Moors Meadow Open Gardens and Nursery - Bromyard

This Month

This Month May 2025 - Thursday, 01 May 2025

What an amazing time in the garden, one visitor summed it up rather well with just two words in the visitor book - ‘just wow’. Some other visitors saw a Grasshopper Warbler in the garden, this small bird is a summer visitor and now quite rare being on the red list. The best way to recognise it is by its song which sounds like a grasshopper. I heard a Cuckoo on the 15th April, it continued calling through the day but I haven’t heard it since so I was wondering if it had moved on due to not finding a mate near here.
I was happy to see a lovely white double Camellia which I had forgotten I had put in. The Embothrium is in flower and looking stunning. More Rhododendrons are out and the colour from all the Acers is exquisite with their fresh young leaves.
I have been planting out but still haven’t finished as a lot has been newly bought in. A local nursery had a sale where I bought good pots of perennials for just £2.70. I had previously tried some Astilbe in the far fernery and they had done well so I planted several more. This area used to be wild ferns but most of these have been removed in preference of some rarer species of trees with partly exotic-looking under planting. At the same sale I bought Betula albosinensis Chinese Red which is now planted in the spring garden.
I was pleased to find the energy to work the worst of the vegetable beds in preparation for the seedlings which I started in the greenhouse. I am looking forward to young fresh vegetable as I have very little left from last year. I think I have caught up with my schedule in that area. Surprisingly I have also found time to start the summer prune and a new project so I am wondering which jobs I have forgotten to do as it is a rare time to be ahead of myself.
Yes I did say ‘new project’, I can’t stop these ideas popping into my brain but I do think this is a particularly good one. We used to keep a few chickens and the chook house and pen are still in place inside the large area, about half acre, which I started planting two years ago, before then it was fruit trees and rough grass. The chicken pen is as large as a lot of town gardens and contains a few small apple trees which I have left but removed the lowest branches. This area is dappled shade with a little deeper shade and a little tiny bit which catches a modicum of sun at certain times. It is also very sheltered and has moist but well-drained soil so perfect for a lot of things waiting to be planted out which are border-line hardiness or untested. It will be an exotic garden entered through a gated fence dripping with Clematis Montana, other climbers continue around the fence. I am not sure what to do with the chicken house, it seems in quite good condition so I may leave it as it is, or open one side for a seating area, or paint it in a medley of colours, or something else yet to come to mind.
As you know Moors Meadow is now an RHS Partner Garden which is an honour and raises the profile greatly, this is also of benefit to the local community as it brings more visitors to the area. A good way to increase this is for you all to vote Moors Meadow Gardens as ‘your favourite’ partner garden, any member of the public can vote and you will be entered for a prize draw to win £100 gift voucher. All you have to do is go to www.rhs.org.uk/pgoty scroll down and click on ‘Vote now for your favourite garden’ and follow instructions clicking on ‘West midlands and East Anglia’ region, then scroll down to Moors Meadow Gardens and finish the very short details.

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