SPRING is in the air at Seaton Delaval Hall. It’s an unseasonably warm late January day, with the temperature nudging into double figures.
The balmy weather has set the birds twittering, and following from what has been a mild winter.
In Seaton Delaval Hall’s walled garden the 18 community allotments are showing positive signs of life with leeks and onions, lush dark green winter and purply red cabbages, Brussels sprouts and even new growth on some of the herbs.
Seaton Delaval Hall is one of more than 20 National Trust properties that run allotments, gardens and orchards on or near their sites.
It’s a year since these plots at the property, were first measured out, dug and offered to local groups.
Now it’s not unusual to see pupils from New Delaval Primary School sowing, digging, weeding and harvesting alongside members of the Whitley Women Community Choir, Escape Family Support or the Northumberland County Blind Association.
Another 10 community plots are being planned for the 1.5 hectare walled garden that can trace its roots back to the 18th Century and which once met many of the culinary needs of generations of the Delaval and then the Astley families.
There are other schemes as grand as the Sir John Vanbrugh designed surroundings to help bring the walled garden back to life and help people of all ages and backgrounds reconnect with the food chain.
It is proposed to replant heritage fruit trees to the exact layout shown on old maps; introduce bees and bugs; improve the old orchard with its apples, pears and plums and sow a wild flower garden to attract insects.
In the long term, it is hoped to restore the derelict but no less impressive orangery and 20th Century glass house that stand within the walled garden.
Some of the work will be funded by Greggs the Bakers, which has donated money to the community kitchen garden to mark Sir Michael Darrington’s 26 years as the firm’s managing director.
Cash has already been spent on a garden hub where National Trust volunteers and allotment-holders alike can meet and pass the time of day as well as seeds, tools, paths, pergolas and rabbit proofing. A potting bench and greenhouse are in the pipeline.
The transformation is being overseen by the new gardener Debbie Crombie, who joined the team at the end of October last year.
A mother of two teenagers, she is passionate about introducing children to the delights of being in the outdoors and gardening (as she was herself by her father growing up in Sunderland).
One of her first tasks has been to pull together a week’s worth of fun gardening and growing events for the half-term between February 11-19.
Activities will include making a bug box to attract ladybirds and solitary bees as well as other beneficial insects to help keep your garden healthy; growing a living salad box to take home; sowing a wildflower pot; making a grass head and sowing a multi-seed tray that can be planted in the spring in the hall’s new bee area, work on which will begin in earnest over the Easter holidays.
Other foodie related events later in the year will see a spring plant fair in April, nature’s garden activities over the school summer holidays, a harvest festival in September and gathering and preserving in October.
That’s not to mention a special Queen’s Diamond Jubilee themed tea party on June 4 and a Georgian banquet planned for late September.
In the 18th Century the Delavals were famed for their fabulous feasts and lavish entertainments, especially over the festive period.
That was at a time when all but the most exotic foods would have been gathered from the Delaval estate and surrounding area. Seasonality was paramount and food miles would have amounted to the few paces it took to walk from the walled garden to the hall’s kitchen.
Even the aristocracy who never had to dirty their hands, would have been in tune with where there food was coming from.
It’s a connection we have lost with ingredients being flown half-way around the world and once seasonal delicacies like strawberries available 365 days of the year.