May has been a bit of a washout so let’s hope June is an improvement! but we still have one more talk before then –

Wednesday May 26th (tomorrow) at 7.30pm is the talk from Adrian James on “Gardens of Paradise” (This talk covers the history, design and symbolism of Persian/Islamic/Moghul gardens). The plant list / handout for the talk is already available to download from our Programme page.

This is the last talk that has been arranged via the Tender Shoots Garden Club Network. If you missed any of these recent talks, they are available to see on their YouTube page here

Successful Fruit Growing

Dorothy Clive Gardens

National Memorial Arboretum Alrewas

The Plant Hunters

History of Herbs

Extending the Season in your Garden

and RHS Bridgewater talk from Curator Marcus Chilton Jones

Meanwhile The Tender Shoots inter club group trip to see the brand new RHS Bridgewater garden is on Wednesday 21st July.

“I hope you can all join us, it would be lovely to meet you all.   We so far have 70+ people going from various clubs by coach & car.”

Entry to gardens is £12.10, or free if you’re an RHS member.  Or if your garden club is RHS affiliated, then 55 of your members can go free.  It only costs your club £35 for this benefit.  

For those that are local to Stoke-on-Trent Barlaston Village Garden Club have an outdoor plant swap event on Saturday 29th May 12-2pm in the rear car park of the St.John the Baptist Church, Barlaston, ST12 9DA.  Bring along a folding chair and flask of tea for a socially distanced chit chat.  Details on the Facebook page This was postponed from last Saturday because of the weather.

We hope to have more news on Open Garden weekends soon. In the meantime have a look at our links page to find the NGS gardens open near you in the next few weeks, as well as links to RHS gardens, National Trust gardens and plenty of others to help plan your trips.

This photo of Wisteria was taken on May 5th last year! This year there are some buds . . maybe by June 5th it may look a little more like this, and so might the weather – we can but hope.

It should be the Chelsea Flower Show this coming week but it has had to be put back to the autumn. However Virtual Chelsea will be happening from Tuesday 18th – Friday 21st (Monday 17th if you are an RHS member). You can find out more and follow the links here.

We have two more talks for you this month through the Tender Shoots Garden Club Network – the last one sounds particularly fascinating, especially if you remember watching Monty Don’s programme a few years ago.

Wednesday May 19th at 7.30 pm – Talk from the National Arboretum Alrewas – Sponsored by Penkridge Garden Guild

Wednesday May 26th at 7.30pm   –  “Gardens of Paradise” (This talk covers the history, design and symbolism of Persian/Islamic/Moghul gardens). Talk from Adrian James. Sponsored by Evesham G&C.

Further details on how to join the talks (via Zoom or You Tube) along with lists of plants or gardens you can download can be found on the Programme page.

The Plant Swap in Barlaston for today (Saturday 15th) has been cancelled as the weather forecast is not promising.

We have two talks coming up next week and then at the weekend Barlaston Village Garden Club have organised a Plant Swap –

For those that are local to Stoke-on-Trent we have an outdoor plant swap event (weather permitting) on Saturday 15th May 12-2pm in the rear car park of the St.John the Baptist Church, Barlaston, S-o-T, ST12 9DA.  Bring along a folding chair and flask of tea for a socially distanced chit chat.  Whilst here, you could also visit Trentham Gardens, the Dorothy Clive Gardens, or Keele University for the National Collection of Cherry Blossom.
Details of the plant swap are on the Facebook page

Our talks next week are –

Tuesday May 11^th at 7.30pm – ‘Extending the Season in your Garden’. Talk from Victoria Logue.   Sponsored by Ellesmere Garden Club

Thursday May 13th at 7.30pm – “The History of Herbs”.  Talk from Margaret George. Sponsored by Stone, Chrysanthemum & Dahlia Society

More details about the talks and further talks planned for the rest of the month, and into June, can be found on the Porgramme Page.

The Ecclian Society have just announced that they are planning to run their ever-popular Open Gardens weekend on June 19th and 20th. Further details later.

Talk about Climate Change! What happened to those April showers? We’ve just had the driest April since forever and the coldest one for 60 odd years too. And now its the May Bank Holiday – time to plant up the hanging baskets, finish hardening off the plants in the greenhouse, take cuttings of the dahlias that are sprouting well . . . Somehow I think we will be tucked up by the fire this weekend and leaving the plants in the comparative warmth of the greenhouse too. But we do have some more talks (via Zoom thanks to the Tender Shoots Garden Club Network) this month to take our minds off the weather.

