Open garden at Home Farm, in Ryhall, near Stamford, raises thousands for National Garden Scheme charity

A husband and wife have once again raised thousands for charity as visitors flocked to catch a glimpse of their garden.

Karen and Steve Bourne opened the gates to Home Farm, in Ryhall, to more than 300 visitors on Saturday and Sunday.

The couple have spent the past 16 years developing their garden and six years ago began opening it to the public to raise money for the National Garden Scheme charity.

The scheme gives access to more than 3,500 private gardens across the UK, while supporting organisations such as Marie Curie, Macmillan Cancer Support, Hospice UK, The Queen’s Nursing Institute and Parkinson’s UK.

This year, Karen and Steve raised about £2,500 for the charity.

Karen said: “It was wonderful to see so many people visiting the garden, seeing the new features and enjoying tea and cake.

“The roses have been fantastic this year; they’ve loved the dry conditions, and we adopted a new pruning technique which has been successful.”

Visitors were treated to about 120 different roses in bloom, including the striped fuchsia and white-petalled King’s rose unveiled by rose breeder David Austin at the Chelsea Flower Show in May.

There was also a newly created herbaceous ‘hot bed.

The couple will continue with open garden groups by arrangement for the rest of the month.