Appleby Manor Hotel & Garden Blog
Hi, and welcome to our hotel Blog, hopefully this will inform you about the going's on and events with-in the hotel and about the progress of our Cumbria in Bloom award winning gardens through-out the year. Please feel free to send any comments or questions you have to myself or our gardening team which consist of Ronnie & Marjorie Dunbobbin and head gardener Gavin Walling on any subject covered by the Blog to Appleby Manor Blog.
Regards
Mike Dunbobbin
2010
First Post for 2010 - Cumbria in Bloom Winner 2010 - 03/09/2010
A lot of hard work has gone into making the gardens of Appleby Manor look spectacular and wonderfully beautiful. Our keen gardening team have worked very hard throughout the year to maintain the gardens and keep them looking wonderful. This hard work has paid off as Appleby Manor Hotel has just won the Hotel Section of Cumbria in Bloom 2010, which gives us the best looking garden in Cumbria hotels this year. A big thanks to our team of gardeners who have made this possible.
2009
First Post!! 7/5/2009
Hello, and welcome, new to this blogging but hopefully you will find this interesting and informative. Anyway, this morning the sun came up and all is well, the garden team are busy beavering away cutting the grass and planting out basil seedlings as we are self suficient in herbs from june. Also this week the team have started planting hanging baskets with some just containing busy lizzies for shaded areas, clearing many of the paths of weeds and begining to harden off the bedding plants bringing them in at nights as there is still a nipp in the air.
Lastly Marjorie has been buying some seeds like polyanthus, pansies and forget me nots for sowing next month so the are ready for planting in the autumn.
Ongoing Work! 20/5/2009
This week the lawns have been treated with weed & feed and moss killer, getting the putting green in tip-top condition with great views over the Lake District fells. The roses have been treated for greenfly and blackspot, and the gardeners are continuing to fill our many hanging baskets and troughs with a variety of plants including Geranium, pendular begonia's, surfinia, petunia's, lobelia, impatiens, verbena, helichrysum(silver greenery), fushia's, daiscia and bacopa.
To help water retention, special granules and fertilizer are being added to the compost.
Planting out! 1/6/2009
At last the sun is shinning and the temperature has risen, its time to plant out the summer bedding plants. The beds were prepared earlier in May by rotorvating until the soil is loose and powdery adding fish, blood and bone fertilizer. Before planting we removed any weeds by hand - if you dig them in they will re-appear 20 fold!!
We have planted all three of our circular beds in the rose garden with great views of the lake district fells, with the addition of hanging baskets in the centre of each bed. The baskets are planted with scarlet pendular begonias mixed with lobelia (string of pearls) and orange diacia, we have also underplanted
the trees with scarlet bedding begonias encircled with 2 rows of cineria (silver dust) - after planting water well after the sun has set. The putting green is now needing 2 cuts per week - hooray!! Below pictures of the happy gardeners!
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Last of the planting out 16/06/2009
This week has seen the last of the summer annuals planted in the beds and borders.
The hanging baskets and tubs were also put in place, grass cutting continues and maybe needs to be cut twice a week from now on. Sunday 14th brought much needed heavy showers, the lawns and flower beds were really drying out after a very dry early June, this has saved us a lot of time not having to water by hand.Our sweet peas, planted last october are now flowering well. The first flowers cut last week filled the hall with that distinctive fragrance, and the colours are the most delicate shades of lavender, blue, pink, red and salmon.
Last week we had time to pot all the delphinium, lupin and hollyhock plants into bigger pots to grow until next spring, we will not allow them to flower this year, nip out any flowers that grow and this will give us a much stronger plant to place in the borders next spring.
Finally the leaves of the daffodils and tulips have now turned yellow and are dead, ready for tidying up. They have looked untidy for weeks but it is worth the wait because the bulbs will produce better flowers next spring when they are left to die back naturally.
Summer arrives! 30/6/2009
At last the weather is warm & sunny, the beds and borders are all planted amd growing well.
