Untold hours of labour and love go into the fantastic entries for campaigns such as South West in Bloom. But there are also some key points to be aware of when preparing for any garden competition which will give you that all important edge over the others.

Some judging tips:

– Its important to make a good impression; the judge has limited time

– Shrubs and hedges should neatly clipped and any dead plants, flowers or leaves removed

– Plants should look healthy. There should be no disease or insect infestation

– Garden design is important, and includes layout, use of colour, line, form, texture and plants

– Beds should be well mulched with material that doesn’t look as though it was put down the day before judging

– Try to have a clear theme for the garden and stick to it

– Lawns should be healthy, weed free and nicely edged

– Resist the urge to put in an instant garden or planted garden. It will be obvious to a competent judge.

We are delighted to welcome Richard as one of our judges for #ILoveMyDevon Garden 2022. Here’s a bit more about him.

I have worked in the horticultural industry for forty six years years, forty two of which have been spent working in local government. In local government I came up through the ranks from gardener with Birmingham City Council to becoming Leisure Community Development Manager at Torbay Council where I worked for fifteen years until I retired in 2015. At Torbay I was responsible for parks, allotments, sports fields, play areas, funding and park friends groups.

 

I have been a South West in Bloom judge for over fifteen years and am also the Devon coordinator for the Royal Horticultural Society’s ‘It’s Your Neighbourhood” award, entries which are managed by South West in Bloom. 

 

In my home town of Bovey Tracey I lead the South West in Bloom entry. I also manage South West in Bloom’s Best Parks competition.

 

For over twenty years I was a Green Flag judge for Keep Britain Tidy, judging parks, nature reserves and community projects in the South West.

For all the details of our #ILoveMyDevonGarden charity campaign click here

I am a Living Options Devon Trustee and a keen walker. Being able to access the outdoors with friends and family means everything to me and is really the best thing for my mental and physical wellbeing.  There are over 14 million disabled people in the UK, and more than one in five of us will be affected by disability at some point in our lives. Why would we as a society not want everyone to benefit from the great outdoors?

When I see a tramper being used is one of the most joyous things I think – and it’s so simple, there should be trampers everywhere!    I am sure most of us, or family and friends we want to spend time with, will need some sort of tramper at some point in our lives. Living Options will continue to work tirelessly to make sure that our world is accessible for all and all are included in the benefits of being outdoors.

Please get involved with the HCT Turf  #ILoveMyDevonGarden capaign and feel proud that you are part of sharing the outdoors with everyone. And if you are not already a tramper user, do look out for them when you are out and about!

Susan Fallon

For all the details of our #ILoveMyDevonGarden charity campaign click here

Susan Fallon

We are delighted to welcome Susan as one of our judges for #ILoveMyDevon Garden 2022.

For all the details of our #ILoveMyDevonGarden charity campaign click here

The art of capturing a great photograph often doesn’t come down to what equipment you have but rather some basic understanding of light and composition. Let’s have a look at some ‘rules’ of photography.

Composition – an essential one

This usually draws people in; things such as leading lines and the rule of thirds are two popular compositional guides. The rule of thirds works by placing the main centre of attention on both a horizontal “third” line and a vertical “third” line, which you can see in this picture below. When relating this to lawn photography, possibly by placing the horizon on one of the horizontal lines, this could achieve the rule of thirds. Another example would be to place a feature such as a shape in the lawn on one of the verticals.

“The rule of thirds” – HCT Turf archive image

Lighting

Arguably as crucial, if not more, is lighting. When lighting your lawn images, you rely on the natural light around you. As a rule of thumb, bright sunshine looks warm and inviting but creates shadows in your picture. Cloudy or overcast days give the image a cold and flat look, but shadows are reduced. When thinking about the time of the day, I love to shoot during the golden hour, or as the sun becomes much lower and gives a lovely golden glow to the image. Try taking pictures at different times of the day and see which you like best; there is no right or wrong, so try and experiment.

2021 entry

Angle

When taking your images, it’s good to think about the angle or height you might want to take your photo. The height at which you take your picture will change the depth/layering of the image. The higher you take the photo, the flatter the image will look; try getting lower and creating foreground interest. As a rule of thumb, choose either low down or from height. Taking a photo from head height is the easiest way to take a picture, but it will mean your images look very similar to all the other images we see on the internet.

2021 entry

Now you have a few tips and tricks that you can use while photographing your lawn images. If you can remember composition, lighting and angle, you will be set to capture a great shot. I look forward to seeing your entries. Good luck!

