New nursery acquisition at world-famous Bodnant Garden will help secure living collection for next 150 years

The large glass nursery, acquired in late 2023 and located adjacent to the garden, has undergone many months of essential refurbishment work to prepare it for use by the garden team.

It will provide four times the current on-site nursery capacity to enable the garden team to propagate and protect Bodnant Garden’s significant plant collection, including the 20th-century rhododendron hybrids bred in the garden that are not available elsewhere. Although the nursery will not be open to visitors, the plants grown inside will, in time, be planted in the garden for all to enjoy.

The nursery will not only continue the legacy of Bodnant Garden itself, but also the legacy of the McLaren and Puddle families, whose horticultural skills have given us the garden we know today.

The nursery opening comes as the National Trust celebrates 150 years since the estate was purchased by industrialist and chemist Henry Davis Pochin, and 75 years since Henry McLaren, 2nd Lord Aberconway, donated the garden to the National Trust.

Ned Lomax, Head Gardener at Bodnant Garden said: “The legacy of any gardener is that many of the trees and shrubs we nurture and plant today will not reach maturity in our own lifetimes. We do what we do now to enable future generations to sit below the branches of these amazing plants, enjoying them for many years to come, and hopefully into the next 150 years at Bodnant Garden.

“The nursery is the engine room of any garden, and this new area will provide Bodnant with four times the amount of space of the previous nursery. It will mean that the team are able to propagate and care for many rare hybrids that simply aren’t available elsewhere.”

Bodnant Garden, situated in the Conwy Valley, has a vast and diverse collection of highly significant plants amongst its 80 acres of historic formal and woodland garden. It is famous for its rare and exotic plants, five National Collections and Wales’ largest collection of UK Champion trees. However, it is the rhododendron hybrids bred at the garden that are particularly important to the garden’s story, and to its future development.

Many of the Bodnant hybrid rhododendrons are known to have died out over the last century. Of the 350 varieties that were named and registered, it’s estimated that only 125 varieties are still in existence. Many of these are only represented by one or two ageing plants in the garden at Bodnant, so propagating and replanting these is crucial to conserve the living collection.

During the winter of 2023, Bodnant’s expert garden team began the process to propagate 65 of the rhododendrons most at risk. The dormant flower buds were gathered and, along with all the necessary legal paperwork, were sent to a micro propagation laboratory in Cornwall for dissection and processing.

Once the tiny new plants are weened out of their test tubes, they will be delivered to the new nursery for growing on. It can take five or six years before a new plant is ready for introduction to the garden. However, in the meantime, should a parent plant succumb to drought or storm damage, its genetic material or ‘bloodline’ will be secure.

It's hoped that the new nursery will enable Bodnant Garden to carry out the entire propagation process for these varieties and many more on site, safeguarding them for future generations to enjoy.

The new nursery would not have been possible without a generous gift from the late Bodnant Garden volunteer Dr Rees-Jones. It is thanks to the generosity of visitors, National Trust members and volunteers that this type of work can continue, now and into the future.

Carolyn Samuel, Gifts in Wills Manager for National Trust Cymru, said: “Many of the team at Bodnant will have known and fondly remember Dr Rees-Jones who volunteered in the garden. His generous gift to the garden left in his will has allowed Bodnant to acquire the new nursery and continue the work of propagation on site together with all the exciting future work that this will enable.”