November brought a change of tone and pace to the garden with its fading light levels and the weather beginning to turn to wetter and colder conditions. The final glorious shades of autumn have become muted, and the growing season started to wind down in preparation for the winter months ahead. Arriving to work with a heavy frost on the ground has become more of a regular occurrence, so it was time to focus on the next phase of the garden.
In the Cutting Garden, we have been busy preparing the dahlia tubers for overwintering. This year we are using a combination of methods to protect these late summer flowers.
For our newer dahlias, we opted to lift the tubers from the ground to overwinter in the safety of the dry glasshouse. It is essential to remove any moisture before storing these dahlias. This is done by gently removing the soil from around the tubers and then allowing time for the newly exposed tubers to dry out. Once cleaned and dry, they are wrapped in hessian or fleece before gently being placed them in crates to overwinter until spring arrives.
But, due to limited storage space, we have also decided to keep many of our more established plants in the ground. These are prepared for winter by cutting their stems down to approximately 10 centimetres, and then mounding over with a thick blanket of mulch-remembering to label each individual plant!
Continuing with flowers, November is the perfect tulip planting month. The colder temperatures help reduce the chance of fungal infections that thrive in the warm, damp conditions of earlier months. New varieties include Tulip ‘Albert Heijn’ – a lovely peachy apricot tulip which pales towards the edge of the petals, and Tulip ‘Daydream’ -a sunshine yellow Darwin Hybrid tulip. We also added over 5,500 bulbs in the Jo Thompson designed Melon House border- including Tulip ‘Bakeri Lilac Wonder’, Tulip ‘Doll’s Minuet, and Tulip ‘Havran’. I can’t wait to see this beautiful display in spring.
November was also a busy time in the Kitchen Garden. The Autumn sown Elephant garlic bulbs were planted deep in the ground, the asparagus fronds were cut back to ground level to prevent damage to the crowns due to wind rock, and our overwintering broad beans ‘De Monica’ were sown in root trainers to be planted out at later date- this will hopefully give us a head start in the next growing season.
The beds may be beginning to empty but there is still plenty to harvest for the restaurant with radicchio and chard, celeriac and parsnips, kale and winter greens , and plenty of fresh salad leaves and herbs from the glasshouse, all being in high demand from the chefs.