Denton, Norfolk

Denton Gardening Club

Introduction

Denton Gardening Club normally meets on the 3rd Tuesday most months (though there are occasional exceptions, like the month of the Annual Show). Between October and April meetings with guest speakers are held in the village hall and in the summer meetings include evening outings locally, perhaps a visit to a garden or nursery, as well as meetings in our own members' gardens.

We also hold an Annual Show, summer outings, plant sales and other events. New members are most welcome so do come along and join us. Details of the current programme appear below.

Contact: Adele Godsmark: 01986 788352, Email

Information about the history of the Club appear on the Club History Page.

Meetings

Between October and April meetings with guest speakers are held in the Village Hall, starting at 7.30 pm. Previous meetings have been on subjects such as Garden Design, Perennials, Orchids and Container Gardening. Whatever you are interested in, there will be something for you!

The summer schedule includes evening outings locally, perhaps a visit to a garden or nursery, as well as meetings in our own members' gardens.

Club Programmes 2024

Autumn-Winter Programme

NB - No meeting in September.

October 15th - A Complete Guide to Clematis - Peter Skeggs-Gooch Thorncroft Clematis
Peter Skeggs-Gooch opens our new programme for Autumn 2024. Peter is the third-generation owner of Thorncroft Clematis. He has lived or worked with clematis almost all of his life, growing up surrounded by them in the family nursery and its gardens and progressing through the nursery from production assistant to production manager then finally to owner. Over the years he says he has been very lucky to meet many clematis enthusiasts and other growers with whom he is very pleased to have a strong friendship. He believes that this has given him a wonderful foundation to continue the hard work and hopefully the success his parents have enjoyed for many years to come.
His talk will be “A Complete Guide to Clematis” a general talk looking at clematis you can have in flower throughout the calendar year, followed by investigating the different ways of using clematis in the garden and finishing with their planting, pruning and care.

November 19th - Magical Medlars – Jane Steward, Eastgate Larder.
The once-popular Medlar has been misunderstood for far too long, and our speaker Jane Steward is determined to change that.
Often the tree is in the garden, because of its beautiful and unusual form, but Jane’s mission is to enthuse as many people as possible about growing and eating the medlar, as a fresh table fruit, in a preserve and cooked in a variety of savoury and sweet recipes.
Somewhat to her surprise, Jane has gradually become an expert within the UK on growing and using the fruit and has travelled as far as Tasmania, to meet fellow enthusiasts who grow and use the fruit. Her book MEDLARS, Growing & Cooking, was published by Prospect Books in April 2023.
As well as being a gardener, and holder of the National Collection of medlars in her orchard of 115 trees, Jane is also a cook and the Medlars are now her business. Her Medlar Jelly is supplied to our very own Flint Vineyard for their 15-mile lunch. She is also very interested in the Medlar’s increasingly recognised role in modern regenerative agriculture, agroforestry and food diversity.
Jane hopes to bring along some fruit for us to see and taste as it will be harvesting time, as well as copies of her book a royalty from which goes to the NNUH. She will also have Chutney and Jelly for sale.

December 17th - Christmas Social Evening
Details to be confirmed.

January 21st - Wildlife of The Waveney Valley - Tony Brown
January’s talk features wildlife of the Waveney Valley where our members live and garden. Tony will talk about the River Waveney starts at its source at Redgrave Fen including some of the wildlife of the fen including the Great Raft Spider, all the way through to Burgh Castle where it joins Breydon Water at Yarmouth.
His talk will feature various places along the river including a little about the Otter Trust and Philip and Jean Ware who both ran it. It shows much of the wildlife that can be seen on or around the river and which we may also encounter in our own gardens.

February 18th - The Story of Tea and Coffee - Patricia Alker
February’s meeting focuses on crops we all consume but which are not grown in this country (other than for tea now grown in modest quantities in Cornwall).
Pat and Philip Alker live in Brundall and will be giving us a talk full of interesting facts and photographs about Tea and Coffee including where coffee originated, how it was discovered and spread around the world, the difference between Arabica and Robusta coffee, who first drank a cup of tea and how we became tea addicts in the UK.
The talk will cover the amazing process required to produce a cup of tea and what goes into our simple teabag as well as how both of these crops came to be grown all around the world.
Pat and Philip support a small school for HIV/AIDS orphans in Ethiopia and will tell us about the work it does.

March 18th - Composting - Dave Burrill
Dave is a volunteer member of the charity Garden Organic and a part of the charity’s Master Composter programme, sponsored by Norfolk County Council and particularly focussed on promoting reductions in domestic waste through home composting.
This talk will cover why we should compost and the process of composting as well as what happens in a compost heap and, when armed with this knowledge, simple tips to make your composting as efficient and effective as it can be.
There will be practical guidance on what to put in (and not to put in) your compost, from things we all have in abundance in our home and gardens as well as an opportunity for lots of questions and problem solving.
The talk will build from first principles so should be ideal for beginners to composting but will offer simple tips and techniques that will enable even the most experienced composter the knowledge to adjust their techniques according to the conditions they face.

