The Halfway Mark

We’ve just had another Public NGS Open Day and so I slept in til around 10:30am this morning. Five events down, five to go. We’re at the half-way mark and along with several pages of very kind comments written in the guestbook by garden visitors under duress, we have an interesting statistic to pull about about the cake: with 223 visitors to the garden, we’ve served 256 slices of cake. Make of that, what you will.

Interestingly, I’ve had very little time to actually tend to the garden, there is an embarrassing amount of dead-heading that I haven’t managed, the border edges are looking rough, there is staking that is sorely missing and if I’d managed to keep on top of watering in some new perennials, I wouldn’t be worrying about why they’re dying and what I’m going to replace them with.

Part of the problem was that I put my lower back out and was out of action for several days after planting four honeysuckle under beech hedge that runs the length of the garden. The aim is to have such a long mass of flowering scented honeysuckle that in summer, you should be able to smell it from the next village.

The rhododendron hedge needs cutting back too as it’s coming out too far over the pergola and “sitting” heavy on it. I’m hoping my landscaper neighbour will be able to help get rid of the bulk bags of pruning that’s going to generate.

Other than those along with some odd-jobs such as extending the wire runners for the jasmine and roses, there’s – dare I say it – not that much in the way of “heavy” work. It’s actually a quiet period, though with all the work for the NGS Open Days, it doesn’t feel like it.

I still find it odd that visitors don’t “see” the work that’s been missed – they certainly don’t comment on it anyway, I expect they’re too kind for that and keep it to themselves. Instead, the number one question I get is, “how do you keep your hostas from being eaten by slugs?” closely followed by, “who is the baker!?”.

When we have private group visits, I give a short talk about the garden where I say the garden is in the “Romantic Style”, which has a strong element of over-abundance in planting, a feeling of the borders tipping out of control and even a sense of neglect or abandonment, like suddenly coming across a “secret” or “forgotten” garden. It’s that last part I’m having trouble accepting.

Gardening in a romantic style still involves a lot of work and maintenance – especially when you have so many plants crammed so close together – but it’s done in a way that doesn’t make it look manicured and pristine. While this is how the garden initially starts each season – especially in the early Spring after the winter clean-up, by mid-July, visitors are already having to brush past plants that are closing in and meeting each other across the grass paths, well-defined border edges are disappearing as plants spill over and the line between what is under control and what isn’t, is distinctly blurred.

Visitors coming later in the remaining Open Days for this season will hopefully be able to see and appreciate this, especially if I think to write a spiel on the elements of a “Romantic Style Garden” to focus their attention on the good bits and distract them away from the jobs that I haven’t managed to get round to doing.

If that doesn’t work, well, there’s always cake.