Throat Farm July 2020

We re-visited Throat Farm on Exmoor last night. This little cottage has stood in the ‘throat’ of the Harthanger Wood valley near Luxborough for hundreds of years, changing hands between farmers abode to farm workers digs and today a wonderful pair, who saw the potential of the location, call it home.

As you wind down the long gravel drive the little pink cottage is surrounded by native woodland and species rich grassland harbouring orchids, rare perennials and Common Blue butterflies.

We set to work last April on the landscape, crafting seating areas, plumbing the downpipes into stone troughs and retaining the steeper slopes in the vernacular ditching stone of the moor.

The final touch was to mix plug plants with a bespoke seed mix, which suited to the soil, aspect and the desire for a wild garden similar to what was found when the property was acquired.

Yesterday evening, as the sun spread long shadows from the Harthanger wood above, this is what one year of growth had achieved.