Special Plants Nursery between the M4 and Bath near Cold Ashton is fabulous, run by plantswoman Derry Watkins, it's a plantaholic's paradise. Derry has normalised an obsession with gardening and plant collecting and of course encourages it, so visitors feel perfectly at home when buying large numbers of plants in the nursery.
Last week I visited for one of the Tuesday talks, there's a different topic each week. Derry talks for a bit about her chosen subject and then goes into the garden to illustrate what she means with plants unless she can bring them into the house. There are still 14 talks left this year, including Salvia Extravaganza this Tuesday. Our talk was about plants for dry shade,especially useful for deciding on planting the beds outside the Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, particularly the area under the copper beech which according to Derry is the hardest tree to plant underneath because its roots grow near the surface, absorbing water and nutrients.
I took a few photos of pots and the garden, starting with the entrance to the house for the talk, this first part is particularly interesting because of the lovely mix of Salvia discolour which has black flowers and leaves that smell of blackcurrants, the Aeonium with almost black reflective leaves, and a healthy looking Pelargonium ardens which I've had to give up on this year after several years of worsening appearance, maybe I'll try a root cutting before consigning it to the compost heap. The flowers on P. ardens are spectacular.
This pot also had a lovely arrangement of Aeoniums in the centre with white frothy flowers around the leaves
Rudbeckia Cherry Brandy doing very well this year in the heat below
I also liked this arrangement just by the front door, there's purple sage and I'm not sure what else
I didn't take photos in the kitchen when the talk was going on, but took a few while being guided through the wooded area to look at plants growing there, I'm not sure what this spectacular plant is:
There were about 20 of us looking at plants Derry was pointing out to us
Derry can just be seen below collecting Camassia seed heads
From there we looked at some pretty Geraniums which like growing in dry shade, and then walked round the garden and I took photos. I think the gravel garden leading from the kitchen is probably my favourite part, with the rust coloured Coleus at the end forming a delightful backdrop.
The day was so bright that it's hard to see that the plant below is variegated sweet corn
This was a bed of Salvias
The Californian poppies above were lovely, and in the lowest bed, there were some amazing flowers which I meant to ask about in the shop. I wondered if they were Crocosmia
No trip to the garden is complete without a photo of this sculpture
From the garden, I looked round the nursery, not intending to buy anything because I've got my own nursery at the moment by the back door, being reluctant to plant things out when it's been so dry. I was quite restrained but got a lovely Sanguisorba and a tall Erigeron, a yellow Salvia and a couple of dry shade plants for the museum bed. Looking forward to going to some more talks, especially since it's rained a bit.
Last week I visited for one of the Tuesday talks, there's a different topic each week. Derry talks for a bit about her chosen subject and then goes into the garden to illustrate what she means with plants unless she can bring them into the house. There are still 14 talks left this year, including Salvia Extravaganza this Tuesday. Our talk was about plants for dry shade,especially useful for deciding on planting the beds outside the Swindon Museum and Art Gallery, particularly the area under the copper beech which according to Derry is the hardest tree to plant underneath because its roots grow near the surface, absorbing water and nutrients.
I took a few photos of pots and the garden, starting with the entrance to the house for the talk, this first part is particularly interesting because of the lovely mix of Salvia discolour which has black flowers and leaves that smell of blackcurrants, the Aeonium with almost black reflective leaves, and a healthy looking Pelargonium ardens which I've had to give up on this year after several years of worsening appearance, maybe I'll try a root cutting before consigning it to the compost heap. The flowers on P. ardens are spectacular.
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