April 15th - The Fragrant Garden Throughout the Year - Matthew Tanton-Brown
Some members may recognise Matthew from the Plant Sales table at Plant Heritage talks. Having trained at the RHS Garden at Wisley he spent three years at Hadlow College in Kent before working in commercial horticulture for several years growing plants for sale to companies such as Marks & Spencer, Wyevale and the London markets.
A later spell at Otley College was followed by work at several different nurseries in Suffolk, finally ending up at The Place for Plants where he was the manager for nearly 20 years.
He now talks on a variety of gardening subjects and appears on BBC Radio Suffolk. He has just taken on the mantle of helping to get plants propagated for sales for Plant Heritage {or the NCCPG).
His talk will look at what could smell wonderful in your garden from the start of the year in January through to December. He hopes to cover things we are familiar with but also maybe throw in something unusual to ignite our senses believing that scent is one of the best ways to enjoy a garden and that scents always take us back to places we have been or visited.
He hopes this will inspire us to grow something fragrant that will make people who visit our plot remember it with fondness.

Summer Programme 2024

All summer meetings are held at 7pm on the third Tuesday of the month. We are lucky that some local gardens which open to the public for charity have generously agreed to host us this summer as well as some more local friends.
Please try to car share where possible and park considerately to neighbours of the gardens we are visiting. As always, wear footwear suitable for uneven ground!

Tuesday May 21st.
A private visit to The Laburnums, The Street, St James, South Elmham, IP19 OHN, thanks to the owner Jane Bastow.
If ever a house were aptly named, it's The Laburnums. There are nearly 30 of the trees in the one-acre garden, with new seedlings always coming along. The garden is a quarter of a century old now, having been created from an empty space and can be described as a plants person’s paradise with a huge range of plants collected over the years. Jane hopes to have a few plants for sale.
Cost £5.00 per person from which Jane will make a donation to the Suffolk Heavy Horses Society (Suffolk Punch Horses).
Please park at the Village Hall nearby.
Tuesday June 18th.
A private visit to The Old Coach House, The Street, Brockdish, IP21 4JY. (Opposite Old Forge Court)
Jackie Spooner regularly opens her riverside garden for local charities and has kindly agreed we can visit in June. A courtyard, with a mix of baskets and pots, leads on to perennials and annuals. a cutting garden, and a small veg plot. Through the honeysuckle arch, there is a grass area, with fruit trees, and seating to watch the visitors to the bird feeders. A circular walk takes us through the woodland of about 2 acres and riverside seating may offer a glimpse of a pair of Barn Owls that have nested here for the last couple of years and a pair of swans who return each year with their young.
Cost – a donation to Jackie to pass on to one of the charities their open gardens support (including the East Anglian Air Ambulance).
Parking. Please park carefully on the road. There may be one or two spaces at the house for anyone with mobility issues but please check first with Adele.
Tuesday July 16th.
July offers us the opportunity to visit two very local gardens.
Meet at 7pm at Darrow House, Darrow Green Road, Denton, IP20 0AY, where Fiona Tomlinson and Ed Reed have kindly agreed we can visit.
Their garden is 0.9 acre with a natural swimming pond. Should the weather be suitable we are welcome to swim, as long as people don't mind a few other creatures sharing their swim.
Fiona and Ed have been there almost 7 years and planted quite a few trees and added herbaceous beds to what was previously a field. It is nature friendly plot and they have Great Crested Newts, Hedgehogs, Goldfinches and Barn Owls living there as well as an occasional kingfisher.
Fiona is a fan of Beth Chatto’s gravel and dry gardens and has been moving in that direction.
There will be parking for about 4 or 5 cars on the drive for those with limited mobility. Other visitors can park on the verge outside being sure to tuck in.

We will then drive the short distance to Abbey Farm, Mill Road, Alburgh, IP20 0DS.
Having only lived here for 3 years, Yan and Denise Michael are Gardening Club members and, in their words, “we are trying our best to establish a garden.”
This ‘Garden in Progress’ is part of a plot which is approximately 2.3 acres in size. The previous owners ran the garden as more of an allotment and kept sheep. (Gardening Club did visit some years ago.)
Yan and Denise are now working to turn it into a flower garden – something that has had its challenges with the extremes of weather they have experienced since moving in. There is also a small orchard and vegetable garden, a wooded area and a large meadow.
Parking is available in front of the house.
There will be refreshments at the end of our visit in the garden.
Tuesday August 20th.
A visit to Henstead Exotic Garden, Church Road Henstead near Beccles, NR 34 7LD. Meet there at 7pm.
Owner Andrew Brogan gave us a highly entertaining and interesting talk in February on the development of The Exotic Garden at Henstead. He has kindly invited us to enjoy this tropical paradise on a private visit for our last meeting of the summer. Variously described as “Suffolk’s Secret Jungle” and a “Cornish Garden near Beccles” and much praised by Alan Titchmarsh, this garden promises to delight us with its tropical plants and interesting landscaping.
To round off the evening the Committee will serve light refreshments in the garden.
Cost £6 to members (subsidised by DGC) Guests welcome £8.

The Annual Show

An Annual Open Show is held either in July or, more commonly, at the beginning of September, or even at the end of August!

The 2024 Show was held on Saturday 31st August
Full details, the entry form etc. can be seen on the Show Page

Details of this year's winners and those from previous Shows appear on the Show History Page.

Christmas Tree Competition 22

Following on last year's triumph, the Club again decided to enter a tree in the Alburgh competition.
There were more entries this year, including one from the Art Group, but the Club won again -

The tree was then proudly displayed at the Club's very successful Christmas Social Event on December 29th.

Christmas Tree Competition 21

A group of Club members joined together to create an entry in the 2021 Alburgh Church Christmas Tree Festival. To their great delight, following a poll of those attending, they were rewarded with First Prize.
The pictures below, thanks to Peter Wiltshire, show:
The winning entry -

The trophy and certificate -

And the plaque on the trophy -