Sandringham Estate garden competition. Winner of the King George VI Challenge Cup is Colin Wood at York Lodge. Here Mr Wood is pictured with his wife Amy and 18 month old son George. Picture: Ian Burt.

For many people, having two children and four dogs would be a recipe for disaster when trying to prepare a beautiful garden for the Sandringham estate Cottage Garden Competition.

To send a link to this page to a friend, simply enter their email address below.

The message will include the name and email address you gave us when you signed up.

Email address

  Send link

To send a link to this page to a friend, you must be logged in.

But Colin Wood is celebrating after winning the King George VI Challenge Cup for the best cropped, cultivated and kept estate cottage garden for the first time – despite his boys 18-month-old George and Adam, 11, tearing around his garden regularly.

The father-of-two, who lives in Sandringham, said: “It is a family garden, so I don’t know how we manage to maintain it because we spend a lot of time out there as a family.

“Having said that, both my wife and I have put in a lot of hard work over the past year which, combined with the garden maturing, has, in my opinion, helped us win.

“It is really nice to have won this competition for the first time after being runner up a few times before and I’ve got plenty of years ahead of me to keep winning it.”

Mr Wood, 34, has prepared his garden with wife Amy for the competition for the past 10 years – seven years from his current home and three years from the family’s previous home in West Newton.

He continued: “The rose garden is the bit I like doing the most in our garden, but we both get a lot of satisfaction from gardening and enjoy doing it.

“I’ve not got any major plans for the garden for next year’s competition but want to just keep developing it bit by bit.”

He added: “Hopefully there will be more people entering next year’s competition. Having six gardens is nice, but I think the more people entering the better.”

Judges Don Andrews and Ken Grice awarded Mr Wood 45.5 points out of a maximum of 57 points in this year’s competition.

The runner-up with 43.5 points was Paul Hunter of Abbey Road, Flitcham. In third place was Geoff Rolfe, of Dodds Hill road, Dersingham with 43 points.

The winner of The Queen Mother Challenge Cup for the most pleasing garden on the Sandringham Estate was Barry Purple, of Appleton Farm Lodge.

In second place was Nancy Cooper, of Anmer, and third was Mr Wood. Nine gardens entered this competition and the judges included Mr Andrews and Mr Grice and two members of the Grimston Greenfingers Gardening Club.

Three discretionary prizes were awarded for special garden features which the judges thought to be outstanding.

They went to Lorraine Bewick for her peaches and espalier fruit, Christine Bye, of Shernbourne, for her sitting area and David and Linda Brown, of Anmer, for their rambler rose.