The first one is next Friday May 7th and the full list follows. You can find details of the talks, any plant lists to download and how to join the talks on our Programme page.

Friday May 7^th at 7.30pm  –  ‘The Plant Hunters’.  Talk from Jeff Bates.  Sponsored by Austrey Gardening Society.

Tuesday May 11^th at 7.30pm – ‘Extending the Season in your Garden’. Talk from Victoria Logue.   Sponsored by Ellesmere Garden Club

Thursday May 13th at 7.30pm – “The History of Herbs”.  Talk from Margaret George. Sponsored by Stone, Chrysanthemum & Dahlia Society

Wednesday May 19th at 7.30 pm – Talk from the National Arboretum Alrewas – Sponsored by Penkridge Garden Guild

Wednesday May 26th at 7.30pm   –  “Gardens of Paradise” (This talk covers the history, design and symbolism of Persian/Islamic/Moghul gardens). Talk from Adrian James. Sponsored by Evesham G&C.

We’ve had a few late entries for yesterday’s virtual Show. First up are some marvelous Magnolias from Moddershall –

plus a random Trillium kurabayashii

and a few more flowers

Don’t forget there are still several talks coming up this month – including two next week – from the Tender Shoots Garden Club Network. Details of the talks, plant lists to download, and how to join the talks are over on the Programme page.

We asked members to go out into their gardens over Easter and take photos for a virtual show – and they didn’t disappoint.

First we have ‘gardens’ – some sent several photos (they’ve been working hard!), others one or two of interesting or favourite spots –

Then we have flowers in pots – at this time of year tulips seem to feature a lot –

Flowers in the rest of the garden produced a lot of Springtime favourites – daffodils, primroses, fritillaries . . .

The shrubs too were flowering well – Magnolias, Camellias (hope the recent frosts haven’t caused too much damage) and several others, including quinces and currants.

Finally some photos from Keele – an Easter walk to view the National Collection of Flowering Cherries

If you have been missing your garden visits then don’t forget the talk on Tuesday April 13^th at 7.30pm  –  ‘The Dorothy Clive Garden, Seasonal Changes’. Full details and how to join in via Zoom or You Tube are on the Programme page.

Members and friends should by now have received an email from Helen about a new virtual show in April. Please check your junk/spam mail folders if you haven’t found it. We are asking everyone, as it’s now officially Summer Time, to please grab your cameras or phones and take some photos outside.
We would like you to go out into your gardens over Easter between April 2nd- 4th and take a photo(or more) of the garden, of flowers, of shrubs and/or small trees – whatever takes your fancy, then send them before April 8th ready to go on to our website from the 9th
No prizes, just the pleasure of seeing your photo(s) on the website the same as we did back in September for our Virtual Show.

In conjunction with the Tender Shoots Garden Club Network we have a wide variety of talks available for you to join during April.

Tuesday April 6th at 7.30pm – “Succulent Gardens”. Talk from Howard Drury.  .

Thursday April 8^th at 7.30 pm  –  ‘Millenium seed bank project’.  Talk from Sue Bosson.  

Monday April 12th at 2.30pm (rooms open 2.15pm)  – “Drought tolerant plants”.  Talk from Nick Hamilton (Son of Geoff Hamilton).

Tuesday April 13^th at 7.30pm  –  ‘The Dorothy Clive Garden Seasonal Changes’. Talk from Kathryn Robey. 

Tuesday April 27th – Successful Fruit Growing’. Talk from Philip Aubury. 

You will find the full list and links on the Programme page.

We’re looking forward to seeing all your photos

You can find details of the virtual talks we take part in via the Tender Shoots Garden Club Network (TSGCN) on our Programme page. These take place via Zoom but you can also access them via You Tube and some are recorded so you can catch up later. These talks are all free for our Members and Friends. This month’s talks cover gardening as you age, garden bird evolution, the development of RHS Bridgewater and the Borage genus – something for everyone! Any plant lists or extra information from the talks can be downloaded from the Programmes page where you will also find links to the You Tube channel and TSGCN. Our next two talks are on Wednesday March 10th “The Making of Bridgewater Garden: Plans & Progress” and on Thursday March 11th “Brilliant Borages” – download the Boraginaceae plant list.

