April, this most delicate of months. Soft with new growth, poplars silvering and wild cherry lighting the valley. We can be sure now in the knowledge that we finally have momentum. An unstoppable push with the flash of yellow dandelion, cowslip and cuckoo flower. Ahead of the grass in the meadows for these few days they have their moment, but not for long now that the rush is with us.
This second week of the month, the one just past, is a reliable moment to take in this brief and wonderful window. A time when the newness is as fresh as it ever will be, untarnished by the elements and at its most vital. As green, as shiny or downy and often saturated with an inky stain and bronzing. A colouring that is ephemeral, particular to now and to be savoured for the hand full of days it is at its best. This year we took a fortnight to be in the garden and to be part of it, to look and to do.
The Paeonia x emodii ‘Late Windflower’ are arguably at their most sumptuous when they first grow into spring. Their deep fleshy roots unleashing a store of energy that you are rewarded by if you visit daily. I want to be here more now that the garden is settling in and the rewards of the last years are deepening. Every year there is more complexity and richness where things are doing well. The Astilbe rivularis, the most beautiful of all astilbe, spreading now where it has found its feet in a little shadow of the heptacodium. From ground hugging and slowly advancing knuckles, it reaches through its companions, sending new foliage that appears to be stretching after sleep.
The rearing up and away from the leaf mould is never more graphic than in the serpent like spears of Disporum longistylum ‘Night Heron’. Protected here in the lee of the milking barn, I have given it one of the most sheltered and sought after corners on our windy hillside. A delectable plant, taking very little space at its root, it is allowed to rise head and shoulders above its companions of epimedium, hellebore and wood anemone. The Asian Epimedium are also found a place out of the wind or they will pine for their origins in damp woodland and show you by their marbled, young foliage burning in the wind. The European Epimedium are considerably tougher, taking to dry shade and the elements, though they always do better where protected from the wind. Now the garden has matured, even the company of neighbouring perennials is enough to allow the foliage to live its very best fortnight of perfection.
Down at the bottom of the ditch, where even on a roaring day of wind, you can be sure to walk into the still, I have taken advantage of the conditions to amplify the rush. You pass through a grove of gunnera on the way down, which push through their protective covering of last year’s leaf into a new growing season with gusto and an energy that leaves a hum in their orbit. The Aralia cordata grow here too in the deep, hearty ground, their shoots safe from foragers, but perfect for harvesting now. Just a fortnight ago I was eating the new tips as tempura on a work trip to Japan. We also ate the fiddleheads of ferns in the same manner, but we spare the ferns here too, for they are rare on our open ground and not plentiful.
As you reach the meeting point of the ditch and the brook at the bottom, I have carved out a place for the Royal Fern to wallow in the wet hollow. The purple-flushed Osmunda regalis ‘Purpurascens’ (main image) epitomises this gentle window in spring. Unfurling fronds of the softest plum purple rise from a raft of tight knit roots, their elegant reach lengthens daily amongst the inky spears of the Iris x robusta ‘Dark Aura’. We are drawn there to witness this moment, past the primroses that every day are slowly consumed by the rising tide of the season and through catkins that are giving way to first leaf on the willows and with it the next chapter.
Words: Dan Pearson | Photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 13 April 2024
