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Special Plants Nursery (Chippenham, England)

Our third day was a busy one as we left our first hotel in Bath and traveled to Wells. There were several stops along the way, the first being Special Plants Nursery in Chippenham, England. It was a warm day. The nursery is owned by former Oregonian Derry Watkins, who moved to England decades ago when she married an Englishman. She is a plant collector and has traveled all over the world, her favorite place being South Africa.  That is Derry in the above photos talking to our group. The house and garden are located on a steep hill with idyllic countryside surrounding it. She says the garden was designed by her architect husband and she has filled it with her favorite plants, mostly tender perennials that she has collected from her plant-hunting expeditions. Most of the beds are terraced and many plants are grown in gravel. The garden is also enhanced with some striking ornaments - Lower island beds proceed downhill - A bog garden - At the bottom of the property is a woodland walk....
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Got Snow?


Mother Nature continues to throw us for a loop. Michael woke me up early apologizing but said that I might want to look outside at some of our trees. I was too groggy at first to understand what had happened. It was snowing lightly when I went to bad shortly after midnight. The weather forecasters were talking about snow but I've got to where I take what they say with a grunt of disgust because 90% of the time they are wrong, especially when they forecast rain or snow. Well, we got snow all right. I did not measure but later heard that the official total for Hazel Dell was 7 inches. And it was a heavy, wet snow that was very destructive.

Here is a fact to ponder - The Portland / Vancouver area has never received snow in April (except for traces). The latest measurable snowfall on record was March 25, 1965.


We could see out the window that our beautiful strawberry tree was splaying in all directions and there were some obvious broken limbs. Looking out the back windows brought further distress - the 7' azara tree was lying on the ground.



I dressed quickly and had some coffee to wake myself and headed out and started shaking trees. I quickly discovered that it was not only trees but also shrubs - peonies, rhododendrons, camellias, etc. all looked as if a truck had driven through the garden plowing everything down in its path. The bad news was that the snow was continuing to come down, massive snowflakes lightly falling, re-covering everything that I was diligently working to eliminate.




It is now 2pm and 45 degrees. The snow has been slowly melting and now that the plants are clear, things look better than I thought they would. Still, there are some plants that are going to require some creative pruning or worse.

The Strawberry Tree (Arbutus unedo) looks to be the worst with several huge limbs broken off -



Photographed later in the day -





Most deciduous trees were fine with the exception of the Katsura -



There is at least one broken limb and heavy leaning of branches on one side -



Most heartbreaking of all is the Azara. I got some encouragement on Instagram when someone said they had the same thing happen. The pruned it, stood it back up and it survived. I will try that and hope for the best.





Here's a sign of hope!



Text and photos by Phillip Oliver, Dirt Therapy
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