Reydon Grange

About Reydon Grange

The approximately 2-3 acre country gardens consist mainly of a series of mixed herbaceous and shrub borders, orchards, a rose garden, kitchen garden, lawns and a pond. We have been developing a romantic and colour co-ordinated style to the garden, with a number of internal vistas, and also grouping plants according to their environmental needs. The view from the south side of the house across the two largest herbaceous and shrub borders to the 6-acre wild field is particularly stunning in July.

The rose garden, which was formerly a tennis court, lies to the southwest of the house. The David Austin shrub roses grew extremely vigorously after being planted in December 2020, and are already well established. There is a beautiful surrounding mature buxus sempervirens ‘Suffruticosa’ cloud hedge.

Following the 2022 drought, we are grouping plants according to their environmental needs and installing seep hose irrigation, from our well, where appropriate. For example, there is an irrigated mixed shrub and herbaceous border containing many plants that grow wild in the eastern and central parts of the USA and need some summer rain to flourish. Another bed contains plants that come from areas with a more Mediterranean climate, so are accustomed to drier summers. These areas do not need so much irrigation in dry summers.

Some years ago, the wild meadow/field had been sprayed off and sown with grasses suitable for silage production, mainly meadow fescue and bent. Up to 2019 it was fertilised and cut for silage three times a year. Since 2019, the outer part has been left uncut and planted with saplings. The larger central part of the field has been planted with a few specimen trees, sown with wildflowers and planted with wild flower plugs, and cut annually. We are still in the process of trying to control the vigour of the meadow grasses and increase the number of wildflowers!
.