What does it take to get the Explorers Garden ready for re-opening?
Caroline: “So it’s been a very mad rush this week as we gear up to open the garden on 1 April. When we close at the end of October, we then do all of our garden maintenance work, and that can be everything from carpentry, all the way through to obviously our most important feature of woodland gardens: the trees. We do a lot of tree surveys and we also get contractors in to do the works before we are fully open to the public, as health and safety is of course really important to us, and that is work that’s mainly done over winter.
We’re also doing things like producing compost, and we do this by collecting a huge amount of leaves to make our beautiful leafmoulds, which mainly comes from all of the deciduous trees that are dropping their leaves. It does take a long time to do, and we have a working area from the top of the garden where we have huge spaces there to build up the moulds which is really imperative to support us in the garden, especially our national collection of Meconopsis, as they’re very, very hungry plants that are desperate for richness, and we get that by producing compost ourselves here in the garden.”
What are you most excited about when the garden reopens?
Caroline: “Well, I love the garden, so I’m excited by the whole space! But for you coming in, especially as we are predominantly a Spring Garden, do look out for our nurtured rhododendrons. We have over 120 species of rhododendrons in the garden from China, Tibet and some various Himalayan sections, so we’ve been pruning them, we’ve been feeding them, and even some of them had some grubs and bugs that we’ve been getting rid of.
We don’t use any chemicals in the garden, so it’s really important for me that we watch, look and do everything by hand, and we use nematodes, which are microscopic bugs that go in and do the work underneath the ground for us.
So look for the rhododendrons, and we have a successional grouping of them, so one will flower, then the next will flower, and then they’ll continue to do that all the way into June, just in time for our beautiful azaleas that then take over.”
What is something people should look out for in the garden?
Caroline: “People come from all over the world to see is our national collection of Meconopsis – that’s our big blue Himalayan poppies. We don’t just have the blue ones in the garden, we have white, purple, pink and yellow ones.
We have a very, very rare one at the moment, which I managed to get some seed from Tromsø Arctic-Alpine Botanical Garden in the North of Norway at the Arctic Circle. The botanical garden kindly gave me some seeds and we’ve managed to grow some very, very rare ones so they won’t last long. Do come and visit and make sure that you see them just as you’re coming into the top of the Himalayan section. They’re very, very pale, and they’re quite small, so if you see any of the team dotted about the garden, ask us where to find them and we will happily point them out to you, as well as the rest of the collection.”
How would you summarise the garden to someone who hadn’t visited before?
Caroline: “If you’ve never been to the garden before, Explorers Garden is based around the history of Scottish plant expeditions from the last 300 years taking us right up to present day. We also follow these expeditions around the world, so you start off in our South American section and end up in our Japanese garden and reflection pool, which is our newest creation. Each area is dedicated to a Scottish explorer that went out and found these wonderful plants and brought them back to the UK, but more importantly celebrates the original histories and cultures of the native countries that these plants come from, and so the gardens is wholly dedicated to that art and culture.
We also have a beautiful amphitheatre in the space that we produce, summer theatre productions, and that’s right in the heart of the garden. That’s what I call my bird’s nest. I like to do my paperwork in there on a nice day, because you’re surrounded by birdsong, the dam, and the river that’s flowing, and its just blissful.
It is predominantly a woodland, shady garden, built on a slope, and it is certainly a garden that is not to be rushed. We have teeny, tiny little, alpine plants that you could miss if you blink, but if you know where you’re looking, it’s really worth taking the time. We have some beautiful structures in the garden, dedicated to our stonemasons of Scotland, including a beautiful new Moon Gate, which, again, is worth coming to see.
The full space is just extraordinary – the garden’s singing and it’s just going to get better and better.”
Explorers Garden is open from 1 April – 31 October, and tickets can be purchased online or in-person.