Sue Biggs to
LONG WAITS
RETIRE
for allotmenteers Allotments have always been in high demand, but, since the pandemic, waiting lists in the UK have grown even longer, research by MyJobQuote reveals. Londoners who sign up for allotments face the longest wait of up to 17.5 years on average (one gardener in Camden waited for 18 years and three months), followed by gardeners in East Lothian, who can wait for up to 15 years. Nottingham City Council has the highest number of applicants with 6,845 names on their waiting list. Google searches for allotments are 4.5 times higher than pre-pandemic levels.
IRISH PLANTS
IMAGES NATIONAL TRUST IMAGES/CLIVE NICHOLS; ANNA STOWE; SHUTTERSTOCK; RHS/LUKE MACGREGOR; PADDY TOBIN; INDIA HOBSON/HAARKON
get collection status
The Royal Horticultural Society has announced that Sue Biggs CBE, its director general since 2010, will step down in June 2022. With Sue at the helm, the RHS has grown to record membership numbers and launched many initiatives to improve the Society’s gardens and flower shows, educational programmes and standards of horticulture and science. Most notably, Sue has overseen the opening of its fifth garden, Bridgewater in Salford, and Wisley’s RHS Hilltop – The Home of Gardening Science. Recruitment for a new director general is currently under way.
Some 1,000 plants held in 75 locations across both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland have been awarded National Plant Collection status by conservation charity Plant Heritage. The plants have either been bred or collected by, or named after Irish horticulturists or plant explorers and include rarities such as Iris unguicularis ‘Kilbroney Marble’ (pictured), listed by just one supplier. The collection is managed by the Irish Garden Plant Society and has been 40 years in the making. plantheritage.org.uk
CHATSWORTH’S Arcadia Gardeners at Chatsworth in Derbyshire have completed the final planting in the garden’s biggest transformation for nearly 200 years. Designers Tom Stuart-Smith, Dan Pearson and James Hitchmough have been working with Steve Porter, Chatsworth’s head of gardens and landscape, and his team for three years to bring Stuart-Smith’s masterplan for the 105-acre garden to fruition. More than 300,000 plants, including hundreds of trees, have been added to a previously underused area known as ‘Arcadia’. A new ‘meadow glade’, seeded with thousands of perennial flowers, was one of the final areas to be completed. Work has continued throughout the pandemic. “The Duke and Duchess of Devonshire have often been in the garden helping out with planting, placing and watering, particularly when we were short-handed,” says Steve. chatsworth.org MARCH 2022 THE ENGLISH GARDEN 11
