The Maldon and Heybridge Horticultural Society  held  its Spring Show at the URC Hall, Maldon on Tuesday 18 March and the President, Gillian Coppen, welcomed exhibitors, members, judges and Ian Unwin the Guest Speaker.  Ian Unwin told us that it was his Great Grandfather, William Unwin, who had started the Unwin seed firm. He was a market gardener at the time sweet peas were all the rage and had spotted a longer-stemmed mutation which he isolated and bred. Coincidentally a similar one was found for Countess Spencer and this became the Spencer sweet pea. 

Our speaker had attended agricultural school in Somerset learning to scythe and plough with horses, later training in Holland, he speaks fluent Dutch, and graduated from University. He built up the family firm with 400 people working on mail order and 30 reps before he left to be a professional horticultural consultant and trouble-shooter. After 50 years in the industry he still manages an 80-hour week and has written three books and appeared on TV and radio programmes. He has known many of the early horticultural characters such as Percy Thrower and Harry Dodson but is now guiding the local Mayflower Garden Centre and he had discount cards and brochures for our members. 

In the last twenty years the sale of vegetable and flower seeds has reversed from 70% flower 30% vegetable to 75% vegetable 25% flower. The taste of home-grown vegetables is totally different and they can be grown in tubs preferably with an organic vegetable compost. Even just six seed potatoes may yield 12kg of potatoes from a 20 litre pot. Ian Unwin explained the properties of F1 hybrids and amazingly that F1 Begonia seed is worth twice its weight in gold bullion!  Members’ questions were expertly answered and many useful tips gleaned on growing seeds and on fertilisers and composts and the prevention of frost damage to plants. The speaker’s second topic was to encourage wildlife in our gardens by providing a total eco-system of rotting logs, water, British wild flowers and different grasses for birds, bees and insects. It was a most successful evening. Tony Froom, Publicity Officer

Diary Dates

Thursday 10 April                    MHHS Committee Meeting,  Moot Hall, 7.45pm

Thursday 8 May                     MHHS Committee Meeting, Moot Hall, 7.45pm

Tuesday 20 May                      MHHS Members Meeting, URC Hall, 7.30pm

April Joint Meeting with Purleigh Gardeners Society – Town Hall - 15 April

This year it is our turn to host the joint meeting with Purleigh and as the URC hall is getting rather cramped we decided to move over the road to the Town Hall for the April meeting to make room for both societies.  Our speakers are Olive Baldwin and Thelma Wilson who will be talking about ‘Warley Place and the Essex Wildlife Trust’.  Warley Place is a famous garden once belonging to plantswoman, Ellen Willmott, and has been run as a nature reserve by the Essex Wildlife Trust for the last 30 years, 2008 is also the 150^th anniversary of Ellen Willmott’s birth.  The meeting will start at 7.30pm and will have the usual Janshaven Cup, raffle and refreshments. 

Wild about gardening……this month the results of the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch and more on bumblebees.   If anyone has any interesting wildlife stories, or wildlife features in their garden they would like to share please contact me, thanks.  KH 

The RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch 2008 Over the weekend of 26 and 27 January 2008, almost 400,000 people counted more than six million birds across 228,000 gardens. 

Top 10 birds in Essex and average number of birds seen per garden:

Starling                                    5.13

House sparrow                         4.24

Collared dove                           2.60

Blackbird                                 2.54

Blue tit                                     2.28

Woodpigeon                            1.89

Chaffinch                                 1.43

Robin                                       1.29

Great tit                                    1.18

Magpie                                     0.96 

With an average of 3.60 seen per garden, the house sparrow retained its top spot with starlings coming in second and blackbirds completing the top three.  Overall, the average number of birds seen in each garden has declined by a fifth since 2004, and house sparrows have decreased by almost two thirds since 1979, and starlings by three quarters over the same period.

Despite this, however, four species of finch, which spend the winter in the UK, were seen in increased numbers.  Numbers of colourful finches visiting UK gardens over winter are at their highest levels for five years.  For the first time in the survey's 29-year history, the striking siskin made it into the top 20, and the scarcer brambling moved from 57 to 36 in the rankings.  This increase in bramblings and siskins (up by two thirds in the last five years), suggest that tree seed supplies have been poor this year and they've been forced into gardens to find food.  Along with siskin and brambling increases, redpoll numbers skyrocketed, being seen in twice as many gardens this year as last. Again this is probably due to poor supply of food.  With a third more birds recorded than in 2004, the colourful goldfinch made it in to the top 10 for the first time.  Goldfinch numbers swell because our milder winters encourage them to stay here instead of going to southern Europe.  Our gardens can be very welcoming to finches, especially those with nyjer seed provided and thistles and teasels left to grow which also provide food. 

Bumblebee Nests cont…. I sent the information on our bumblebee nests (as included in the March Newsletter) to The Bumblebee Conservation Trust and this is a compilation of two emails I received from them: 

“Many thanks for letting us know about your two bumblebee nests.  We’re very grateful for any information about nests because so little is known about the specific nest requirements of the different bumblebee species.  I am currently doing my PhD project on the nesting habits of British bumblebees. Your nests have now been added to my database on the subject.  It is interesting to hear that you have had mice prior to the occupation by bumblebees and that you found nests in approximately the same sites in different years.  Two theories that I am testing are 1) that bumblebee queens are able to find old abandoned rodent holes and choose to use them as nest sites and 2) that bumble bees will often nest where there has been a bumblebee nest previously. 

