What are our gardeners doing this month? - November 2020

November would normally see our cemeteries and memorials full of people ahead of Remembrance Sunday and Armistice Day. While things are different this year, our staff remain busy.

Throughout the autumn one of our gardeners’ main tasks in the northern hemisphere is planting up, to prepare our horticulture for the coming year.

The borders which run along the rows of headstones are planted with a wide range of alpine and herbaceous plants.

In France, as in other parts of the world, we face increasingly sporadic weather patterns, leading us to adapt to the uncertain climate. Although we have had a wet autumn this year we also had a very hot and dry spring and this has taken its toll on the planting.

To better face up to these changes we sometimes adjust and adapt the planting schemes using our experience of plants which have been successful as well as introducing new better species and cultivars which can survive the changes.

This year in France more than 49,000 plants were ordered from our supplier and our teams across the country have replanted nearly 9km worth of borders in cemeteries, topping up soil, adding compost and manure and dividing and splitting existing plants where possible.

Autumn is the best time of year to do this as there is some heat in the soil and there is the chance of some growth before the winter cold. Planting in autumn also gives plants a better chance of establishment particularly if we continue with the dry springs we have experienced in Northern Europe it’s a really good time to divide and replant at home too.

In Turkey, gardeners are undertaking some of the annual remedial work that helps our turf stay green for the important commemorative events held on Anzac Day, 25 April such as here at Lone Pine Cemetery in Gallipoli, Turkey.

We don’t use irrigation in our sites in Turkey and the sites here are in a transition climatic zone. As there are cool season and warm season grasses, staff are over-seeding the lawns with cool season grasses to help replenish what has naturally died off over the summer.

By planting seed again now the weather has cooled, after scarifying and aerating the ground, they can encourage new growth ready for next April. These cool season grasses will start to die off as the temperatures rise in late spring and the warm season grasses take over again.