Report on the talk "A year in the life of a Multi-Season Showman"

Darren Everest: A year in the life of a Multi-Season Showman

On Tuesday 3rd March, the hall was full for Darren Everest’s talk. Darren comes from the Isle of Wight and has been growing award-winning flowers for forty years. It was a huge thrill to see his gold medal from Chelsea Flower Show displayed in its presentation box. He grows a bit of everything, but his main loves are daffodils, dahlias, chrysanthemums and sweet peas.

His gardening year starts in October when his daffodil bulbs arrive. We winced when he told us that special bulbs for show quality daffodils cost about £2.50 each, never do so well in their second year, so are treated as annuals by competitive growers. He plants his first batch of sweet pea seeds in mid-October into well-soaked seed trays, which are not watered again until germination. He recommended covering the trays with some form of mesh to keep out mice, which love these seeds and can easily crunch their way through an entire crop.

November and December are all about lifting dahlias for winter storage, pricking out sweet peas in preparation for Chelsea Flower Show and sowing more seeds for a succession of exhibitions and events. He grows approximately 4500 sweet peas!

Dahlia cuttings are taken in February and March. They root easily, so he takes plenty, sometimes up to 3000. By March, the daffodils are flowering ready for spring show season. The year is starting to get very busy.

In April, May and June, his life is a balancing act of when to plant out, when to prune, and how to coax capricious flowers to be at their best when they are needed. Dahlias are dependable, but sweet peas are very weather-dependent and can’t be relied upon to flower to order. Droughts and heatwaves cause spikes and troughs in plant growth patterns, changes in behaviour of wildlife and unexpected setbacks. When the rabbit population ran out of grass in the heat of last summer, they invaded his polytunnel for fresh greens and ate through his young dahlias.

Darren first exhibited at Chelsea in 2023 and was awarded a silver-gilt medal and shortlisted for Plant of the Year. In 2024, he was awarded gold and met the King. He sells seeds at Chelsea and loves the fact that they travel all over the world. Gardeners in America, Canada, Kazakhstan and Jordan are all growing his flowers.

Throughout the summer, Darren supports as many shows as he can, from the big national ones to the small village events. He illustrated his talk with a slideshow of his beautiful flowers in all seasons of the year.

By the end of his year, in October, when he had battled the heat and the drought, and show season was over, his dahlias finally looked magnificent - - - just in time for the whole cycle to start again.

The Flower of the Month competition was won by Jo Lobnitz with a beautiful black hellebore.