Trees Around the Gardens
Important features of the gardens
All round the garden are interesting trees, particularly maples. On the Front Drive north of the Hall are three large Acer cappadocicum from Turkey, while nearer the East Wing there is a young plant of Acer davidii with red new growth, grown from seed collected in China in 1992. The Paper Bark maple, Acer griseum, can be seen in a number of places with its distinctive peeling reddish bark, and there is a splendid old Acer palmatum and Acer nikoense in Silverwood which colour bright red in autumn. Acer capillipes, rufinerve, japonicum, palmatum var dissectum, circinatum, and longipes ssp longipes can all be seen scattered around the garden while there are a few old birches of uncertain origin and name, but probably hybrid forms of Betula utilis and jacquemontii, with a fine pink barked Betula albosinensis var septemtrionalis below the bottom terrace. Many young birches have also been planted from wild seed, including Betula utilis, jacquemontii, albosinensis, szechuanica, ermanii, and grossa.
There is a good example of the Handkerchief Tree, Davidia involucrata, south-east of the Hall, with a young one nearby from Sichuan seed, and many interesting sorbus, including a rare Sorbus harrowiana with its distinctively large leaflets, half way down the Front Drive on the south side. Sorbus hupehensis flourishes in a number of places, while the whitebeams are well represented by a Sorbus vestita on the path south of Silverwood, as well as others. Opposite the S. vestita is a real curiosity; looking like a large broom, it is in fact an Olearia virgata from the North Island of New Zealand. Cherries are frequent, both for their flower and autumn colour. The Monterrey Cypress, Cupressus macrocarpa, is all over the place as background greenery, while Queen Victoria herself planted the Algerian Oak, Quercus canariensis, near marker post 7.
Cercidiphyllym japonicum, the Kadsura tree from Japan and China, has always been a favourite; many young ones can be seen with some older ones in Silverwood. They have lovely autumn colour, from yellow to pink to red, and the leaves give off a distinctive smell in the autumn particularly after a little rain.
North-west of the Croquet Lawn is a nice plant of Cotinus coggygria with particularly good autumn colour.
These are a selection of the trees to be seen, both in the garden and in the new arboretum mainly to the east of it, and many more are being planted for the future. There are approximately 12,500 trees and shrubs in the garden and arboretum.
