Page 64 - Simply Vegetables Summer 2023

Welsh Section
IVOR MACE
Our AGM was in March, and all positions were filled. We are now looking forward to our branch championships at the National Museum of History, St Fagan’s, nr Cardiff CF5 6XB, check out their website.
Our championships coincide with their food festival and the show is set in the atrium as you enter the museum, St Fagan’s is a museum like no other, buildings from all over Wales have been dismantled and re-erected in 50 acres of parkland. Our show schedule will be ready soon, but not in time for this issue. Past exhibitors will receive a copy by post, and anyone who would like a copy can ring Arwyn Edwards on 07974519962 and he’ll send you a copy.
Admission to the museum is free with a small car parking charge. A social evening has been arranged at Glamorgan Wanderers RFU clubhouse, at Memorial
Ground, Sterling Road, Ely, Cardiff CF5 4SR. I’m looking forward to it and looking forward to seeing everybody and I assure you, you will be made most welcome.
We have lost our past president, Roy Tudor, Roy was loved by us all. He was quite well until a fall in the garden caused problems that at 95 years, he couldn’t
get over. I have lost one of my very best friends of 50 years. Besides his love for vegetables, Roy bred Dahlias and prefixed his new creations with Trelyn, the Welsh name for his village Fleur de Lis; of course, he found the sport of Kiwi Gloria, much loved by Dahlia Exhibitors. We have also lost another Welsh Branch member John Wheatland from Kidwelly.
We have had a big disappointment at the cancelation of the horticultural section at the Royal Welsh Show, we were all set to put up a display of vegetables. It’s such
a shame they delayed till mid-April before cancelling. OK they’ve saved the cost of the marquee, but we’ve all spent a small fortune on heating and lighting. Last year we fund raised a considerable amount at the show, this year it will be zero. This is our main concern now; opportunities for fund raising are becoming difficult to come by.
Although January, February and March were not as cold as December, thankfully as we would have been paying even more on heating and lighting. These first three months of the year were very wet and dark, and generally, my plants are a little behind schedule. This was compounded by me running the greenhouse at 8°c instead of the usual 10°c at night. I’m sure things will soon catch up.
I hope you all have a good growing season and enjoy your gardening.
Obituary – Royden George Tudor
Roy was born in Fleur-de-Lis nr Blackwood, Gwent, 5th March 1928, died 29th March 2023 age 95 years. Service at St David’s Church, Fleur- de-Lis, and internment at Gelligaer Cemetery on 18th April 2023.
Roy lived all of his life in the same house in Victoria Road Fleur-de-lis. He joined the NVS in 1968. In those days we were in the Midland Branch. When the Welsh Branch was formed in 1981 Roy became a committee member, and has been ever since. He was on the judge’s selection committee of
the Welsh Branch and Judged and stewarded at our championships every year until last year. Roy judged the National in every Branch. He helped train and mentor new judges.
He gave good support to both the Gwent & Glamorgan DA’s. He was a past president of the Welsh Branch.
Roy valued his horticultural friends and regularly visited me here in my garden and my place of work. He visited Charles & Mary Maisey. He loved his visits to Jim Thompson and Alan Hopkins allotments and Graham Carey’s dahlia garden. He accompanied many of us to various flower shows. He supported all the local shows in South Wales, either exhibiting or judging. He judged our show in Ynyswen for 44 years.
Roy attended horticultural college when he was aged 52. City & Guilds awarded him the silver medal for the outstanding student of the year in
all of GB. He worked on the surface of Penallta Colliery until its closure, and as a ground and sports field maintenance team leader with Gwent County Council until his retirement.
Roy only gave up his driving licence about 3 years ago when his eyesight started to deteriorate, He was active until recently and until about 2 weeks before his death when a fall caused hospitalisation.
I met Roy circa 1970 at Risca Mineworkers Flower Show. We’ve been friends ever since. He was a great horticulturalist and an even better human being. I will miss him dearly.
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64 Simply Vegetables