Harvesting wild rushes
Summer adventures in a bean den The sea caught in glass
Cottage garden | Daylilies | Gardening for bees | Apricots | Glass blower | Dry stone waller | Sweet chestnuts | Chesil Beach | British bats | Llangollen
July / August 2015
simple treasures
July / August 2015 £4.25
Life at nature’s pace
Issue 24 | July / August 2015 | £4.25
LandScape - Life at nature’s pace
www.landscapemagazine.co.uk
The boardwalk runs past the perennial-filled West Border on the right, and the Rock Garden behind the pond on the left.
canvas of colour A cottage garden in Kent drifts into late summer, woven with a tapestry of flowers and foliage that melt into the surrounding landscape
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The flowers of helichrysum keep their colour after drying, producing beautiful decorations that last forever
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Growing a green den of runner bean plants creates a world of imagination and adventure for young playmates Beckett and Emmy
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rown with RUNNER bean plants, this teepee-style den allows children to be actively involved in the garden. The beans are fast climbers, productive and easy to grow. The bean den provides just enough space for small hunter-gatherers to pick the produce from the inside, while providing a fun play area. Kept cool even on the hottest summer days by the wide-leafed plants, the bean den provides valuable shade for the children’s safe outdoor play. ›
green Hideaway
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river of beauty The Welsh valley around Llangollen combines ancient ruins with industrial engineering masterpieces in a spectacular landscape
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The magnificent Horseshoe Falls on the River Dee sit at the head of Llangollen Canal.
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Radish fritters Makes approximately 16 400g radishes 1 tsp salt 6 spring onions 2 tbsp chopped fresh mint 3 tbsp dried breadcrumbs 2 tbsp cornflour 1 egg 4 tbsp full-fat natural yogurt finely grated zest of ½ lemon black pepper 4 tbsp rapeseed oil Coarsely grate the radishes. Place in a nylon sieve and sprinkle generously with salt. Allow to stand for 15 mins. Rinse well then squeeze out as much liquid as possible by pushing down against the sieve with a small bowl. Place the grated radish in a mixing bowl. Trim and slice the spring onions and add to the radish. Stir in the mint and breadcrumbs then sprinkle with the flour and stir to combine. Beat the egg and yogurt together in a jug, then pour over the radish mixture. Add the lemon zest and pepper, before mixing everything until well combined.
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Heat 2 tbsp of the oil in a heavy-based frying pan. Place rounded spoonfuls of the radish mixture into the pan and flatten slightly to form a small patty. Cook the patties for 3 mins until golden brown on the bottom then flip and cook for a further 3 mins. Remove from the pan and keep warm. Continue cooking the fritters in batches until all the mixture is used, adding extra oil as required. Serve as a vegetable side dish or as a starter topped with a spoon of soured cream.
A rosy glow The crunchy red roots of radishes bring a peppery heat and vibrant colour to summer meals
Radish spread
Serves 4
175g radishes 200g full-fat curd cheese 4 tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley 1 tsp finely grated lemon zest 4 dashes Tabasco sauce salt and black pepper Grate the radishes in a food processor. Squeeze out grated radish to remove any excess liquid, then place on kitchen paper for 5 mins to drain thoroughly. Place radishes in a mixing bowl, add all the remaining ingredients and beat together until well combined. Season to taste. Serve spread onto freshly toasted crusty bread.
Radish salad with caper dressing Serves 4 as a starter or side dish 350g radishes 2 tbsp capers 1 cocktail gherkin 2 anchovy fillets in oil, drained 20g flat-leaf parsley leaves 7g mint leaves 1 tsp wholegrain mustard 6 tbsp cold-pressed rapeseed oil 1½ tbsp cider vinegar
To prepare the dressing, chop the capers, gherkin, anchovies, mint and parsley. Combine in a small mixing bowl. Add the mustard, oil and vinegar and whisk together with a fork. Thinly slice the radishes with a mandoline or sharp knife and arrange on serving plates. Season lightly with salt and pepper. Drizzle the dressing over the salad and serve.
