August in the Ednovean Farm Garden

This August at Ednovean, the fig trees that line the courtyard are giving up their harvest of plump sweet fruits – just enough for breakfast some mornings if Charles has beaten the black birds to the prize. I love the Mediterranean feel to the courtyards at this time of year and this month we’ve put together our first little video clip celebrating the courtyard gardens nearest to the house.

In the car park the tall Date palms are twined with the dainty white stars of jasmine luxuriating in the long hot summer day’s that we’ve had this year and the cats bask on the hot gravel or slip into the cooling shadows. For this months photo showing the month in pictures in its many moods click here.

Charles’s new four speed lawnmower is proving a gem of time saving efficiency and reduces the lawns to a delicate sward in only one afternoon’s work – in fact the garden rabbits are in danger of loosing weight under the competition. But with the commitment of the strictly-self-employed-rabbit and they’ve produced a fine new burrow system tucked behind the Italian gardens amongst the olive trees.

In August the design bones of the garden start to be needed again as the exuberant Echiums, such a dramatic statement for so long, finally falter and die leaving behind next years crop, ready to flower and already tough waist high plants. The gravel terraces are full of exotic Agapanthus – well actually very full and I think I must not let them all self seed again for another year or I might not find anywhere to sit!

My suggestions for gardens to visit this month

1. Our guests usually like a garden to visit during there stay and this month I think Tremenheere Sculpture garden will be gorgeous, the high Mediterranean style garden with stunning views down over Mounts Bay suiting the season perfectly. You may remember our visit and snaps ! There’s a chic little café at the bottom too.
   
2. For further afield Trebah Garden has something for every season – it is often November before we manage a visit but the romantic river valley garden running down to its own little beach was warm and secluded even then.
   
3. For something a little different try Bonython where the swathes of cannas and grasses beside the lake should be stunning this month
   
4. I found Lamorran House gardens inspirational when we were setting out our gardens and never tire of the romantic fantasy of follies weaving down to the Helford river.