“Our garden has a romantic look”
This pretty woodland garden leads past snowdrops to a picturesque Monet bridge over a babbling stream. Owners Margaret and Hugh O’Reilly take us on a tour
This pretty woodland garden leads past snowdrops to a picturesque Monet bridge over a stream
This naturalistic woodland garden has a soft and romantic feel in winter, when snowdrops nose up through the frosty soil and sculptural tree branches create tunnels above winding paths. “The garden is especially atmospheric at this time of year,” says owner Margaret O’Reilly, who lives here with her husband Hugh.
The couple moved here 32 years ago. “It was an overgrown field that had been neglected by the previous owners,” says Margaret. “Yet there were signs that it had once been lovely and well-ordered. We discovered that Mary Felstead, a previous owner, had been a very keen gardener and had built up collections of daffodils, dahlias and delphiniums, but most of them had been either dug up or lost over time. She later came to visit us and was very pleased that the garden had at last been taken on by keen gardeners again, even though we didn’t know much about gardening at the time.”
Taming the garden was a voyage of discovery. “We had no idea the garden had a winterbourne (a stream that only fills up in winter), which takes the rain runoff from neighbouring fields. It was just a dry ditch in August, but as we chopped at the undergrowth we discovered a giant stepping stone that reminded me of one of those lovely old Devon clapper bridges.”
The sloping garden rolls down to the stream and up the other side. “Gardening here isn’t easy,” says Margaret of the terrain. “It’s a frost pocket, with steep paths in places and the soil is heavy clay over flint. We have to improve it every year by laying a thick mulch of well-rotted manure and compost. We’ve found that laying a barrowload of mulch in autumn is worth two barrowloads in spring – so it’s laid as soon as the leaves are off the trees.
It’s a frost pocket with steep paths and heavy clay over flint
We keep a good-sized compost heap and make leafmould from fallen leaves too.” At the top of the garden, by the house, are hellebores and a winding brick path that leads under an arch. At the top of the garden Margaret is trying to establish a new wildflower meadow. “We hope it’ll be a bit easier to manage than lawn,” says Margaret. “We’ve already got corncockle (Agrostemma githago) and marguerite daisies (argyranthemum) established. We don’t cut the grass until the end of summer so the wildflowers have a chance to set seed naturally. We then scarify the grass in autumn and sow more annual f lower seed.”
Snowdrops are the only flowers that ‘walk’ if they don’t like conditions
Rambling roses and clematis cascade over the archways in summer, creating a blowsy, romantic feel. “The garden slopes down to a Monet-style bridge with an ivyclad tunnel on one side and a stone bridge on the other,” says Margaret. “Beyond the stream is a pond and a cascade. Our Primrose Path at the far end of the garden winds between primulas, ferns and cyclamen, leading to Hugh’s ‘Man Cave’, where he takes on projects such as producing posters for village events.”
On the banks of the stream are daffodils and moisture-loving astilbes. “Ideally I’d like to line the stream because it would be nice to have water in it all year round,” says Margaret, “especially when the roses are in bloom and hang over it.”
Margaret also has ambitious plans to build a folly. “We’ve collected an old pew end, some mullioned windows and pretty screens that look like stained glass windows,” she says. “We’re hoping to create the folly around them, building brick and flint walls.”
In spring this leafy garden is alive with blossom, from Cornus kousa chinensis, Amelanchier lamarckii, a white-f lowered cherry and an ancient Bramley apple. “Mary admitted that they’d never pruned the Bramley,” says Margaret. “So it grew to about 60ft tall with a lovely natural shape, but the apples were all out of reach! It fell down in high winds in 2015, but we kept the stump as a fernery, and now it has started to sprout again. I’ve bent its new stems over to form a fruiting arch.” The woodland garden is a real hit with wildlife, attracting birds from miles around. “We’ve been so successful in encouraging wildlife that mice and voles have also moved in,” says Margaret. “They tend to eat my new plants – pansies are like caviar. I spray young plants with garlic solution to deter them, and lay coffee grounds, which they’re supposed not to like.” There’s never a dull moment in this garden for all seasons.
“We open for the NGS snowdrop festival in February,” says Margaret. “Most of my collection are Galanthus nivalis, but I do love collecting and sharing unusual ones with other gardeners.” Margaret lifts and divides congested snowdrop clumps to spread them around. “I divide them ‘in the green’, or just as the tips are emerging from the soil,” she says. “Snowdrops are the only flowers that ‘walk’ if they don’t like where you’ve planted them. So if some are starting to push themselves up and roll off to sink their roots down somewhere else, I’ll dig them up and move them to another spot.” Scillas, daffodils, bluebells and forgetme-nots follow the snowdrops. “Then we have herbaceous perennials for spring and summer,” says Margaret. “We enjoy season after season of colour. I love sweet rocket (Hesperis matronalis) and ferny cow parsley, and, although they’re a bit rampant, you can always pull them up. If you want the natural look, you have to put up with a few self-sowers.” ✿