Archives for September 2017

The Last Pole

25th September 2017 By John Roper 1 Comment

This photo taken 18th February 2016 shows a straight pole laying in the dell in the early days of site clearance.

Is this the same pole (i.e. ‘the third pole’) that has been laying for the past year at the entrance near the two bent Poles?

If it is – can somebody please confirm that this is the case, i.e. that somebody moved it.

Or are we looking at ‘the fourth Pole’ – and if so – where is it now?

And have a look at this one taken on the 9th December 2016 – nearly one year later.

This looks like another pole, but a bit bent. Is this an iron pole or something else?

Answers by Comment below please.

Work Party Report – 21st September 2017

23rd September 2017 By John Roper 2 Comments

Objectives

Although we aimed to continue the work of the very successful August working party – see Report Work Party 17th August 2017. this was an extra-ordinary meeting as we had two one-off events scheduled at the same time, which was a distraction.

We will deal with these first.

Reinstalling the Entrance Poles

Right on time the blacksmith from Essendon returned the two iron poles which had been straightened through the application of heat and a power press. The costs of this project, including the contractors’ (Maydencroft) costs for the initial removal of the poles and their re-installation, has been entirely funded by the Friends, following a generous private donation.

Paul and Radek reinstall the straightened poles

Another Hole found – an unexpected further diversion.

About 1 metre from the right hand pole, Maydencroft’s Richard casually leaned on a steel rod which promptly disappeared into the ground until it hit rock! The following photographs show the red-brick hole on the left from which our entrance poles came, and the one on the right shows the new hole, also lined with brick walls, that nobody has yet explained! It seems that there might have been a far more elaborate iron-work Victorian entrance structure than any of us imagined!

The newly discovered brick hole 1 metre away.

Installing the Water Cabinet/Shed

Another Project funded by the Friends reached completion too, or very nearly so. The mains water supply funded by the Borough Council needed protection and the new shed hides a standpipe and tap, to which a hose reel (for plant watering) will ultimately be connected.

The shed is secured to the concrete base and it is planned to store low value hand tools there too, for the convenience of working parties.

Maintenance

While all that excitement was going on, the work party quietly carried on: weeding some of the Victorian Planting Beds, excavating

the gullies on the Top Path and further exploring the decorated pebbled wall that was discovered on the Top Path last month.

Fencing

Under Stephen’s direction, John struggled to lift the two fencing panels that were recently discovered by Stephen’s grandson using his plastic metal detector. They had been buried under 12″ soil for perhaps 100 years, and John could not photograph this manoeuvre and breath at the same time. Next month we will re-enact this for the family album if Stephen is present.

Future Meeting Dates

After some discussion during ‘elevenses’ it was agreed that for a trial period we will meet twice a month as follows:

3rd Thursday each month – Working Party meeting at The Fernery at 10 a.m. as at present.

1st Saturday each month – Gardening Group meeting at The Fernery at 10 a m

Social Media – progress

This Report and all future Reports will now be published on our website www.danesburyfernery.org.uk even though it is still under construction.

Our FaceBook page @danesbury fernery , and our Twitter account @danesburyferns are both up and running.

British Pteridological Society

Andrew is inviting all Friends to let him know if they would like to be included (i.e. ‘named’) as a member of a Group Application for membership. He has a supply of Application Forms for those who wish to join individually but, as an alternative approach, Friends can join as a collective, but only if they are registered as such in the Group. So please let Andrew Beattie know how you stand on

Date of Next Meeting

Thursday 19th October – Working Party

Saturday 4th November – Garden Group

Frond Memories

12th September 2017 By John Roper Leave a Comment

Harry has drawn our attention to a very interesting piece named Frond Memories published by The Guardian on Sunday 1st September 2002, written by Monty Don, which is worth a read, even though written 15 years ago.

The theme of the article is that Monty Don has not always been terribly ‘lit up’ by ferns, but that he is ‘joining the fern fan club’.

Monty observes that ferns seem to be making a comeback, but he is adamant that ferns, particularly Tree Ferns, should not just be ‘plonked down’ but that they should be placed ‘in context’. In terms of our work to restore the Danesbury Fernery we should clearly be able to respond to that advice because if we are careful and responsible, our ferns should be able to be presented in the Victorian and Pulhamite context without too much trouble.

A few weeks ago Andrew drew our attention to the Gardeners World TV programme on ferns, (presented by Monty Don) and it seems that Monty Don, like all ‘fern amateurs’ has been drawn to Martin Rickards Plantfinders Guide to Garden Ferns (£13,99 David & Charles) and we are all encouraged to visit Rickard’s Hardy Ferns now named Bowdens Ferns.

