which would have shown a tight whorl of petals in the opening flower rather than what you see opened flat here now. Well worth propagating!

Magnolia ‘F J Williams’ still has buds just coming out on its lower branches. What a colour; although it fades as you can clearly see here.

The huge pink clump of Rhododendron arboreum is just out all of a sudden below the greenhouse. The white one we saw yesterday in Grampound Village had a hint of pink in the flowers but the orangy-brown indumentum under the leaves is identical. You do have to loop up as you walk underneath!

1,750 readers of this garden diary last month from around the globe. If we all become compulsory housebound due to coronavirus (and the hysteria in the media has increased exponentially this week) this may become our only means of communication for a bit?

2019 – CHW
A day of firsts!Our first flowering of Rehderodendron indochinense which was bought from Crug Farm nursery about four years ago. It was 6ft tall on arrival and is now twice this.

First flowering of Magnolia ‘Amethyst Flame’ in Kennel Close.

First decent and unfrosted flowering of Magnolia sprengeri ‘Daisy Diva’ which was planted in 2015.

First flowering of Camellia reticulata ‘Lila Naff’. Odd name – huge flower.

Clearance of the Tin Garden continues apace. Unfortunately pushing over a Pinus insignis hit an Aesculus wilsonii which we were hoping to retain but there we are.

2018 – CHW
Off to Heligan with the Canadians for a rapid fire tour. Much evidence of box blight in one of the walled gardens. These problems will be useful to Julie for my recent care article about edging and hedging plants to grow and use as an alternative to diseased box. Despite the sign I do not think it will actually recover from the disease even though cut back.

Agapanthus leaves turned to mush by the cold but the bulbs will probably be fine.

Rhododendron eximeum looking very poorly after the cold east wind.

In another walled garden the box hedging and edging looks extremely well. I guess Julie could use these pictures too.

Rhododendron sinogrande looking hurt by the cold but it should recover.

Drimys winteri, much like ours at home, has taken a hard knock and will need cutting back to reshoot. The lower branches will be dead.

In a sea of devastation Schefflera macrophylla is untouched. Those plants are totally hardy through they do not look as if they should be. Tetrapanax papyrifer ‘Rex’ will recover although all of the leaves are browned off and dead but Scheffleras undeterred..

Hoheria sexstylosa by the Heligan toilets looks dead from cold. Some of ours do too. Totally dead or a cut back to reshoot? Too early to say.

Even the Vinca has snow damage and withering.

2017 – CHW
Another day for the magnolias to do the talking on their own.Another plant of Magnolia campbellii ‘Darjeeling’ on the Hovel Cart Road in strong wind. Exquisite colour which has faded a bit since yesterday.

The first colour on the buds of Magnolia ‘J C Williams’ on the small plants on Hovel Cart Road.

Colour on Magnolia ‘Pickards Stardust’ – now I think I see where the name comes from having been rude about this last year.

Magnolia ‘Bishop Michael’ with the sun at the right angle to see the colour properly. What a colour!

Rhododendron Golden Oriole var ‘Busaco’ – a hint of red in the flowers unlike ‘Talavera’ which is a pure yellow. This group is above Rogers Quarry.

The younger plant of Magnolia ‘Philip Tregunna’ below The Engine House in about its eighth year of flowering. A good colour despite some windblow.

Unlike the full out plant on the drive this Magnolia sprengeri var ‘Diva’ is only just opening up in a few places. Note again the unique shape of the tree and flower.

Rhododendron niveum full out now. We saw it starting three weeks ago on another plant in this group and this one is now over.

Camellia japonica ‘Grand Slam’ at its best and catching the sun.

Two days ago nothing but suddenly Magnolia ‘Caerhays Splendour’ has sprung out in the wind at the top of the tree. Not as dark or as large a flower as in earlier years but still impressive.

Ilex perado subsp perado is covered in nearly ripe berries. No sign of any flowers yet but they will come.

Last year’s planting of Camellia ‘Volunteer’ has produced results – two!

This is Jaimie’s hybrid Rhododendron ‘Maisie’.

A Rhododendron kiyosumense has also sprung into flower although the other plants remain dormant.

The US bred Magnolia ‘Mossmans Giant’ is now full out above the greenhouse. A giant indeed but nowhere near as large as our campbellii alba seedling pictured a few days ago.

Magnolia ‘Todds Fortyniner’ is STILL full out at least six weeks on from when I first photographed it this year. A good white on the inside of the tepals is now evident.

The magnolia season rushes on far more quickly than last year. To have missed this weekend would have been to miss 20% of the best of the year.