Feed and water all tubs and hanging baskets, baskets without swell gel will need water every day, we have used the gel and will only need to water twicw a week.
We are continuing to feed the row of sweet peas once a week with miracle grow, the seeds for the sweet peas were purchased from a specialist grower at tatton park flower show, they have proved a great success and we will definatley use this supplier again this October.
Now is the time to get sowing seeds for spring, we always need to think ahead to the coming seasons. Choose from winter pansies or wallflowers, polyanthus or forget-me-nots or any of a large selection of seeds for spring. We have also been sowing herb seeds for use in the kitchen,
dill, corriander and basil in the green house and parsley, chives, mint, sage, oragano in the garden.We are also busy in the borders dead heading the late spring herbacious plants, poppies, lupins and others, if cut back as soon as they die they will probably flower again in the late summer.
Getting Ready 7/07/2009
With the Cumbria in bloom competition only 2 weeks away most of our time is now being spent keeping all the baskets and tubs in good order, deadheading is an almost daily task!
Removing the dead and fading blooms will keep the plant producing more flowers.
The borders are filling out and begining to look a mass of colours, keeping them all free of weeds is another task to keep on top of. The lawns were begining to dry out but thankfully the showers over the last few days has refreshed the grass back to its green state.
Today Marjorie is helping to judge the hamlet category of Cumbria in Bloom, she might pick up a few tips we can use ourselves in the Appleby Manor garden!!
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Finishing Touches 12/07/2009
Our Garden has never looked better, one week to go until judging day. All paths have been weeded, edged and tidied, all the grass has been manicured to perfection.
Roses are flowering wel but need deadheading each day, cutting off the fading bloom keeps the rose producing more flowers. We have also been busy clipping all the hew and box hedges, we cut the top flat then clip the sides ensuring the top is narrower the the base.
All our hanging baskets are full and blooming well, we deadhead each day especially the surfinia and petunias. We have also been busy in our kitchen garden herb bed, a lot of the parsley, sage and corriander are producing flowers, cutting the all down ensures the plant makes plenty of fresh leaves for picking. We feed our large rosemary bush with miricle grow once a week, the basil in the green house is doing well, and we are sowing more to keep a steady supply throughout the summer. The sweet peascontinue to be fed and we are being rewarded with bunch after bunch of cut flowers. Keep thinking about autumn planting and plan ahead by buying bulbs and seeds now
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Judging Day!! 26/07/2009
Friday 17th July was the judging day for Cumbia in Bloom, dawn broke and the heavens opened! It rained all day as if it had never rained before, so the garden was judged walking around in raincoats and the use of a few good golfing umbrellas.
The judges seemed very impressed with our garden and took photgraphs all the way round of the hanging baskets, fushias, sweetpeas and the flower and rose beds. The awards ceremony is on the 3rd september. Now is the time bulb catalouges will be dropping through your door, its time to think ahead and plan your spring garden, we are going to busy in the next week taking cuttings from our fushias and any shrubs we want to multiply - it is an excellent way of increasing your stock.
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The Cumbria in Bloom awards were held on Thursday 3rd September, Appleby Manor was awarded runner up in the hotel section of the competition.
Autumn is now upon us and the garden has really suffered during the terribly wet August - wettest in 30 years! The hanging baskets and tubs have faded and we have already removed some from our displays. The flowers may be going backwards but now is a great time to visit the Lake District as all the trees are turning to wonderful amber and golds, this is an excellent time to gather seed heads and to stor until spring in a dry place, we put the seed heads into labelled paper bags or envelopes. We are saving the fushias and geraniums from the hanging baskets to over winter in the green house and any begonia tubers are being cleaned and dried to be wrapped in paper and stored in a frost free place for winter. Now is the time to buy bulbs and plants for Autumn planting.
Now signing off for a few weeks as going on well earned holiday - will leave you with a few pictures of the garden during the summer!
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