Hocus Crocus Gardens & Trees · Boroughbridge, North Yorkshire
Gardeners and Tree Surgeons in Boroughbridge
Rated 4.5 from 19 Google reviews
Hocus Crocus Gardens & Trees works as a gardener and tree surgeon in Boroughbridge, and on this side of the patch the job usually starts with water. The town exists because the Normans rerouted Dere Street to cross the River Ure at a more convenient point, and the settlement that grew up around the new bridge became the borough on the bridge. Build a town around a river crossing and you get gardens that sit low, close to the water table, on ground that has been flooding for a very long time.
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Waterlogged lawns and ground that will not drain
Properties south of the river, including Fishergate, High Street, Back Lane and St Helena, sit inside the Environment Agency flood warning area for the River Ure at Boroughbridge. The highest level recorded at the Boroughbridge station is 15.79 metres, on 26 September 2012. You do not need a full flood to have the problem either. A lawn that stands in water for days after heavy rain loses its grass to moss and rush, and a border that stays saturated rots roots from below.
What we do about it is unglamorous and it works. Rake the moss and rush out of a sodden lawn, top dress with a sharper mix so water can get away instead of sitting on the surface, then overseed or re-turf once the ground is draining again. Where a lawn genuinely cannot be recovered we lift it and re-lay it on ground dug over, improved and re-levelled first, rather than patching over the problem. Our lawn mowing and turfing page sets out how that work is done, using premium turf with bespoke edging.
Just had some more gardening work and trees done by Karen and her team. New lawn laid at back and borders altered to make life easier. Realistically priced for a full days work. Such a professional eye to detail. Asked them to maintain my garden monthly. Great.
Marilyn G.
Google review
Silt, raised beds and plants that forgive wet ground
After the water goes down there is silt. It caps the soil surface and seals it, so air and rain stop getting through and everything underneath struggles. The first job after a wet winter in Boroughbridge is often breaking and clearing that crust rather than planting anything at all. From there the sensible answer is to stop fighting the level: raised beds lift the root zone clear of the worst of it, and a planting list chosen for ground that floods will still be alive after a bad February.
Plants we use on wet Boroughbridge ground include dogwood, willow, alder and guelder rose for structure, with astilbe, hosta, ligularia, iris sibirica and marsh marigold lower down. Lawns and edges get the drainage work, borders get the plant choice, and where a garden really does go under every winter we say so and design around it instead of selling a scheme that will drown. Our garden design page covers the full process.
More about Boroughbridge
Old trees, old stones and the villages around the town
Boroughbridge was a Great North Road coaching town, roughly halfway between London and Edinburgh, and at its peak the Crown alone had stabling for a hundred horses. The long plots and inn yards off the High Street still carry the mature trees that came with that era, which is why so much of the work here is crown reduction, crown lifting and deadwooding rather than planting. All tree surgery is carried out to BS 3998 by an NPTC approved team, and we give you guidance on the TPO or conservation area notice you need first.
Just west of the town, near where the A168 crosses the Ure, stand the Devil's Arrows: three aligned late Neolithic or early Bronze Age standing stones, scheduled by Historic England, and among the largest stones of any alignment in Britain. Aldborough on the edge of town is the site of the Roman walled town of Isurium Brigantum on Dere Street. We cover the villages around all of it, Aldborough, Minskip, Roecliffe, Staveley, Copgrove and Ferrensby included. South west of here, Harrogate, Knaresborough, Nidderdale and the surrounding villages are where most of our work is, so a Boroughbridge job and a Harrogate job often fall in the same week. The whole patch is listed on our areas we cover page.
Before and after
Jobs we have finished
Karen's own photographs from recent jobs.
Other towns we cover
- Harrogate
- Killinghall
- Knaresborough
- Hampsthwaite and Birstwith
- Ripon
- Summerbridge
- Wetherby
- Every area we cover
- Aldborough
- Minskip
- Roecliffe
- Staveley
- Copgrove
- Ferrensby
- Skelton-on-Ure
- Bishop Monkton
Not answered here? Call Karen on 07816 779 064.
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