Medieval Fair Weekend at the Old Hall



Selling wares

© Margaret Clark

 Here's the first of our general Tatton blogs .. thanks to Margaret for this brilliant impression of the Medieval Fayre, which took place on 18 & 19 June!

The Hidden Gem of Tatton becomes very popular this time of year with a great many re-enactors and traders arriving from Thursday evening onwards...amazing how on Saturday morning they all seem to have been there forever! Not only in the grounds of the Old Hall but also outside in a Living History camp where they’ll chat and show you just what they do...no sleeping on the ground for them but cosy looking wooden, tester beds with curtains and luxurious blankets to keep them warm.

Mick firing the cannon

©Margaret Clark

After the midday gun, a show from Gauntlet Birds of Prey started the day off well and followed closely by the Company of Ordnance...gunners to you, fascinating! and noisy with some very loud bangs and sound shock waves...everyone enjoying themselves despite the damp start.

Skies cleared and we saw the Old Hall getting crowded, the Education tent very popular and then the Muster with the men at arms and knights. At that point it started to pour down so there was a slight delay but nothing could stop the Battle. The Tatton Company of Archers joined the Lancastrians, that’s Mick Ricketts, Sheila Cartwright, Bob Douglas and myself, to find us facing fire arrows, gunfire and explosions...we came through safely after scoring some hits on the opposition....great fun! And, we didn’t get too wet.

Sunday’s weather was much better with blue skies and some warm sunshine, and the crowds kept coming ...as well as the demonstrations in the Old Hall Arena there were musicians, singers and gentry...including King Edward IV on his horse, wandering through the Old Hall grounds.

This time the Company of Ordnance had a celebratory to help fire the breech loading cannon...Mick, he almost vanished in a cloud of smoke!

Once again into battle but this time in the sun, thank goodness. We had a head wind so the arrows took a bit more effort to hit their mark, the other side had a following wind and their arrows fell behind us...but a couple of loud ‘thunks’ on shields when flat shooting at a company of soldiers, told us we’d made a hit...who won? Well, we did of course!

A brilliant and busy weekend, roll on next year...we need more arrows!
Margaret Clark

Celebrating the centenary of our Japanese Garden

When we reach 100 years old, we get a telegram from the Queen but when a bit of our garden, namely the Japanese Garden, reaches 100 years we throw a Japanese themed party and get messages of support from the Japanese Embassy.

It’s been a bad year for the Japanese people so far, with only news to us of doom and gloom, so another good reason to have a celebration was to show our visitors what is so great about Japan. So against the backdrop of our world famous garden, we had a celebration of Japanese Children’s Day. This was originally Boys’ Day, a day to fly the carp flags, symbolising the carps’ journey home, against the odds, who then turn into a mythical dragon, an allegory of a boy turning into a great man.

On 2nd May we flew carp from our monument, our garden shop and in the trees around the garden. We had Japanese food stalls, Japanese Gifts and pottery, kimono demonstrations, craft activities and children’s games: all this to the accompaniment of Rochdale’s finest Taiko drummers.

The day was a fantastic success and gave people a valuable insight into the culture behind our 100 year old garden, so much so, our intention is to run Children’s Day every year.

Gardens are not only places about plants but are also about the people behind the plants and here at Tatton we are passionate about giving our customers new experiences related to the world of plants. So keep looking at our website for new and up and coming events.

Happy gardening.

Simon Tetlow, Team Leader

Alliums all over the place!

In the last few days I have been planting out the leeks and onions in the kitchen garden. We’re using Musselborough leeks, a traditional variety and Ailsa Craig onions – a large, bulbing onion which is also a traditional variety.

With the leeks I’ve been topping and tailing them – that’s where you take an inch off the roots and an inch off the top because you plant them using a dibber and you just drop the leek into the hole and water them in. I’ve planted over 50 so far since 8.30am this morning! I’ve got three crops of leeks to go in this year, plus my giant winter leeks so there’ll be plenty for the garden shop and soup-lovers everywhere!

I’ve been looking at reducing the amount of ‘thick necks’ that we have in the onion crop. This can cause ‘neck rot’ when they’re in storage. There are various reasons for this including the soil being too loose and/or too firm. If the soil is too firm the onion has to force its way through the soil, which is why it develops a thick neck. So in order to counteract this they have to be planted at the same height that the bulb is on the stem. However, if you plant it too high, it’s loose in the soil and it bolts. Tricky business! Onion varieties we’ve sown include Bedfordshire Champion, Red Brunswick and Red Baron.

I have over 60 baby pineapple plants now, of which there are probably ten ready for potting up to go in the Pinery. This is the largest number of plants we’ve had since the restoration of the Pinery and we’re now running two beds. One of the beds is a fruiting bed and the other is a succession bed, producing side shoots for potting up, that will eventually go into the fruiting bed. It is the usual practice to take the first two to three side shoots of each plant due to the fact that any produced after the third one usually has much less vigour than the first two or three (I found this out after some experimentation!).

