Riversdale
Riversdale is a much loved and cherished garden which was designed in early 2000 to provide the owners with self sufficiency in terms of fruit and vegetables for the table and freezer and also to provide a safe haven for birds and wildlife. All plants , trees and bushes were carefully chosen to provide winter, spring, summer and autumn colour and over 15 fruit trees were planted. We garden organically and never use weed killers especially on the lawn , preferring to let the wild flowers grow and provide vital nectar for the bees and other insects. Come and relax in one of the many secret places in our garden. Produce from this garden will be on sale at the Jam Stall (it is delicious!!) and they will also be selling plants grown from this garden as well as those nearby.
Bush Farm (2014)
A family garden bursting with bees, butterflies and blooms, it produces enough fruit to keep us going for most of the year. Planting is largely perennials, bushes and bulbs, with a healthy sprinkling of hostas and heucheras. Being a family garden, Bush Farm is hosting children’s competitions and will have ice-lollies on sale if the weather is good.
Flowton Hall
An extensive and delightful garden which has been developed over the last eighteen years from an overgrown hayfield. As well as a small vegetable and soft fruit garden there is a large herbaceous bed complete with flower clad arbour, two ponds which are home to ducks and moorhens, an orchard with old style apple trees, many and varied hedges, and myriad roses and honeysuckle climbing up trees and telegraph poles and rambling over buildings. Within this setting there are numerous hidden corners and long distance vistas. Flowton Hall will be hosting a stall from Priory Plants (Hintlesham) as well as a second hand book stall.
Grove Cottage
This was only our second summer in the garden which, when we arrived, was very overgrown. Half a dozen new borders and lots of clearance have started to create a mix of semi-formal and wilder areas alongside a new vegetable and fruit patch. Come back to the next Flowton Open Gardens in four years’ time to see how it develops!
Tanga Lodge
A mix of lawns, flower and shrub borders, water features, fruit & vegetables, this garden has evolved with it’s present owners over the past 38 years. Now a peaceful and pleasant haven. Tanga Lodge will be hosting a cake stall and a ‘guess the name of the gardener’ competition.
Corner Cottage
A garden developed over the years from a good, basic one to a pleasing jungle of trees, shrubs and perennials, with lawn and hedges, a little topiary, a vegetable patch and an old well.
Little Park Nursery
The Nursery was a wholesale and retail production nursery on both sides of the road until the mid 1980s when the wholesale business was closed and the remainder sold as a retail nursery. We came here in 1986 as the second owner of the retail business. At the time, many supermarkets were opening garden centres and car boot sales were beginning to sell plants. The nursery, tucked out of the way, did not attract much custom. It was reluctantly closed in May 1995 and is now mostly turned over to a garden.
We have always been interested in wildlife and we are trying to attract as much as possible to the garden. The four ponds are managed naturally without fish and have attracted all the usual pond life, though frogs have been absent in the area since the 90s. The newts succeeded in attracting a Kingfisher last year
The nursery area grass is cut as a meadow with walkways in order to attract maximum butterflies. Buckthorns have been planted to provide food for brimstone butterfly caterpillars. The old inner car park is a butterfly hot spot, the main nectar source being Marjoram.
Growing vegetables has proved difficult in the past but now they are protected against rabbits and Muntjac deer by a large cage, moles are the only problem.
Pesticides are not used at all with herbicides used very sparingly, mostly on pathways. We have planted many species and varieties of trees and shrubs, with over 250 varieties on the nursery. Some perennials and trees are still propagated, particularly Hostas and Irises, some will be available for sale.
Church Cottage
This was a garden much loved by its previous owners, now sadly deceased. It has been a work of restoration and rejuvenation over the last 18 months. There is a new herbaceous border, raised vegetable beds and lots of lovely old roses. The garden at Church Cottage is hosting the cream teas, between 3pm and 5pm on both days.
The Old Rectory
Enclosed by mature hedgerows and trees that include horse chestnut, silver lime and oak, the Old Rectory garden is well established and features old-fashioned climbing roses and ramblers. The rose arches lead to the wild orchard and through the more formal yew hedging to a box-edged vegetable garden and fruit cage. Primarily a family garden, the Old Rectory is somewhat ‘au naturel’ in parts and therein perhaps lies its charm! Ice-creams and drinks available. Come and play croquet!