It is no coincidence that as a result of Andrew’s recent quest involving the British Pteridological Society, Martin Rickard, has written personally to him about Danesbury, and he is complimentary about our recovery work. Martin Rickard advises that as soon as possible we need to get some ‘shading’ on the site as it is rather exposed as a result of our (essential) clearance work. Oddly he also advises against planting in Pulham’s fern pockets; advice which contradicts what we have previously been told.

But before you go out and buy Martin Rickard’s book, have a read of Monty Dons Guardian article.

At this rate we might all find ourselves becoming experts, in an amateurish sort of way.

Dewstow Hidden Gardens and Grottoes – Caerwent, Monmouthshire

8th September 2017 By John Roper Leave a Comment

Dewstow House, near Caerwent, is not far from Chepstow in Monmouthshire, and one of the incredible things about this garden is that it was only discovered in 2000, after lying buried for nearly sixty years.¹

Anybody who has attended one of Claude Hitching’s Pulham Legacy Presentations will recall that he declares that Dewstow is the ‘jewel’ of all the sites he has ever looked at, and a quick glance at his wonderful book demonstrates that there cannot be many sites that he and Val Christman (descendant of the Pulham family) have not visited.

My wife and I visited Dewstow in July 2017 on our way from Hertfordshire to visit our son and his family who live in Cheltenham. A quick glance at any map will show that this was a considerable diversion, and it is worth noting that this is not an easy site to find and the location advice given on the website should be carefully studied before setting out.

I took some photos while we were there, and I have included just a few with this report. But aficionados are recommended to go to the Dewstow website to get a proper impression of just what this site has to offer visitors, not just on their first visit, but also on (irresistible) subsequent visits.

Driving to Dewstow down the M4 on a busy Friday is not to be recommended. We arrived mid-afternoon and had only two hours, which was just enough time, but in all truth nothing like enough time, to see everything that we should have looked for.

The astonishing Grade 1 listed garden has been found to be one of the most significant examples of Pulham’s landscape gardens.

While there are many examples of the Pulhams’ work in stately homes in the UK, Dewstow is unique in its scale and subterranean focus. ²

Because we were a little late we benefited from a personal welcome from the proprietor John Harris and his staff in their Tea Room. I explained our interest in Pulhamite and presented John with our Danesbury Fernery Leaflet, and explained how the Friends of Danesbury were recovering the Danesbury Fernery from underneath 24″ builders spoil. John showed us the Dewstow video which showed how their site was buried under tens of thousands of tons of soil, excavated and developed into the jewel that Claude Hitching rightly describes it. The scale of their enterprise is staggering.

But putting aside contrasts of scale, it was when my wife and I declared plaintively that at Danesbury we had no water on our site, John Harris proudly declared that Dewstow did not have water either! At the time we were gaping at a large, surface level, Lily Pond, having just passed a duck pond, a Waterfall and a subterranean set of underground tunnels with water channels, koi carp, caves, grottoes and ferneries.

John Harris went on to explain in his gentle way, that the Dewstow site was half way up a hill, miles away from the River Severn and with no natural springs to feed it. He explained that the Lily Pond was at the bottom of the run of their water features, and the rain water filled Lily Pond was pumped all the way back to the top where it started on its underground journey.

Even though I immediately dreamed of the opportunities for us to pump water around the Danesbury Fernery, I stopped short of a Lily Pond – we just do not have the space at Danesbury!

The ground level at Dewstow is indeed spectacular as their leaflet proclaims, but it is when we started to explore the subterranean network of (Pulham) rock gardens, water features and ornamental areas that our breath was taken away.

Putting aside the magic of subterranean Pulhamite caves and grottoes and water features, the gardens were in full spring colour and it was quite easy to imagine how we might develop the gardens at Danesbury, even though on a vastly smaller scale. The team of gardeners at Dewstow had planted ferns, rock plants and perennials in herbaceous borders among Pulhamite stones and tufa rock (or so it seemed to me). There is no reason why we should not try to emulate that approach at Danesbury as we move forward.

We will visit Dewstow again, even though my son might wonder how it is that the journey from Hertfordshire to his home at Cheltenham seems to be taking us many hours longer that it used to.

^{1 Rock Landscapes, The Pulham Legacy, Claude Hitching, p.162}

^{2 Dewstow Visitors Leaflet}

Notice of Work Party 21st September 2017

7th September 2017 By John Roper Leave a Comment

Next Meeting Date

The meeting on 21st September 2017 will aim to continue the work of the very successful August working party – see Report Work Party 17th August 2017.

Start Time and Place

At the Fernery at the top end of North Ride, Welwyn, AL6 9RD starting at 10 a.m. Please note that team leaders and tools will be on site from 9 a.m for those who prefer to start earlier. Work continues until lunchtime and volunteers should wear strong boots, gardening gloves and bring a hot drink for refreshment. Tools will be provided.

