Garden Ninja

Look at this thing. It is my favourite tool (currently). It looks so terrible.
I don't know what it is called. The Garden Dagger, for gardeners/assassins. It is, in fact, a sharpish-edged trowel, with a weed-picker point, and my own innovation is carrying it in a holster on my belt, which I highlight because it's only taken me ten years to discover a way to NOT lose one trowel/week. Which can get expensive. I would not have discovered this method if not out of the necessity of carrying my sharpish Garden Dagger. I hope nobody authoritative reads this and decides you need a special licence to carry it/bans it. I will strap it to the inside of my gumboot if I have to.



Oh--almost forgot. These are my favourite gloves (currently). They are called "Carrot Tops" which is not just super-cutesy (and annoying to men) but because the orange finger-tips are double-coated in neoprene goo to make them extra-durable. So the whole glove disintegrates before the cheerful orange fingertips show any stress. Do you know how many other, less-enlightened gloves are rendered useless just because the index fingertip* wears out? Do you know how hard I tried to Frankenstein old fingers onto otherwise-perfect gloves, leaving gruesome trails of dismembered duct-taped digits through unsuspecting clients' gardens? You don't know. You don't care. Fine.
To my knowledge, Carrot-Tops can be purchased only at Jim's Home Hardware in Dundarave, which is a great store. I like all Home Hardwares. They are independently owned and when I am an old lady I want to work in one. I'm not telling where you can buy Garden Daggers, because I don't want them in anyone else's hands.

*Do you truly realize how much you use your index finger?

Really Crazy Little Rock-Daisy

Here's a close-up of the Erigeron karvinskianus 'Profusion' from John and Margot's garden today. It is the ultimate billowy rock-garden plant, forever-blooming, that I mentioned I introduced to Jim & Rojeanne's garden. Just want them to see what it does. There's a bit of John's rock-work below. He has indeed sculpted garden beds onto a precarious pitch of original granite coastline--I have to bring rubber-soled shoes and tie-lines and they drop me off the balconey...




Okay, I lie.

Fleeting moment of bicycle beauty....

Mysterious image of Virgin Mary's bicycle glimpsed on paneled wall of new restaurant in Lynn Valley...

Mesmerized, I scramble to capture the image with my trusty Canon, before...

...it drives away on top of an SUV?? Sacrilege!

Canna You See Me?

This is a 4-in-1 Promotion Shot for canna lilies, zinnias, West African dashikis, and pre-formed concrete. Although they are best in combination, I will understand if you are not bold enough to plant zinnias--they are an eye-popper.

This is Rose's newly-completed pool-deck, a portion of a very chi-chi garden which I have infiltrated (obviously, I blend right in) under the guise of helping Mike: fellow gardener/philosopher and, I believe, a former dashiki-wearer.

When Rose is not force-feeding us freezies, ordering us to jump off the dock into the inlet, or alternatively, shoving me under the outdoor shower "to cool off" ( I think she was super-excited to show us everything) she's raving about her garden. Which is wonderful. But we still want Dan to come back. We love you, Dan.

I'm not joking, either, about the pre-formed concrete, because I do think the radiant heat, combined with an irrigation system, may be the ideal conditions for canna lilies. I do not lie--they were a few little leaves in one-gallon-size pots when we planted them in late May/early June. We're especially pleased with the tricky spot below, where the cannas and Red Baron grass (Imperata cylindrica) are squashed into a narrow space and also hiding some kind of mechanical box in the centre of the planter. The edge of the planter doubles as a pool-side bench, so we had to choose something that wouldn't flop over.

I actually think dashikis look great on people (my orange one is huge so I look like an enormous butterfly...) and I think we should start a trend. Dashikis are, hands down, the most comfortable garden-wear ever, conclusively, period.

Ye Olde Apple Tree Garden

Jim & Rojeanne's Garden, Adopted 2007

A year of weeding and pruning (2007), a year of rearranging perennials, planting the slope with grasses and adding this and that here and there (2008), and Something Happened this year. I do believe It All Came Together.

I think the first shot below is May'09, and the second, July. Don't you just want to jump in that grass.

Swath of Mexican Hair Grass (Stipa tenuissima) planted early Summer'08, survived following infamous Winter 08/09 due to sea-level southern exposure (thank-you God-of-All- Things-Green-and-Growing).

