Byron House Forest Garden Now in its second year, the planting in the Forest Garden is now starting to mature. The garden is designed around a circular teaching and meeting space, surrounded by an alley of hornbeam, which is large enough for an entire year group to sit and discuss and learn together. The design mimics the natural ecosystem of a woodland, with nearly 3,500 plants. The rambling roses that were planted last year are beginning to make their way up into the canopy of the winter flowering cherry and the mature holly where they will grace the foliage with long trusses of blooms in June. Rosa ‘Seagull’ and R. ‘Bobbie James’ are joined this year by the repeat flowering
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rambler R. ‘Phyllis Bide’ which has been planted to grow up into the lower branches of the mature walnut tree. We have been very pleased to see that the elder has begun to produce seedlings, as the plant material is useful for creating whistles, instruments and bug habitats due to the natural soft core in the centre and the plants ability to replenish itself at speed. The children in Gardening Club have been hard at work looking after the garden, tying the hornbeam into the wide arch and using their computational thinking skills to make light work of the tricky challenge of building new supports for our climbing plants.