Elsewhere you will find lots of other fascinating virtual talks – some free, some you have to pay for. One of these this month is from Plant Heritage. You may remember that back in 2018 we had a trip to Keele to see the collection of cherry trees (and we also went to Middleton Pottery and finally had tea at Whitmore). On Thursday March 25th Plant Heritage have a  Zoom/ Webinar talk to be given by Chris Sanders, VMH on “Japanese Flowering Cherries” many of which are present in the National Collection at Keele University. To attend you will need to book with Plant Heritage for fee of £4-00. They have a lot of other talks this month too so it is worth exploring the site to find out more – if there are enough talks you are interested in it might even be worth joining the Society as some talks are free for members.

The 1st of March is not only St David’s Day, it also the first day of meteorological Spring and over in our Photo Gallery you will see some lovely Spring flowers starting to appear in our gardens thanks to the beautiful warm and sunny weather we have had over the last couple of February days – even if the nights have been rather frosty.

And as it is St David’s Day we bring you a daffodil (or two) in celebration.

There are several Zoom meetings planned for March – you can find details about this on our Programme page. – but here is a brief outline –

Monday March 1st – 2.30pm (rooms open 2.15pm) – Talk from Katherine Crouch (Chelsea Gold Medalist) – New tricks for old gardeners – Sponsored by Sutton Coldfield Ladies Gardening Club

Wednesday March 3rd  at 7.15pm – “Love & War, How we created our garden birds”  Speaker – Kevin Reynolds.   Sponsored by Great Bridgeford & District Garden Guild

Wednesday March 10th at 7.15pm  –  “The Making of Bridgewater Garden: Plans & Progress”. Speaker – Marcus Chiltern Jones.  Sponsored by Wolverhampton Horticultural Society.

Thursday March 11th at 7.15pm –  “Brilliant Borages, starring the pulchritudinous Pulmonarias”  Speaker – Dr. Andrew Ward, Norwell Nurseries.   Sponsored by Stone Chrysanthemum & Dahlia Society Garden Club. The Borage family is very diverse and contains familiar and unfamiliar garden plants often with intense flower colour. This talk is great for spring and looks at Pulmonarias, Omphalodes, Brunnera, Symphytum, Anchusas and others plus plants from outside the family that will complement them.

Wednesday Mar 17th at 7.15pm – Quiz – from Kings Bromley Garden Club

Don’t forget to join our Breakout Room at the beginning and end of the meetings so you can catch up with your friends and fellow members even if, for now, it is only via video.

If only! However there is a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel now. First – places to go – the NGS are releasing their Yellow Book soon and you can pre-order from their website where you will also find details of gardens you can visit now for exercise if you pre-book, and as its snowdrop time you will find there are still snowdrop walks to go on; you will just have to go alone rather than in a group and stay local, remember. The NGS are also holding talks about some of their gardens and have virtual tours too. But as we need to keep local for now the National Garden Scheme, Staffordshire & West Midlands Booklet 2021 is now available and if you would like a copy you can send for one by post. You will need to send a self addressed STAMPED envelope size 22cm x 11cm to:-  Peter Longstaff, 18 Newport Road, Great Bridgeford, Staffordshire, ST18 9PR. Please note all visits will be subject to national restrictions so do check before you travel.

As for people to see ? Well, we have virtual talks and meetings still so, yes, you can meet people but only via video. It is better than nothing though. Our upcoming talks are all listed on our Programmes page but the next few are –

Mon Feb 22nd – 2.30pm (rooms open 2.15pm)  Talk from John Chambers (Knaresborough) “Wildflowers – Establishing & maintaining a wildflower area” – sponsored by Barlaston Village Garden Club

Wed Mar 3rd  7.30 (rooms open at 7.15) – Talk from Kevin Reynolds – “Love & War, How we created our garden birds” – sponsored by Great Bridgeford & District Garden Guild

Wed Mar 10th 7.30 (rooms open at 7.15) – Talk from Marcus Chiltern Jones – “The Making of Bridgewater Garden: Plans & Progress” – Sponsored by Wolverhampton Horticultural Society

Thu Mar 11th 7.30 (rooms open at 7.15) – Talk from Dr. Andrew Ward, Norwell Nurseries – “Brilliant Borages” – Sponsored by Stone, Chrysanthemum & Dahlia Society.

Links to fact sheets and plant lists that come with these talks are put on the Programmes page as soon as they are received. You will also find details there of the YouTube channel where any talks that have been recorded are available for you to watch for about a month after the talk. Also on YouTube are some ‘how to use Zoom’ tutorials that Indy (Barlaston Village Garden Club) has done. Each participating club now has its own ‘Breakout’ room so you can ‘meet’ with fellow members before and after the main event of the day for a chat. We hope to see some of you soon.