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Harvesting the river’s bounty The waterways of Bedfordshire provide ideal conditions for the last large-scale cutting of England’s wild rush
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punt slides gracefully through a slow-flowing river, piled high with rushes. Felicity Irons is gathering her harvest from the water’s edge. Transported to her farm near Colesden, Bedfordshire, the rushes will be dried ready for use to make flooring, hats and baskets. Once a thriving industry, Felicity is now the last person harvesting wild English rush on a large scale, single-handedly keeping this centuries-old tradition alive. After working with rush for more than 20 years, her passion for it remains unabated. “When I’m harvesting I think nothing could get better than this,” she says. “The scent is amazing. When the rushes are first cut they have a cucumber smell. When they dry, it is a beautiful sweet, musky hay-like scent. Nothing beats it. Then I start to really look forward to using the rush.” She came to the craft by chance. “My mother was an antiques dealer and an upholsterer, my father was a French polisher and cabinet maker. This meant there were always pieces of furniture in the house in a state of disrepair,” she explains. Left housebound by a car accident in her late teens, she decided to mend some of these items. ›
Felicity Irons on her punt, gathering rushes, closely watched by Molly the dog. 80
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A fragrant display is created by hanging the wands from old coat hooks.
Lavender wands Dried and woven with ribbon, lavender releases its fresh, sweet fragrance for months
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eaving a handful of fragrant lavender into a wand creates a long-lasting freshener to hang in a wardrobe, perfume a linen drawer or fasten to a handbag. The sweet-scented flower buds are encased in a basket woven from their stems and a length of ribbon. They naturally dry inside the wand. Picking the lavender The lavender is picked on a dry day, when all dew has evaporated. The best stems are robust ones with either flower buds that are not yet open, or a few open flowers. Stems with fully open flowers may be used, but the flowers may become detached during the process. Their fragrance will not be as strong. Some green pigment may leach from the stems at first. If the wand is to come into contact with fabric, it needs drying for two weeks. The wands here have been created using 31 stems and 3mm-wide ribbon. There is no limit to the number of stems, but it needs to be an odd number. The more stems and thinner the ribbon used, the more intricate the weave that is made. ›
The wands are used to scent linen.
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Shaping the first gather of glass using a cherry wood block.
Malcolm holding a Wavy Sea bowl.
the sea caught in glass In his studio in southern Cornwall, an artist blows beautiful glassware reflecting the wild nature of the coast 98
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ivid blue bowls crowd the shelves of Malcolm Sutcliffe’s whitewashed studio in Penryn, Cornwall. In the far corner, a large furnace emits a fiery glow each time the door is opened. Malcolm set up his studio in a former bakery 14 years ago. “I had been working in glass for more than 26 years when my artist wife Jean and I decided to relocate from Chesterfield where we had a studio to Penryn. In our youth, we both had summer holiday jobs in St Ives, getting engaged while we were there. We always hoped to live by the sea, and looked in Devon and Cornwall until we found this place. “I always wanted to make things, and I became hooked on glass making in college. I got good technical training and discipline working in a small glass company, in terms of honing my skills, but it was not artistically satisfying,” he says. He wanted to be in full control of the whole process, from creating to selling. “I wanted to create a glass blowing studio with a gallery to display and sell the work in. It took a while to get established here but we have successfully done it now for 14 years which we are both delighted with.” When they moved in, the building was in a terrible state. “It hadn’t been used as a bakery for 26 years, the windows were smashed and there was no water,” he says. “It took six
months to get the furnace and studio up and running but we have never looked back.” Since then, the sea and coastline have become an increasing inspiration for his art. The design of his seascape bowls and vases conveys a sense of movement and immersion. This is created through the vivid colours and textures he adds to the glass, and also by the shape of each vessel. His elegant Wavy Sea design reflects the white-tipped waves against the blue of the sea and the sky. The convex surface of the bowls brings the scene and patterns to life. It is as if they leap from the glass. His designs range in size from dainty perfume bottles 4in (10cm) high to magnificent bowls measuring 19½in (50cm) in diameter. Wild inspiration Malcolm’s working day starts at 7am when he removes the previous day’s pieces from the ovens, and runs until 5pm when he finally lays down his blowing iron. The muffled ongoing rumble of the furnace is accompanied by the odd tinkling and pinging of small pieces of surplus glass as they cool and detach from the blowing irons. He is constantly on the move, deftly rotating, swinging and raising the blowing ›
Malcolm at work in his studio, shaping the top and sides of a bowl using a pad of wet newspaper.