Felix Northover

For all the details of our #ILoveMyDevonGarden charity campaign click here

We are delighted to welcome Felix as one of our judges for #ILoveMyDevon Garden 2022. Here’s a bit more about him.

With a distinction in UAL Photography and a 1st in Film and TV from Exeter College, as a professional full-time photographer and filmmaker I now list the college, Exeter Chiefs, Exeter City Council, Devon County Show, ISCA Wellbeing and SWComms, among others, as key corporate clients.

 

From my base in Devon, my work takes me across the country and often beyond; opening up opportunities and experiences that both challenge and excite me on a daily basis.

 

Professionalism stands at the core of my work, allowing me to create content that captivates and engages my audience from every aspect; each and every new project offers an opportunity to grow, to learn and to exceed client expectations with the highest quality end result.

 

To find out more, visit – felixnorthoverphotography.com

For all the details of our #ILoveMyDevonGarden charity campaign click here

1. The turf laying boards ensure an even distribution of your weight which:-

a. Avoids indentations made by walking on the newly laid turf, and
b. Helps to compress weight for good soil to turf contact.

2. They also act as a straight edge for your next row!

Using laying boards

Professional landscapers use turf laying boards for the reasons stated above. And, when you’ve spend hours raking and levelling your soil, you really don’t want to undo all that hard work by putting your big size 12’s in the soil or leaving tracks by heaving your heavy wheelbarrow across the garden!

What you’ll need

You’ll need at least a couple of boards, approx. 4 foot long each. This will enable you to move one board along while you are standing on the other. Plus, a 4 foot board means it’s not too heavy to pick up and reposition.

Let’s get started

1. Lay your first row of turf.
2. Place your laying board on top of the turf to use as a platform to work from. Stand on the laying board to ensure you don’t do any damage to the newly laid turf.
3. As you move along, move the first board and place it onto the turf and move along without standing on the fresh turf.
4. Stagger the joints (brick pattern) of the turf from row to row to avoid any unsightly joins.
5. Push the turf as close together as possible.
6. It’s useful to sprinkle fine top soil into any gaps between rolls of turf and brush over with a soft broom for even coverage and to avoid the edges drying out. In warm weather some shrinkage is normal, so these steps will help to make the newly laid lawn look as good as possible.
7. Curved and slanted lines will require the turf to be cut to fit. An old kitchen knife will do the job just fine!
8. At the end of a row of turf where a piece is cut to fit, it is best to avoid finishing with a very small piece. If necessary, cut the previous piece and use a longer strip to finish. Again this reduces the problems of shrinkage.
9. Any exposed edges of new turf can be butted up with more top soil along the cut edge to stop it drying out and help the turf to root down and establish.
10. Water the newly-laid lawn well. Continue to do so regularly until its established.
11. In warmer weather this this could mean watering it once or twice a day. Take a look at our summer guide for more details.
12. Avoid walking on your new lawn for a couple of weeks so the turf can bed in and knit together.
13. And only mow once the turf has rooted. Find out more here

Other related articles
– TURF ORDERING

We supply quality turf all year round. If you would like any further advice on lawn care or would like to talk to us about your order, please contact us on 01392 231040 or email sales@wesellturf.com

Seeding large areas

If you have an area of around 500 square metres to seed by all means call us. We may be able to sell you a bag or two of seed if we have enough stock for our current requirements, however we would not be able to sell part of a bag. If we can’t spare any at that time we will suggest trying Mole Valley Farmers who sell a lawn seed mixture, or search online. There is a good chance that their price will be lower than ours so you may like to try them first.

Where to buy small amounts

For patches or small areas to seed, garden centres and even supermarkets (in season) sell boxes of grass seed. The box should tell you the seed mixture, coverage and instructions. We generally use 25% ryegrass and 75% a mixture of fescues. It varies a little from year to year but a mixture like that will look very similar to our turf. Even if you put down seed which is a little different from this proportion, over time it will all look the same as the grass plants grow and spread. It is definitely not crucial to get precisely the same seed.

How much will I need?

When sprinkling seed with your hands you will need about 35g per square metre. If you have such a large area you are using a tractor and seed drill you could reduce it down to 20g per square metre.

The advice on the RHS website is very helpful, you can find our more here – https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=424

We supply quality turf all year round. If you would like any further advice on winter lawn care or would like to talk to us about your order, please contact us on 01392 231040 or email sales@wesellturf.com

After a smaller scale campaign in 2019 we started planning for the 2020 Golden Spade Award in the winter months. We visited Stallcombe House in Woodbury and met staff and residents who have an amazing community which is a life line to adults with a learning disability and autism, and their families. This cemented our resolve to support them with a donation and publicity. We pledged £1 from us at HCT Turf to Stallcombe House for each garden photo sent to us from Devon residents.

