Burrow Farm In Autumn

There’s something singularly magical about a garden so in tune with nature that a passing butterfly settles on your hand, wings aquiver, before joining other tortoiseshells feasting on eupatorium. But, as startling as it may seem to newcomers, it is no surprise to Mary Benger who has tamed the farm’s verdant pastures to create this outstanding garden. ‘As I’ve added more and more plants, bees, butterflies and birds have flocked here — now it’s not unusual for people to come just to bird watch,’ she says. Visitors are spoilt for choice in this 10-acre garden and woodland, and never more so than in early autumn as dawn breaks with a blaze of gold above the distant hills and valleys of the undulating Devon landscape.