The current fruiting plants are ready to be potted on and are likely to fruit in the next sized pot which will hopefully be in the next eight months.

John Hoxworth

Craftsman Gardener

The diagram above shows the layout of the restored Pinery. At present, the West Compartment is used for fruiting and the East Compartment is used for producing side shoots from plants which have previously fruited.

Japanese Garden Restoration Work

We’re doing some restoration work on the Japanese Garden at the moment. Work started about 5 weeks ago on the ‘four eyed’ fence by taking out the old, rotten posts which had been in for the last ten years and have had some recent wind damage. This involved taking out half the fence around the garden and putting in new posts ready to rebuild the bamboo fence.

The bamboo was ordered from Japan and came in a crate overseas to Southampton, then shipped to Liverpool and then delivered by lorry to Tatton. Making the ‘four eyed’ fence is the trickiest bit as you have to get the bamboo perfectly level on rocky ground and knock them into shape with a rubber mallet. The fence is called ‘four eyed’ because when it’s complete you can see four eyes staring back at you!

The next stage, probably next week, is to tie the Japanese knots to fasten the bamboo to the fence. The knots are a skill in themselves but it’s also important to get the tension right as they tighten and shrink after the rain. The rope (which has also come from Japan) is soaked in a bucket overnight and then is tied on wet.

After this we’ll be putting in three new gates within the four eyed fence. We hope to have the garden perfectly restored by the end of April when Professor Fukuhara comes from Japan for our Japanese Garden centenary celebrations. The Professor advised on the restoration of the garden about 10 years ago.

The photo shows me at work on the fence!

Geoff Horrocks, Craftsman Gardener

Tatton's Blooming!

This week I’ve been liming the lawn in Charlotte’s Garden and the Italian Garden, ready for scarifying. The soil here is very acid so we use the lime to raise its P.H. to help kill the moss off. This is something we do every year at about this time. We’ll also be giving the lawn a spring feed after we’ve finished the scarifying and I have been spraying the paths with sulphate of iron to kill off the moss.

Continuing with the tidying up I’ve been removing ivy from the walls of the L Border. This is to make it ready for re-introducing the traditional wooden trellis which will support climbing roses, clematis and other plants. We’ve ordered in the timber and will be making it onsite to fit perfectly. Also on the L Border I’ve been digging over the bed and mulching it with horse manure to keep the weeds down and feed the plants.

If you get the chance to come down don’t forget to visit the glasshouses near the Orchard and see the beautiful peach blossom in flower. This will only be around for the next week or so!


Alan Denton, Gardener

Digging Up Spring

This is the time of year when the last of the remaining frosts are on the ground and it’s starting to get a little bit warmer. Around the gardens in Tatton the beginnings of spring are starting to emerge: Forsythia intermedia on the L border is now flowering in golden abundance; the delicate white bell-like flowers of the Pieris japonica on the rockery complements the sky blue Irises surrounding them. The pink flowers of the Rhododendron ‘Christmas Cheer’ are peeping through the buds that have enclosed them all year and the dark pink berry-like flowers of the Skimmia rubella around the corner are flowering profusely.

Unfortunately I am missing all of this as I have been digging in the kitchen garden! I have been working on the herb bed which we plan to re-locate to a small raised bed elsewhere in the garden and replace it with a mixture of perennial flowers, including dahlias. We did not have the opportunity to finish preparing this bed during the early winter period, due to the biggest burden on gardeners – the unfavourable weather conditions!

Digging is a tiresome task but very rewarding as it aerates the soil and allows water to seep through. Many of the visitors to Tatton have complimented us on the condition of the soil in the vegetable garden and we simply say it is due to many years of hard work and feeding it with manure and fish blood and bone. I look forward to filling these bare beds with vegetables and flowers later on in the season.

Daniela Jankowska

The photo shows me rotivating a bed in the kitchen garden during late spring

Stone the Crows!

This year we’ve really excelled ourselves in making our scarecrows! It’s the third year we’ve had a scarecrow festival and we think it’s going to the best!

There will be a record number of scarecrows in the gardens this year ranging from Darth Vader, Bill & Ben, to the Stig – who will be dotted around the gardens for half term week (19-27 Feb, closed Mon). There’s also a fantastic quiz for kids’ to take part in and an activity day on Sat 19 Feb.

The glasshouse and kitchen garden team, volunteers and one of the Education team members have been working solidly on making the scarecrows for the past week or so. We’ve taken over the Conservatory to make them in as there’s loads of space now it’s been cleared out for restoration this spring.

It’s a nice change for us to do something different from the day to day tasks. Hopefully the weather will stay nice and we will have a record number of visitors this year!

As this is something we’ve all done together, we thought we’d jointly share this blog with you!
Mark Blomeley, John Hoxworth, Simon Kellett.