I love Wentworth Castle Gardens because it has a huge important history.
It's a grade one listed landscape and there aren't many of those around in South Yorkshire.
I grew up in this area and I spent my life visiting this garden so I feel really privileged to be able to work here.
The site is owned by Barnsley Council but the National Trust have a lease for 25 years.
And we're doing many major works to improve the ecology of the site, to increase the wildlife,
but also to get the local population involved with the site.
Wentworth Castle Gardens was at the forefront of garden and landscape design in the 18th century,
and it still has an awful lot of the original features that were created by Thomas and William Wentworth in the 18th century.
We're at one of the most prominent features of Wentworth Castle Gardens, the castle.
The estate was created in the 18th century. In 1708 Thomas Wentworth bought
the small estate as it was quite then because he hadn't inherited Wentworth Woodhouse
which was the neighbouring estate that he expected to inherit. So he bought the nearest estate and
created something even bigger and better to really upset his cousin.
One of the things that he created was a castle here on the site on the top of the hill right
at the top of the estate. Originally there would have been no trees around it so that
everybody could see the castle. And it was all about showing that the family had history here,
made up obviously. But people came from far and wide to see it. The four square towers that were
created around the curtain wall they say that each one was named after the four children
that Thomas Wentworth had. The tower that we're next to now is thought to have been
the one named after William his son, who then inherited the estate when Thomas died.
Wentworth Castle Gardens is quite unusual within the trust because we're in a partnership with
Barnsley Council and the Northern College. It's a true partnership so we work together all the time.
So we're working with local people in Barnsley centre. We're bringing them
out into the gardens. And we're doing lots of different projects with them,
and we also work with the students here at the Northern College.
Wentworth Castle Gardens is special for a whole number of reasons, but the main reason
you're here today is to look at our collection of rhododendrons. The rhododendron collection started here
in about the 1870s. It was very fashionable in the Victorian era to collect plants from all over the world
and display them in your garden. We've got our first written record of rhododendrons
being planted here at Wentworth in the 1870s. And from then on every subsequent owner or
head gardener has added to the collections. So we have a huge variety, mainly hardy hybrids because
we are in the north of England so the weather can be a bit hard here. But they really love it here
and we've got a whole host of varieties. We've even got the national collection here.
From a distance they look very similar but when you get close up each of the flowers are very individual,.
We have a process of reducing the size of some of them on about a three, four year basis
because they can overtake everything. They respond really well to being cut back
and it helps with their flowering a couple of years later. So rhododendrons like acid soil so we
have plenty of that here which is why they do so well. They're quite happy in semi shade and sun.
A few of them are really quite happy in shade actually. Propagating can take quite a long time,
and they're better grown from seed which can take 10, 20 years for them to come into flower.
But it's well worth it if you get some really unusual varieties. And one of our gardeners here
is a specialist on the rhododendrons. And she has been propagating rhododendrons for the last 20, 30 years.
And so has created some really brilliant specimens which are in the garden now.
The way that the garden has been laid out is we've tried to restore some of the garden to the
original layout as it was in the 18th century, but the avenues have got rhododendrons down the side
so it leads your eye and it leads your walking path towards different features in the garden.
The gardens feel even more alive at this time of year because the flowers are absolutely
buzzing with insects. The birds are even happier because there's lots of insects for them to eat.
So you can hear them all the time chattering away very happy. The visitors are always
very happy no matter what the weather because the blooms are just so cheerful.
And there's such a variety of sizes and colours that there's something for
everyone and it just feels very vibrant and very exciting at this time of year.