Island Life Magazine Ltd December 2012/January 2013 | Page 78

Matt Noyce is head gardener
at Quarr Abbey, and is
responsible for the 200 acres
of gardens, pastureland,
vegetable plot and private
woodland on the estate.

Splitting logs to keep us warm!
Now we are in the grip of winter at
Quarr the setting has changed. The
skyline seems bare; the cold, clear
mornings are filled with birds foraging
in the undergrowth, in the trees and
around shrubs for berries.
The leaves have fallen but the tidying
up continues. This is payment for the
privilege of living amongst wonderful,
majestic, veteran trees, some of which
have been growing for hundreds of
years, here on the estate at Quarr.
Winter or summer, these trees create a
wealth of arboreal habitat within their
creases and cracks. Studies have shown
over 250 different insect species can be
found on a single, old oak tree.
Unfortunately, these trees do
succumb to old age and occasionally
get blown over. Where we can, we
encourage the cycle of nature to take
place. Recently though, we have had
to clear trees and branches that have
created problems and breached our
stock fences. The resultant timber has
given us a great undercover ‘rainy day’
job in splitting the logs. Timber can
keep you warm in three ways: cutting
it, splitting it and burning it!
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The change in season has brought
about a shift in work priorities. We are
now focusing on the necessary estate
work; clearing vegetation and lifting
branches along paths, continuing
with the trimming and reinstatement
of hedges and the removal of non
indigenous species in the copses.

The programme of ditch clearance
is still underway as we are trying to
reduce the rate of land slippage of our
coastline into the sea by increasing
drainage away from those areas.
There still is work to be done though

in the vegetable plot and the gardens.
We are continuing to grow winter
salads and crops under cover in our
polytunnels. Also, we are trialling
the intriguing ‘walking stick’ kale, a
variety that grows around two metres
tall on a stem that ultimately turns
‘woody’ and can have multiple uses.
The areas of the vegetable plot we
aren’t using have been covered with
black polythene sheet to keep the
weeds down and to reduce labour in
the spring.
As an experiment, the Dahlias we
grew this year will be left in the
ground to overwinter. The soil is free
draining and is sheltered somewhat
by the walled garden wall so I trust
they will survive. The Gunnera have
had their annual ‘tepee’ treatment. I
cut the lea ves and invert them over
the crowns to protect them from hard
frosts. We have also planted out some
winter colour in the hanging baskets
around the teashop in the form of
hardy Cyclamen. As for the pruning of
spent vegetation, we’ll leave the seed
heads for the birds and also for a bit of
winter interest.