Tasks

Maintenance

Since the last meeting on 17th August 2017, small ad hoc groups of volunteers have been strimming and clearing the site of nettles. The purpose is to keep the site in a tidy state to make it more presentable to visitors and to make it safer to carry out excavation tasks.

Depending on the progress thus made, we might have some raking up of cut nettles to complete before some of the tasks below can safely commence.

We will adhere to the decision to maintain the North East part of the site undisturbed for wildlife.

Excavation

Continue exploring the direction of the top steps excavated by Moira and Sheila last month.

Continue excavating Margaret’s decorated pebbles and seek possible steps.

Continue Harry’s excavation of the rock work in the gorge to seek the direction of the top path.

Continue weeding the bedding areas.

Explore opportunities to find evidence of the path running North from the gorge.

Fencing

Under Stephens direction, continue to recover lost panels and fill gaps in the fencing.

Water mains standpipe cabinet

We do not have an installation date – but if this does occur before the meeting date, or indeed on the 21st itself, demands on our resources might cause some of the above tasks to take a lower priority.

Entrance Poles

Harry has reported that the forge is underway with straightening the posts and hopes that it might be two weeks to have them ready. The blacksmith is drilling holes in them to allow for a sign to be bolted at the top. Andrew is negotiating with the Sherrardspark Woodwardens to see if they could present us with a rustic plank suitably addressed ” The Danesbury Fernery” printed or carved.

Future Meeting Dates

You are reminded that the Committee are seeking your views on the proposal that we meet twice a month. You have all been asked to give your views to Harry Ward – but he has given up holding his breath!

If you are not able to attend on the 21st September, will you be sure to let Harry know your views by email before that date. Otherwise, we will have an open discussion on the 21st at elevenses as planned, when we ask that you are ready to let us have your views. The choices are to consider offering an alternate day of the week for meeting, and an alternate week of the month too. This is to try to overcome issues that potential volunteers might have if they can never make a Thursday.

It is a condition of this survey and subsequent analysis that we have no intention of changing from meeting once a month on a Thursday as we have always done.

Social Media – progress

We are making progress – Lucy Alexander has successfully launched a FaceBook page, and my daughter Lucy has launched a Twitter account

Please have a look at them and leave comments (if favourable!)

Slowly and surely I am developing the website www.danesburyfernery.org.uk with help from Nick my son-in-law, and you can access it already if you are prepared to accept that it is very much work in progress. It would be very encouraging if you are able to read this Newsletter on the website.

The website offers the advantage that, in our own time, we can all stay in touch with what is going on with so many of the diverse areas opening up about the Danesbury Fernery: Research, Excavation, and Garden Design, without the limitations of email.

We are introducing the opportunity for Friends to submit their thoughts and experiences so that we can all share them. For example, there will be a ‘tab’ that will allow Friends to submit reports of other Pulhamite sites that they visit on their travels, that we can provide links to, and to open up ‘blogs’ on such subjects as buried drainage tanks, and the source and direction of pipework, plus of course learn and share knowledge of the many species of ferns that we might seek to plant in the future.

British Pteridological Society

Andrew, as others have subsequently done, watched the Gardeners World Programme broadcast last weekend which covered Ferns. He has subsequently made some valuable connections with the BPS who are very pleased to learn of our Danesbury Fernery Project and very supportive too.

If Andrew, as our Treasurer, manages to arrange a Corporate membership with the BPS we might well find ourselves in receipt of special offers of ‘packs’ of plants and spores! Andrew has already signed on to a day’s course on 1st April next year to learn how to pronounce the name of the said Society.

August 2017 – Review of meeting places and meeting dates

7th September 2017 By John Roper Leave a Comment

Dates and Times of Meetings

The Friends of Danesbury always meet on the Third Thursday each month throughout the year.

The remaining meetings for this year are as follows:

21st September

19th October

16th November

14th December

Whereas our normal start time is 10 a.m. until lunchtime, we have learned the benefit of offering an earlier start time for those who can, and want, to make it. In the Fernery this will be very much more achievable once we are able to store all our hand tools on site in our new steel cabinet (i.e ‘bike shed’) which is due to be installed in a week or so.

Meeting Places

Whereas start points for work parties used to vary according to the location of the work, all our meetings this year have been held in the Fernery and as a result we have tended to neglect some of our normal maintenance tasks in the Park Field. However, a side-benefit of this has been to remove some ambiguity or uncertainty about meeting points when publishing details of our meetings.

Furthermore, in order to maintain the amazing progress we have made in the Fernery over the past 18 months, we detect a general feeling within the team that we should at least consider scheduling meetings in the Fernery more frequently than once a month. And we also need to think how we might accomodate a future Gardening sub-group.

