Essays

Ginkgo Moments

| Gary Webb
Ginkgo or Maidenhair tree at Berrington Hall, Herefordshire.

The other day I had occasion to visit a garden where aside from varied border displays so artfully cared for by the garden team, I was dazzled by an extraordinary Ginkgo tree. The tree was right in the midst of its autumn display with hundreds and thousands of little leaves, each of them fan-shaped, tiny and glowing gold in the light. I was struck by the tree’s sheer brilliance, illuminated as it was by a low sun shining across the parkland at Berrington Hall. It was a moment that I knew would crown most others that day.

I wasn’t blessed with an abundance of time, otherwise I’d have trotted across the park to view the tree from a distance. It would have looked impressive though for sure, nestled in the midst of ‘Capability’ Brown’s final garden. No, this time I was blessed in a different way, being close-up and personal, us both stood in a sublime part rural Herefordshire.

Standing beneath its mature crown looking up, it was hard not to be impressed by the tree’s volume and its many stems shooting out in different directions. Dare I say, the tree may not have been an artistically formed treasure

Continue reading →

Morning Chair

| Gary Webb

Sitting soon after day break in my living room, freshly opened curtains reveal an autumnal garden in the midst of change. The soft lawn is lending a carpet-like neatness to the open central space, and shabby margins wrap around the garden like a thick fluffy scarf. Welcome to the view from my morning chair.

Halloween pumpkins continue to scowl from just beyond the window, glistening from yet another night of rain. On the ground nearby, a cluster of silver leaved lamb’s-ear plants sit quietly in their now soggy holding pots, and a baby maple already bares its wintry frame from a wooden tub. A lush lawn, some well-stocked borders, a sprinkling of trees and a mug of hot coffee: what more could I want for this moment?

It’s a grey morning, but as a pendulum swings audibly in the room daylight incrementally grows, casting light on the ever-changing outdoors. In the garden, foliage light-green

Continue reading →

Ghostly Gardeners

| Gary Webb

Ghostly Gardeners – a fictional piece based on a world of experience, following a writing prompt about a doorway. By Gary Webb

Looking back, maybe it wasn’t an overactive imagination that placed those oasis-like images in my mind. Maybe the ghostly head gardener had put them there to whet my appetite; to convince me not to pull the old glasshouse down but breathe new life into it. I suppose it could be restored with a few fresh timbers cut-in and some new glass, maybe giving another century of growth, but I’m torn, as when I first set my sore eyes on that tumbledown structure.

When I was there the door, indeed the whole glasshouse clearly needed more than a lick of paint to set it straight. Rust coloured rainwater stained the timber below hinges and where putty should have sat neatly between wood and glass, mossy cushions

Continue reading →

Beyond the Old Bamboo

| Gary Webb

Just between you, me and the trees…

Autumn sun streamed through shade shifting trees on a day I’d put aside for outdoor exploration. The venue chosen for strolling, clicking a picture or two and sitting awhile was a local arboretum, with a strap line quietly confirming it ‘The Cotswolds Secret Garden’, so I feel lucky at least to have found it!

After ten or so minutes of ambling I began to settle in and decided the time had come to sit and write a little. As fortune would have it, set back from the path a silvered timber seat presented itself, its intricate woodwork dressed with tiny vivid green mossy pincushions; I’ll be like the moss I thought, and will sit quietly on this lovely bench and observe.

Sunlit Sasa

Into my view and just across the way came a large lily pond cushioned to the rear by a belt of ferns, their fronds showing signs of a seasonal shift. Filtered light fell all over this area as my still busy mind processed all I could take in. I wondered whether, by the end of October, if the ferns would light up due to the cold or whether they’d fade away gently, as some do, to a brown crispy nothingness.

Over a century ago, the entire scene before me had been carefully created at great cost, both to someone’s purse and to the backs and muscles of many hard working folk. Huge rocks had been acquired, hauled around the

Continue reading →

At One with the Wall

| Gary Webb

A personal response to the felled tree at Sycamore Gap.

There are so many trees I have yet to converse with, but I do count myself fortunate to have encountered the Sycamore Gap tree a couple of times; a tree that’s mysteriously and defiantly prospored beside the mighty Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland. The fact that this tree even established itself, let alone lived this long time and in such exquisite form, is nothing short of a miracle.

I remember my first glimpse from the road of the tree nestled in its gap, and eventually on foot when I paused on the bank above, not wanting to rush my arrival but absorb the tree from on high. I paused awkwardly, but repeatedly all the way down the steps to the bottom of the gap, wanting to catch a glimpse into the tree’s crown without wishing to hold up the steady stream of walkers.

Once at the bottom of the gap I walked away from the tree to find my space, a place to wait and observe; rushing up to the tree didn’t feel right. At a distance and from a rocky seat, I could properly look on whilst trying to understand what made this tree, a simple sycamore, so special.

I’ve met so many sycamores or ‘Great Maples’ in my time, many having proudly stood in prominent places with their flaky trunks and large often

Continue reading →

Looking Back at the Harvest Moon

| Gary Webb

This Friday’s full moon, traditionally called the Harvest Moon, brings with it memories of the festivals my junior school classmates and I would enjoy at our local church of St. James. We’d walk around from the school in lines two-by-two to see colourful displays of produce, and we’d learn of the importance and meaning of this special time.

