Beth Chatto's Garden

Beth's garden is known for it's dry and wet section. She describes it as "poor gravel soil and boggy hollows." The English have funny words. She took the two difficult soil situations and ran with it. I am partial to the dry garden. It had more Mediterranean plants than any other garden we saw in England. The only place I recall seeing an Eucalyptus. Since a major reason for this tour was to find plants to work with back here in San Francisco, I was able to identify with this garden. This is where I found Parahebe perfoliata or Derwentia perfoliata. Now I notice it at the San Francisco Botanical Gardens at Strybling and will start to use Parahebe in my gardens.

We have only a couple days left on our English Garden Tour. We finally made it to the east coast and its a stormy day. We arrived early and chatted with some Dutch ladies in the parking lot. They came over this morning on a ferry from the continent. The Dutch are world renown plant propagators and collectors but they lack the land to make the extensive gardens that you find in England. They are partners in a lucrative trade.




Parahebe perfoliata

Lupine and Sea Kale