A Day at Harlow Carr

15 comments

Whilst we were in Yorkshire a couple of weeks ago Moongrower and myself took a trip to Harlow Carr gardens as it is a place that we don’t get to visit very often. At the end of July the broad herbaceous beds were spectactularly colourful

as were the moisture loving plants by the watercourse.

The moorhens enjoying the lily pond

I suppose that all gardens are allowed ‘unfortunates’ and this depiction of the Matterhorn has always irked me. At least the Gypsophila is starting to smother it a bit.

A couple of individual plants portraits are this oriental lily ‘Venezuela’ with lots of buds still to come and the very bright Angelica gigas.

Lilium ‘Venezuela’

Angelica gigas
However, there can’t be many mice around here as the owl was looking distinctly hungry!

Another impressive sight was the wildflower meadow

As we are both avid alpine growers we were very much looking forward to visiting the alpine section of the gardens. But I am sorry to say that we were disappointed with this area. There are some super stone troughs around but the planting was very eclectic and without any theme. Last time that we visited the new alpine house was under construction. They now have this wonderful new facility but there are too many large spreading plants that are obviously used as space fillers. I was expecting to seeing lots and lots of specialist plants which they seemingly don’t have many of. Strange for an important RHS garden.

Back outside we did enjoy the vegetable gardens. They use raised beds for a whole range of vegetables and companion plants. The overall effect was very colourful and I was delighted to see that the vegetables were actually being harvested and used.

We spent the whole day there and had much enjoyment from our visit. Obviously we left the gardens just before closing time to visit the plant sales area and were pleasantly surprised by the offerings. We bought a large number of saxifrages and sempervivums, all very nice quality plants and at only £1:99 per pot.
They were well grown and I was delighted to find that they were in a peat free compost!

(taken today in the rain!)

10 Aug, 2011
18 likes

Comments

Nana_d

Some lovely photos there bulbaholic:)

10 Aug, 2011

Yorkshire

beautiful blog./ photos, so glad you shared them with us and that you had a nice day,

10 Aug, 2011

Cinderella

I agree, enjoyed looking at the pics. Good selection of alpines you bought too.

10 Aug, 2011

Alextb

Some lovely plants there. You two must have enjoyed yourselves. I am sorry to hear that your favourite part was a let down.

10 Aug, 2011

Marshmallow

Looks like a fabulous place and lovely photos. The veg garden looks wonderful with all the orange.

10 Aug, 2011

Libet

Thanks for showing this, I loved it! The herbaceous borders were beautiful, and the stone trough was really lovely, thank you!

10 Aug, 2011

Lincslass

I would have loved to spend a day there as well, it looks a smashing place. I do like the companion planting in the veg garden and of course one cannot visit without taking home some of what is available.
Lovely photo`s, pleased you enjoyed your visit and thankyou for sharing.

10 Aug, 2011

Clarice

I try to get there every year, but this year it did nothing but rain while i was there, but still enjoyed it, i also find the plants for sale are really well looked after and reasonable price and always buy a plant every time i'm there. Pleased you liked it.

11 Aug, 2011

Bulbaholic

Harlow Carr is a really nice garden and we go whenever we are in the area, which is not very often.

11 Aug, 2011

Izzy123gym

I cannot believe how reasonably priced the plants were, Bulba! I've not been for years....must rectify that!

11 Aug, 2011

Scotsgran

What a lovely day out for you. It is years since my only visit. The alpine house is nicely done. Maybe they ran out of money to supply small rarer alpines and they might rectify that over the next few seasons. Lovely selection of reasonably priced plants you bought.

11 Aug, 2011