Peat-free preferences

Val explains why she prefers plants in peat-free media

- Val Bourne

I’VE been at Spring Cottage since November 2005 and it’s only the third proper garden I’ve made since 1978. All three gardens have been very different, but they’ve all been completely empty of plants on my arrival. My first proper garden was a north-facing Northamptonshire plot with wonderful views across a sloping landscape where sheep grazed and cuckoos called.

My children grew up there and I enjoyed the north-facing aspect because it was sheltered from easterly and westerly winds. The shade cast by the tall stone cottage suited ferns and woodlanders. The soil was free-draining, because it had been cultivated for hundreds of years, and there was a small, very sheltered south-facing garden on the other side of the cottage, complete with a functional well covered in honeysuckle.