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elegant athlete The swift and agile whippet is an intelligent dog who makes a loving companion
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lim and graceful, the whippet’s delicate, almost fragile appearance belies its power and strength. It is one of the fastest accelerating dogs in the world. However, its gentle, calm nature makes it a loyal and loving pet. With a top speed of 36mph, a whippet can cover 600ft (180m) in less than 12 seconds. Outdoors, they are born to run. Their long legs, thin frame and deep chest are all designed to give them great speed and agility. These dogs are sight hounds, hunters who chase what they
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can see. Originally bred to hunt rabbits for their owner’s table, they regard any small animal that runs from them, including a cat, as legitimate prey. Once they become totally focused on a moving object, they ignore everything else, including their owner. Anyone who owns a whippet needs to understand this extremely strong chase instinct. Indoors it is a different matter. Here the whippet turns into an easy-going, intelligent and highly affectionate family pet. “I think of them as Jekyll and Hyde dogs,” says Linda Jones, who has bred and shown whippets for 40 years. “They
are so different outside to how they are in the house. There they seem to be almost lazy. But it should be remembered that these hounds are bred for hunting. When they are lying around, they are reserving their energy. This comes bursting out when they start to run.” The whippet is a highly social breed. Loyal and devoted to its owner, it loves company. It can become destructive if left alone for long periods but thrives in multi-dog households. They are quiet dogs that do not bark a lot. “I don’t think there is a better breed out there,” says Linda. “They are a joy to live with.” The whippet’s perfect day would be to have a least an hour spent running in an open but safe area such as a beach. This should be split into two periods, one 45-minute session and a second shorter walk. The dogs enjoy routine, so exercise is best when it happens at the same time each day. This is then followed by the chance to curl up in warmth and comfort. Working man’s dog Whippet-like dogs have been in existence for centuries, appearing in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and Roman frescos. But today’s whippet originated in England around 200 years ago, initially to hunt rabbits and hares. One theory is that they were the result of deliberately breeding small greyhounds to get an even smaller version. Another suggests that it was developed as a result of crossing tiny Italian greyhounds with small game terriers. The name whippet is thought to derive from the Middle English word wippen, to move quickly, like a whip. They were also known as snapdogs, due to the speed with which they killed prey with one snap of their jaws. In the 19th and 20th centuries they became very popular with miners and other manual workers in northern England. Their hunting ability was a means of putting a cheap meal on the table. It was eventually discovered that the whippet’s speed and agility, combined with the urge to chase anything that moved, made them perfect for racing. In an early form of racing, they were trained to run towards a rag waved by their owners at the opposite end of a straight track. Known as ‘ragging’, these races were a popular Sunday pastime in industrial areas. They led to the whippet gaining yet another nickname of the poor man’s greyhound. A good dog could win the equivalent of a week’s wages in one afternoon, often making it the owner’s most precious possession. It would be lavished with care, sleeping in the house and often being fed better than the rest of the family.
As a sighthound, bred to hunt visible prey, the whippet has keen vision, even in dim light. This comes from a reflective structure in the back of the eye that reflects light back into the light-sensitive cells of the retina.
The breed was recognised by the Kennel Club in 1890, while The Whippet Club was formed in 1899. This still exists today and oversees showing and racing. Appearance In appearance, the whippet is elegant and graceful. Its coat is short and fine, almost velvety to the touch. The deep chest provides plenty of room for the heart. Large for a dog of its size, it is very efficient at pumping oxygen, allowing the dog to sustain its top speed for longer. The shoulders are well laid back with flat muscles. Whippets are strong and broad across the thighs. When running, the front legs are thrown well forward while the hind legs move right up under the body. ›
Bringing the hind legs well under the body as it runs allows the whippet to propel itself at speeds of up to 36mph. As it gallops, the spine bends and stretches like a bow.
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