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Hatfield Park & Gardens
HATFIELD PARK & GARDEN
Andrew Turvey HEAD OF PARK AND GARDENS
2020 was a year for consolidation and to build on the good foundations that we had made in merging the park and garden team. The team had made great progress in enhancing the presentation of the estate, sharing resources, knowledge and team work. This was following what had been a very busy 2019.
As we started to see the effects of the pandemic, our thoughts turned to protecting the team whilst also ensuring we able to continue to maintain our standards. Unfortunately, we had to ask our volunteer to stop for four months before allowing them to come back in smaller groups and spread the team out across the garden.
In early March we started to look at opportunities to grow more vegetables across the gardens in an attempt to help support the pensioners on the estate and local food banks. The idea was to utilising the space in the gardens where we would normally create annual displays and grow vegetables in their place. A few weeks later we were tasked with the thought of making this a much bigger offering. On 31 March we lifted the turf from the croquet lawn situated in the East garden and created just under ¼ of an acre of growing space. Eight weeks later we were harvesting our first produce which continued to grow and grow supplying three local food banks, Countess Anne School, and St Audrey’s Care Home.
Bill keeping an eye on the crops!
The new woodland walks were all finished and ready for the public encouraging our visitor to spend more time in the woodlands rather than on tarmac whilst learning about eight key tree species though new interpretation.
We had our first sighting of Oak Processionary Moth a problem which we knew that we would face in the coming years although had hoped would not reach the estate so quickly. The caterpillars present two challenges one the defoliation of our oak trees and the risk which it presents to humans and animals because of its hairy exterior which is shed during its life-cycle and can cause skin irritation. Unfortunately, a pest which we will have to continue to monitor and remove their nests in high traffic areas whilst
Weir maintenance at Sawmill removing, Branches Bur Reed (Sparganium erectum) to allow flow across the entire weir.”
also aiming to slow its spread via preventative measures. This comes only three years after seeing the damage of another moth affecting our box (Buxus) plants Box moth caterpillar, this does not pose a risk to humans but is a large threat to our historic hedges. We are utilising pheromone traps to capture early moth activity and gauge the best timing to spray our hedges. This task is very time consuming we have therefore looked at other possible methods of controlling the caterpillar we have taken a lead from Ham House in London which has been badly affected by the moth. They had noticed jackdaws feeding on the caterpillars. At the start of the year we installed six penthouse jackdaw boxes with panoramic view straight out onto areas of box hedging in the hope that we are directing them to a potential food source. It is difficult to say if this is having any effect at the moment although we will continue to monitor over the coming years.
As we look forward we have many exciting projects ahead of us including working on a walk through the Warren and the red brick bridge. The development of a large orchard within the southern half of the walled garden, which along with the Beekeeping husbandry will add to the education offer. The second year of growing vegetables on the croquet lawn and the enhancements to the south front parterre.
I must thank all of the team for all their hard work and dedication during this difficult time they have exceeded the challenges faced and have ensured our highest standards have been achieved and surpassed. The help and support we have received from the house staff, strimming, weeding and watering has been very much appreciated.
