Programme of Events

Now that the pandemic restrictions have been lifted, we still wish to ensure the safety of our members so various precautions and changes will continue. Click here to see updated precautions from 25th June 2022.

All lectures are 1:45pm unless otherwise shown. Anyone is welcome. Meeting fees apply. They are preceded by an introduction and discussion session at 11am as described in "What We Do" on the home page.	Meetings are at Corse and Staunton Village Hall, Gloucester Road, Corse, Gloucestershire, GL19 3RQ. Click here for Corse Village Hall website
Click here to see an archive listing of previous lectures and other events

Saturday, 25th January 2025: Why Wait for Spring!

Presenter: Helen Picton
Helen, one of our own members, runs The Picton Nursery with husband Ross Barbour and her parents. She was practically born on the potting shed bench and after a degree in Botany it was inevitable that she was drawn back home to be the third generation looking after the nursery. Though renowned for their National Collection of 'Michaelmas Daisies' the seasons are extended magnificently with rare and beautiful treasures underplanting the gardens. Helen will inspire us to get out there and make it happen for us!

Saturday, 22nd February 2025: Gardening at Kiftsgate

Presenter: Mrs Anne Chambers
Kiftsgate Court has been gardened by three generations of women gardeners. The gardens were laid out in the 1920s turning a bare and challenging hill-top site into one of Britain's loveliest gardens. Anne will discuss Kiftsgate's creation and her contribution to the garden's development.

Saturday, 29th March 2025: From Cang Shan to Balang Shan: Plant Hunting in Western China

Presenter: Duncan Coombs
Duncan lectured for 30 years in Decorative Horticulture at Pershore College following a degree in Botany. His talk features a recent plant hunting trip in the Himalayas finding a complete range of plants from alpine gems to lowland beauties such as rosa species. And Duncan is now a member of our group too.

Saturday, 26th April 2025: Organic Gardening: Happy Plants, Happy Minds

Presenter: Nicola Hope
After leaving school Nikki studied Fine Art at Cardiff but longed for the university holidays when she worked as an assistant gardener at Highgrove for HRH Prince of Wales. She went on to study Organic Horticulture, becoming an RHS Master of Horticulture. She has been Head Gardener in some amazing private gardens and runs a plant led garden design company. A vibrant and inspirational speaker.

Saturday, 31st May 2025: Do Your Roots Need Doing?

Presenter: Andrew Mikolajski
Good root growth is essential for healthy and productive plants. How can you be sure your plants are performing well under ground when you can't even see them? Andrew was a horticultural adviser on the new edition of the RHS A–Z Encyclopedia of Garden Plants and more recently on a revision of the RHS Encyclopedia of Plants and Flowers. He taught garden design and RHS certificate at Warwickshire College, and garden history at the English Gardening School.

Saturday, 28th June 2025: Morton Hall Garden - Hints and Tips from a Head Gardener

Presenter: Oli Johnson
Oli will talk to us about aiming for perfection in our gardens, bringing his knowledge, expertise and flair to share and using examples such as roses, clematis and potwork at Morton Hall.

Saturday, 26th July 2025: Plants for Shade and Woodland

Presenter: Dr Timothy Walker
In this talk Timothy will address those problem areas of the garden where the sun does not shine for some, or all, of the day. This talk looks at which plants can be grown in the five different types of shade in a variety of different soils such as dry or damp. All the plants are suitable for a small garden. It also looks at woodlands around the world that have given us so many good garden plants.
Timothy needs no introduction, having enthralled and delighted us with his erudition and enthusiasm over the years. He is a lecturer in Plant Sciences at Oxford University and a Fellow of The Linnaean Society.

Saturday, 30th August 2025: Chilean Plants and Conservation

Presenter: Martin Gardner
Martin worked at the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh as co-ordinator of the International Conifer Conservation Programme. Part of his work has been to establish one of the world's most comprehensive networks for the ex situ conservation of threatened conifers. Ex-situ conservation of plants may involve a range a methods, including seed banking, cryopreservation or through the establishment of living collections.

Saturday, 27th September 2025: A History of Garden Plants in Twelve Shrubs

Presenter: Dr Julian Sutton
How garden plants reached us, told through twelve shrubs. Very diverse, not an exhausting, exhaustive bio-piece on the turn-of-the-last-century 'plant hunters', though they inevitably get a mention.
Julian Sutton has been a lifelong plantsman and until recently ran Desirable Plants nursery in Devon with his wife Sarah. He will be bringing plants to sell.

Saturday, 25th October 2025: Preparing for Spring and Best Ever Borders

Presenter: Tamsin Westhorpe
Tamsin will share insights in her inimitable style into maintaining a thriving plantsman's oasis, including stories and history behind Stockton Bury's diverse plant collections. Having edited a national gardening magazine for many years Tamsin is now curator and gardener at Stockton Bury Gardens in Herefordshire.

Saturday, 29th November 2025: Gardens are mostly about sex, death and deliciousness...(Celebrity Lecture - ticketed event)

Presenter: James Alexander-Sinclair
James Alexander-Sinclair FSGD is one of the foremost garden designers in the United Kingdom. He has designed gardens from Cornwall to the Western Isles and from London to Moscow. He served ten years as a member of the Council of the Royal Horticultural Society. He is an RHS Vice-President, RHS Ambassador and was awarded the Veitch Memorial Medal for outstanding contribution to horticulture in 2022. Passionate about Horatio's Garden. Expect fireworks!

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Western Counties Group of the Hardy Plant Society