It is also true that bumblebees use landmarks to find their way back to the nest.  If the scenery around the nest entrance changes, it can take them a long time to find their way home!  They will eventually do so though and will modify the image of the nest scenery when they do.  So if your husband had stood still near the nest for long enough, they would have added him to their mental image of the nest entrance and been confused again when he was gone!  I will be launching a bumblebee nest survey this year through the Trust and a survey form will be available soon, so I would be very pleased to hear of any nests you know about”.  

If anyone would like a form, I would be more than willing to obtain one for you.  Shirley Thorp 

The Friary Walled Garden

Sunday 2nd March was our usual Open and Work day. It was also Mothering Sunday and I expected that there would be few volunteers due to family commitments.  But many regulars did arrive and stayed to help.  As a result of the recent high winds the garden was cluttered with rubbish - mainly plastic bags and paper.  Two sacks were filled for disposal.  The main work was to dispose of the huge piles of ivy that has been removed from the East Wall which is now back to brick and stone.  So a start was made cutting it up for sacking or binning it for disposal.  Still a lot more remains to be done with this job.  The wood removed from the plum and pears trees has gone to be used in a wood-burning stove.  Other jobs done were to fit a tap to a water butt and remove dead leaves from the water tub.  Sacks of green waste were taken to the local tip, to use its old-fashioned name.

At present - early March - the viburnums are in flower, there are the usual crocuses everywhere and by next Open day there should be a lot more primroses around.  

The Garden Website - this has been updated and minor parts edited. There were 408 "visitors" to these web pages during February. 

West Wall bed - there was no time available to start any work here.  The whole bed needs to be dug over to incorporate the stable manure and parts also need to be levelled.  

And here's a reminder from Sue Kentish - remember the Friary Walled Garden can make good use of your surplus plants.  As you get dug in to moving around your plants this spring and breaking up overlarge clumps in the herbaceous border, don't throw away the excess, please bring it along to us instead and we will give it a happy new sheltered home. 

The next Open and Work days will be on Sunday 6th April and Sunday 4th May at the usual times of 10.00am to 4.00pm.  We are never short of jobs so come along for a while and give a helping hand or come along just to have a look.   Arthur Cox

Nurseries in East Anglia

Barry Gayton mentioned the following nurseries, with accompanying gardens, during February's talk and we thought you might be interested if you didn’t manage to make a note of them.

In Norfolk
Desert World Gardens, Santon Downham Nr Thetford - Mr & Mrs Barry Gayton (Tropical and arid plants etc)
Creake Plant Centre Nr Fakenham - Trevor Harrison (Savia, hellebores, hydrangea & old roses)
West Acre Gardens, Kings Lynn -John & Sue Tuite (Rare & unusual plants, climbers, perennials, shrubs, alpines & grasses)
Thorncroft Clematis Nursery, Reymerston Nr Norwich - Ruth Gooch (Clematis)
Hoecroft Plants, Guist Nr Dereham - (Alpines, variegated plants, grasses etc)
P W Plants, Kenninghall Nr Diss - (Bamboos & grasses)
The Romantic Garden Nursery, Swannington, Norwich - (Topiary specialist)
Reads Nursery, Lodden Nr Norwich -(Citrus, ficus & vitis vinifera)
P & S Rotchell, Terrington St Clement, Kings Lynn - (Japanese garden trees & plants)

In Suffolk
Woottens of Wenhaston, Halesworth - (Pelargonium, iris, hemerocallis, auricula)
The Place for Plants, East Bergholt - (Euonymous, trees, shrubs, climbers & herbaceous)

National Gardens Scheme – Open Gardens 2008

The National Gardens Scheme Charitable Trust raises money for national nursing, caring and gardening charities through donations from visitors to participating gardens.  These can be found in the Yellow Book available at book shops, the local library or online at www.ngs.org.uk   Here are a few of the first gardens to open in 2008: 

Braxted Place, Kelvedon Rd, Little Braxted, Sunday 20 April, 11.00am – 5.00pm, £2.50 adults, children free, no dogs, home made teas 

Wickham Place Farm, Station Road, Wickham Bishops, Friday 25 April, 11.00am – 4.00pm, £3 adults, children free, no dogs, home made teas 

Ulting Wick, Sunday 27 April, 2.00 – 5.00pm, £3 adults, children free, no dogs, home made teas   

I will list more open gardens throughout the summer, but as I haven’t actually visited them please could anyone who has done so let me know if they would recommend a garden to visit.  Or if you hear of village open garden days locally or any other events our members would be interested in please contact me (details at the bottom of this page).  Thank you!  KH

Horseshoe Nurseries Special Offer! Growbags only 99p each or 10 for £8.00 

Alpha Garden Centre invites our members to an open evening on Wednesday 30 April between 5.00pm – 8.00pm at 238 London Road, Wickford.  There is a tea room and a hanging basket demonstration between 6.00pm and 7.00pm.

The National Vegetable Society, Essex invites you to...‘An insight into Modern Kitchen gardening’ by Barry Newman, NVS Southern Branch Chairman.  At Hatfield Peverel Village Hall, Hatfield Peverel, Sunday 27 April 2008, at 2.00pm, £3 entry, refreshments included.

Any items for the newsletter, comments or requests please contact me on 01621 858624, write to 1d Wantz Road, Maldon, CM9 5DB or email karenhutchings@hotmail.com

Karen Hutchings, Editor