Whether the harvest display was grown nearby I now wonder, as it could have been brought in from the village green grocers, but I do like to think it was locally sourced from a hard-worked allotment or someone’s back garden. The memory of those times fidgeting on pews in church though, is that each occasion served to remind us to always be thankful for food. Those moments are probably the reason why I still hate to see food waste to this day.

The words of those sermons might have faded now, so it’s unsurprising if do not recall mention of the growing efforts behind those festival fruits. Tales would have I’m sure told of dirt ingrained fingers sorting and sowing seed, of the physical effort of soil preparation, of the necessary weeding, feeding and watering, and of the general graft and harvesting process itself. They would have been rich and emotive stories no doubt.

What I could have taken away from those days, nonetheless, is the knowledge that those washed potatoes, exuberant leeks and baskets of beans were grown from seeds sown into living soil. My conscience should have been alerted to the fact that each harvest was itself a gift, a miracle even, and that I should always remain grateful for it. At that time though, as a football focussed fruit and veg’ avoiding kid, I’m not sure if I really understood the meaning of it all, or did I?

Those harvest festival displays, discussions and sermons clearly lodged in my mind. As memory-banked moments they are right up there with a trip to Wembley with my dad, climbing on ruined flinty castles on family holidays, and sitting on a First World War tank at a museum. Each of those moments and many more left deep notches in my own story, each hollowed mark cradling a different memory and meaning.

It might all seem random and unconnected of course, but those early memories did have an impact, and certainly channeled my thinking. I might not have become a soldier or a military historian, or followed my friends onto the football terraces, and I clearly haven’t walked the path of an architect or building conservator. I have though carried throughout life an interest and respect for all those areas, and especially for growing, be it for ornamentation or food. Who knows, maybe those festival displays opened my young mind to a green career after all.

When Friday’s full moon comes around then, if clouds allow, I shall be taking time to look up, as always, but to also think back too. I shall ponder those childhood memories and moments of distraction and will continue to reflect on how influential they were. In my mind’s eye I’m sure that trips out, visits to church, weekends exploring and more will flash by, and I’ll continue to process how those valuable early days might have formed my connection with plants and people.

If you spot the Harvest Moon this Friday, where might your memory take you…?

Gary Webb

Like Gardens Do

| Gary Webb

A comfortable though long journey ended when I opened the car door into a sodden overhanging conifer; it wasn’t the only time I’d get wet that afternoon. Rain was set in for the day, and would only pause occasionally to catch its breath. For the first time in months I was back in my raincoat, with my faded gardening hat ready for action too.

The garden with its new gardener was the focus for the afternoon, and aside from a decorator darting swiftly in paint splashed dungarees from van to the house and back, all that could be heard was the rain. Water poured from the heavy sky glossing over the old flagstones paving the Manor House front, and streamed from the old lead downpipes into mossy drains. We decided to start the afternoon with some steaming black coffee in the gardener’s kitchen.

Chatting whilst watching the weather through an open door, all that we could see was an enclosed courtyard, but in no time at all the raising light level lifted our spirits. We moved out swiftly and through the arch into the damp grey garden, crunching across the gravelly drive towards an area in need of a plan.

On the way we perused empty borders, and some packed full of wet perennials just going over, then made footprints through sodden grass as we moved towards the once glorious garden. Pausing before shallow steps up

Continue reading →

Autumn Is…

| Gary Webb

As if by magic we find ourselves in autumn again and preparing for the inevitable changes that come to challenge our seasonal preferences. Some feel the loss of a memory-filled summer deeply, disliking the inevitable tumble towards chilly days and long dark nights, whilst some, me included, don’t begrudge the tumbledown season at all, in fact quite the opposite.

I feel the natural landscape craves the autumnal change like dry oars need water, or thirsty bees need nectar. Indeed if plants could talk, I’d imagine them right now whispering wearily of how they’re needing this slower more restful time, after their long and somewhat arduous season of growth. This year alone they’ll invariably have seen off extreme temperatures, drought, flooding and attacks from predators, so surely they’re due for some rest and recuperation. In many ways I’m attuned to their situation, feeling mindfully at one with gardens and the great outdoors, although despite ambition, I doubt if paid ‘hibernation leave’ will ever come to be.

Spring and summer seasons for me, as for many folk in the horticultural world will often have been long and challenging after negotiating the fastest growth periods, new season or ongoing projects, and numerous progress checking delays – holidays included. Last year for example in 2022, drought impacted so many places and

Continue reading →

My Open Door Policy

| Gary Webb

With my family slumbering away in their beds I arrive downstairs a little after seven to start a new day, push back the long curtains to flood the room with light, and prop open the door to my green garden. After shuffling back to the kitchen to make coffee, I sink into the soft chair with my writing book beside me open and ready for words. On the whole this has become my daily routine, at least during the school summer holidays when I’m lucky to get an hour of peace and quiet before the day begins proper.

Sitting motionless and peering through the open door, I first notice the slender leaves of a tall ornamental grass swaying in the breeze, a Miscanthus, then a drop of dew gently falling to the ground from the leafy tip of a spider plant on the patio table. Above those, long clear rays of light are reaching over the garden fence and illuminating about a third of the garden, the larger remaining space still in shade. The garden is calmly easing itself into the day, much like myself.

With a constant hush of vehicles in the distance, it’s obvious that for many folk the day is already on the move, the sound of the traffic setting a monotonous base tone for the not so great outdoors. For a few moments, noise from the ground is overtaken

Continue reading →