A resident of Stallcombe House with produce grown in their garden

With this fantastic local cause to support we planned to reach out to our customers and all types of gardening groups and businesses to get involved in June.

And then Coronavirus happened. Like everyone, this rather stopped us in our tracks.

But after some thought we realised that this campaign would actually be a great thing for people at this difficult time. With many people at home more, clearly gardening was an important activity, physically and mentally, and sharing the results of all this work would be a great pleasure.

So after Lockdown was announced in March and then the beautiful weather looked set to stay we made the last minute decision to open up entries for the Golden Spade Award 2020 earlier than planned in the last week of April, running until the end of May.

Entries

Throughout the campaign we had a steady stream of entries and shared the uplifting images of Devon gardens on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. In total around 50 photos were submitted, but through our online community many more people were reached and hopefully took as much pleasure from the glorious views as we did.

The Winner

Once entries closed on 31^st May we had the challenge of selecting our favourite for the Best of Devon Hamper and trophy. From a shortlist of 6 beauties we whittled it down to Lee and Kathy’s tranquil looking garden in East Devon to win the 2020 Golden Spade Award. Now that outdoor visits are permitted it was an absolute delight to be able see their garden at first hand with the excuse of delivering their prize.

Lee commented:

“Our garden can be extremely hard work at times, but it’s times like these that we appreciate our garden all the more. When the work is done, we are rewarded with lovely colours especially in the autumn when our winning photo was taken. We are still buzzing after winning the Golden Spade Award for 2020 and would like to thank HCT Turf for their kindness and generosity.”

Best of Devon Hamper Prize

We were thrilled with the response from Devon based producers of fine foods and drinks to support us with a range of donations for a winner’s hamper.

Dartmoor Distillery at Newton Abbot provided a 70cl bottle of their Black Dog Gin. Otter Brewery near Honiton donated a bottle of their popular Otter Ale. Utopian Brewing at Bow contributed four cans of their local lagers and a branded glass to really enjoy it in the proper style! Waterhouse Fayre at Burlescombe delivered a bagful of goodies: pickled onions, 2 jars of jam and 2 jars of fruit preserve. Our neighbours Good Game in Topsham donated their chorizo and charcuterie platter. And Four Elms Fruit Farm at Newton Poppleford gave bottles of their Devonshire apple juice and Devon Roots cider.

Donation to Stallcombe House

It’s also time for us to send our donation to Stallcombe House. Originally, we set this at £1 per entry but for this year have decided to increase it to £5 per entry, a total of £255 to Stallcombe House.

Amanda Greenaway, Head of Charity at Stallcombe House, filled us in on how they have been affected by Covid-19:

“Thank you so much for your donation, we really do appreciate it. We plan to spend the money on a cuddle curtain for our residents. We went into lockdown even before it officially began on 23 March because our residents are so vulnerable. So they have not been off site in all this time and haven’t seen their families. We hope that next month visits may be possible with the aid of a cuddle curtain so that residents can experience the loving cuddles they yearn for without risk of infection. Seeing their families through a screen just wouldn’t work because they don’t fully understand the situation and why they must avoid contact.

“Activities here have been massively affected; for months now none of our normal pastimes like swimming and visits to coffee shops have been possible. We have had to be creative with new ideas on site to try and keep interest and spirits up.

“Normally our permanent staff are regularly joined here by agency workers. But measures taken in light of Covid-19 mean that is not possible at the moment and together with some self isolation this has meant our team have been working tremendously hard.

“Of course we do have the benefit of a large and beautiful site here where it is a pleasure to live and work. But it is hard to understate how much we long for a return to normality.”

We have thoroughly enjoyed seeing the incredible hard work and talent of Devon’s gardeners that we wouldn’t ordinarily. It’s definitely something that we would like to continue in future years. Hopefully all of this year’s participants plus many more will submit a photo when we come back for the 2021 Golden Spade Award.

Although the unique conditions this year have highlighted the benefits of gardening, of course we desperately hope that 2021 brings a return to normality and we can celebrate that when we reach out to our gardening friends next time.

In the meantime our sincere thanks to everyone involved, all the gardeners who took the trouble to contact us and especially the companies who have donated to the Best of Devon Hamper.