In considering this proposition it is not intended to raise the intensity of working in the Fernery, or further neglect work in the Park Field, but to introduce an alternative date for volunteers who either cannot meet on Thursdays, or who do genuinely want to put an extra meeting in per month.

This might of course lead to the composition of smaller working teams, with an associated pressure on the need for qualified Team Leaders and First Aiders to be present. But conversely it does offer the possibility that we will gain new volunteers if, on a regular and scheduled basis, we are able to offer an alternative working week day, and week in the month.

Proposal

a) Start Times

Unless stated otherwise, all the remaining meetings this year will be in the Fernery, starting at 10 a.m. (or earlier for those who wish to) and working to lunchtime (e.g. 12.30 p.m.)

b) Week day – twice a month

It is proposed that from October 2017 and then indefinitely, we will meet twice a month throughout the year as follows:

Third Thursday as now.
(Second meeting date) 1st Monday / 1st Tuesday / 1st Wednesday / 1st Thursday/ 1st Friday / 1st Saturday – to be agreed with the Friends.

Once we have agreed that second meeting date, we will be able to schedule meetings more positively with clear starting times and unambiguous details about the place where volunteers should meet up.

c) Meeting Start point

It will be the norm that the Start Point for ALL Meetings from October 2017 will be at the Fernery, where our hand tools will be stored, so that they can be distributed by the Team Leader as appropriate to the work in hand.

d) Work locations – subject to the availability of Team Leaders and First Aiders

Fernery – work parties will operate twice a month in the Fernery: on the Third Thursday, and on the agreed alternate week day/week of the month.

Park Field – depending on work plan priorities agreed with the WHBC, and if numbers permit, work parties will operate once a month on the second alternate day of the week/week of the month.

Volunteers will in this way, have a choice of working solely in the Fernery should they wish and once or twice a month as it suits, or share their work between the Fernery and the Park Field once or twice a month as work demands, and as they so choose.

Actions required

The FOD Committee need to hear your thoughts, comments and suggestions in regard to the above Proposals, and we would like you to tell us which would be your favoured second meeting day of the month. Please pass your response to Harry Ward our Secretary.

The issue for the FOD Committee will be to study your collective responses and then produce an agreed Final Proposal.

I would hope that we might set a deadline of the end of September for agreement, and with this mind I further propose that we discuss this as a team at the September Work Party in The Fernery on 21st September 2017 at an extended elevenses break.

With thanks for your time and help.

Work Party Report – 17th August 2017

6th September 2017 By John Roper Leave a Comment

Work Party Report – 17th August 2017

On a beautiful sunny day 13 volunteers turned out at the Danesbury Fernery. A very busy morning was spent working on several fronts.

Iron Fencing – Progress Report

The iron estate fencing that we have been restoring was partly re-aligned this morning based on new data we had gathered. The inner estate fencing will eventually form a curving shape all round the Fernery garden, within the outer cattle fence.

Fern Beds – maintenance

We continued to weed the Fern beds that have been planted. The Ferns have benefited from recent rains.

Strimming

We left the nettles alone this month and just strimmed some of the grassy banks. We have decided that we will in future strim these back more regularly in order to keep the site in a tidier condition, and to facilitate the discovery of more stonework, which is a current priority.

Getting things straightened out.

With mechanical help the two seriously bent iron poles either side of the entrance were removed this morning after 157 solid years in the ground. They have now been taken away by the blacksmith who over the next few weeks will straighten them under heat, preparatory to reconstructing the original archway.

It was harder than expected getting them out because the Victorians had dug large holes, lined them with solid red brick walls, before filling them in with concrete. We have left the holes as complete as possible so that we can make use of the Victorians’ resourcefulness when the poles are returned from the blacksmith for re-installation.

Finding Our Steps – Report on excavation work

We knew there were steps leading down to the bottom of the dell, and we believe we have now found where they are. A volunteer from Birmingham joined us for the day and with a volunteer from the Friends of Mardley Heath, together they carefully scraped away and began to expose steps which we know will lead down from one of the paths – but from which path?

Understanding how the Beds Drained

Pulhamite artificial rock work had drainage channels built into it during construction in 1859/60. But without any plans of the site we don’t know where they are, nor do we know how the water was circulated.

Somehow, when the water reached the bottom of the dropping well, the Victorians found a way of getting back up to the top!

Facebook

A reminder, this Report and much more is now to be found on @danesbury fernery The Facebook Report of the work of the 17th August includes a photo of the work undertaken to expose some decorated stonework that we believe might have been either a feature at the base of the rustic bridge over the gorge, or indeed the base of important steps yet to be found.

John Roper
07910 311589