Gardener in Tarleton

Tarleton parish is a good deal bigger than the village that names it: 5,377 acres taking in Mere Brow, Sollom on the A59 and Holmes on the A565. The old village sits on a low strip of slightly higher riverside land, described in the county history as loam and moss over clay, with Tarleton Moss to the north and Sollom Moss to the south. Both are reclaimed peat, and the quality of that former mossland soil is why market gardening, salad crops above all, became the industry here. Out on the moss the lanes run long and straight and are named Meanygate, carrying farms and smallholdings rather than estates.

The parish splits two ways on water. Tarleton village drains east and north into the River Douglas, locally the Asland, which runs three miles of the parish boundary and is tidal below Tarleton Lock; the lock cannot be worked until the tide clears the lower cill, and it carries a second, higher set of tail gates to hold out exceptional tides. Mere Brow sits on the far side of that divide, its name recording it as the most northerly settlement on Martin Mere. The wind is westerly off the estuary all year, and the woodland blocks nearer the coast are wind-sculpted with it.

• The first question on a Tarleton quote is which side of the village the garden is on. The old riverside strip is loam and moss over clay; Tarleton Moss to the north and Sollom Moss to the south are reclaimed peat, and peat is superb ground handled at the right moisture and punishing when it is not. It compacts underfoot when wet, shrinks and hardens as it dries, and peat dried too far can refuse to take water back up. We test before feeding or liming rather than assuming.
• Plots here are not estate-shaped. Off the Meanygates and the banked lanes the gardens run long and deep, backing onto arable ground or onto a ditch, and a ditch on the boundary is usually the householder's own responsibility as a riparian owner. Clearing the bank and keeping the growth down is gardening. Altering the watercourse itself is not: Lancashire County Council is the lead local flood authority for ordinary watercourses, and consent comes from them first.
• There is very little shelter to work with. The ground is flat, low-lying and open, the prevailing wind comes in off the estuary, and it blows hardest through the winter half of the year from October to March. Hedges go one-sided, new shelter planting leans, and anchorage on the moss is poor because peat gives roots so little to hold. Winter work up here is as much staking, tying in and taking the wind side back as it is tidying.

The yard is on Green Lane in Ormskirk, about nine miles south, so Tarleton is the far end of the round rather than a drop-in: we group jobs up here onto one day, which is worth a little more notice when you book. Tarleton and Holmes run straight into Hesketh Bank along the A59, so a day up here usually takes in all three. We work across Burscough, Rufford and Hesketh Bank too — send a postcode and we will tell you either way.