Moors Meadow Open Gardens and Nursery - Bromyard

This Month

This Month January 2026 - Wednesday, 31 Dec 2025

Happy new year. I am hoping 2026 will be less onerous than last year. The last days of December saw me pruning and chopping off the Hellebore leaves, of which there are a huge amount all around the garden. As I cut off the old leaves it lifts the spirits to see the swelling buds that had been nestling underneath, with one or two already with open flowers. At a glance at an old Pyrus in the Upper Dingle I thought there was just a few little dead twigs. However on closer inspection a lot of it looked in a poor state therefore I made a quick decision to cut it out completely. It didn’t take much of an inspection of the cut tree to realise that it would not have lived much longer. I now have to decide whether to plant a tree which will go straight up but not too tall, such as an Acer, Sorbus or Birch. Or to plant a shrub which will fill the lower space and stop being able to see right through the bed. I will give it further thought before I decide.
Even the 25th of December was a busy gardening day, a day when I completed nearly all the pruning in the upper dingle. The bitter cold wind was not very pleasant but was bearable with many layers of clothes. I have been lifting the lower branches of more trees. Doing this in the Magnolia bed has allowed me to plant more Magnolias and a large area of ground cover. I did buy a few new plants however mostly I split and moved them from various other areas including Euphorbias, Reineckea carnea (Chinese Lucky Grass), Liriope and a few others.
I also planted in other areas of the garden, I wanted to get any plants in the ground as soon as possible in case we have a dry summer again. There will be a few more which are overwintering in the greenhouse but not very many.
Most of the wood posts and crossbeams of the trellis in the front garden between the herb garden and vegetable beds were in various states of rotting so I thought it time they were taken out before they fell down. I thought about replacing the worst but that would have been most of them so I decided to take them out. I really do prefer it with a trellis, however had I put in more wooden posts then some years down the line when I have less energy I would be faced with the same job again. The only thing which needed to be supported was a variegated Honeysuckle but for that we found some odd shaped metal not being used elsewhere. Another problem is the trellis on the terrace, I am not sure how I am going to deal with that, I hope I can prevaricate a little longer.
I am seeing the Red Kites over the garden a lot more lately, a few days ago a pair were flying around along with a pair of buzzards. The smaller birds are very busy on the feeders, eating me out of house and home.
Hot news for 2026: An exciting new venture is happening in the garden through 2026 with the addition of a Poet in Residence. This will be an interesting collaboration between myself and local award winning poet and author Gail Ashton. Gail is widely published in poetry, prose and creative non-fiction mostly with Cinnamon Press, as well as academic works with Bloomsbury, Macmillan and Routledge. Her latest poetry collection is called ‘If this was a map of your life’ with Indigo Dreams Publishing. I look forward to seeing which path this celebration of nature and gardens leads down as the agreement is as freeform and organic as the garden is itself and may change directions several times as we progress through the year. Gail will take her inspiration from the plants, wildlife, landscape and even those who visit as they interact and react to all the intrigues in this ever-evolving environment.

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