*Note--Goes to seed mid-July and requires careful hand-combing (so as not to uproot entire plant) so it doesn't lie flat due to weight of seedheads. (Second picture above is post-combing.) Alternatively, could shear it shorter, but then it would look like it was sheared shorter (I'm a shearing snob).
*Note-- Self-seeds rampantly. Will grow between paving stones, so, obviously, not fussy about soils! Expect to be cursing its presence in lower perennial beds anytime soon.

But isn't it glorious!! Another name for this grass is Angel Hair. I feel like a romantic postcard when I'm drifting through it...singing...playing my harp whilst pulling weeds (not a lot--did a thorough season-long eradication of buttercup and horsetail the first year and oddly, the horsetail seems to have given up--it prefers wet sites anyways so succombed to a little persistence).

*Also planted French Lavender (Lavandula x intermedia) along the top of the retaining wall--it will cascade over the wall, and the flowers are very tall and therefore visible from above (theoretically). And there are King Alfred daffodils and croci (plural for crocuseses) interplanted for spring.

Rojeanne recently picked out some Russian sage (Perovskia atriplicifolia) to interplant in the grasses, and now we need something pink (Yarrow? Sidalcea?) which is also drought-tolerant.

A few more shots... you can see that the grasses are framed on either end by pink & white shrub roses, Peachleaf Bellflower (Campanula persicifolia), Oriental lilies, Giant Purple Allium (Allium giganteum), Shasta Daisy and Fleabane Daisy (Erigeron karvinskianus 'Profusion') Good grief, like I call it that. More like :"really crazy little rock-daisy"**See next post for a photo.

See Progression shots below: Freshly Weeded, Freshly Planted, and The Next Spring...

From east:

From west:

Lower Perennial Beds (along stepping-stone pathway)

Below retaining wall:
Already a lovely assortment of perennials when I arrived--many intentionally tall selections so the flowers are visible from above (the retaining wall below the grasses is about a 4-foot drop).
So...
Tall: Crocosmia 'Lucifer', Obedient Plant (Physostegia virginiana), Shasta daisies, Persian Cornflower (Centaurea dealbata), Japanese Anemones, Phlox, Columbine Meadow-rue (Thalictrum aquilegiifolium), Hollyhocks (Alcea rosea), Milky Bellflower (Campanula lactiflora), Dame's Rocket (Hesperis), Cranesbill (Geranium himalayense 'Johnson's Blue'), Foxglove (Digitalis purpurea), Leopard's Bane (Doronicum orientale)

Medium: Sedum spectabile 'Autumn Joy', Siberian Iris (Iris sibirica), Paeonies, Speedwell (Veronica spicata), Sneezeweed (Helenium autumnale),Fumitory (Corydalis 'Blue Panda')

Short:Dwarf Bearded Iris (Iris pumila), Autumn Crocus

I've added a few more plants below the wall, and generally reduced/rearranged clumps as required--also created a narrow path along the wall for access/allow room for lavender when it starts to cascade.
Additions: Purple Dahlias, Oriental Lilies, Brazilian Verbena (Verbena bonariensis), more Hollyhocks

Below Laurel hedge (of which I do not have a good shot at the moment):
Shadier, and consisted of several huge blue Hostas, as well as some green and variegated Hostas, interspersed with Geranium macrorrizum and Daylilies (Hemerocallis) when I arrived.
I divided everything and distributed them somewhat evenly along the length of the bed, then added..
Siberian Bugloss (Brunnera macrophylla 'Jack Frost')
Golden Japanese Forest Grass (Hakonechloa macra 'Aureola'))
Gold-leaf Bleeding heart (Dicentra spectabilis 'Gold Heart')

Okay, all this Latin is making my eyes go buggy, but I feel like I'm re-establishing neural pathways in my brain. Which is good.

Favourite elements:

--Three Olde Apple Trees sculpted annually by mysterious artist retired in the Gulf Islands.
They create dimension, add sense of antiquity to the space, and the lower branches are great for tying top-heavy hollyhocks

--The juxtaposition of long horizontal lines of the house/upper lawn/boxwood hedge with the curvy organic tumble of the lower garden.
--The rolling profile of the lower laurel hedge (like waves, instead of straight)
--The wide thyme-and-crazy-daisy-covered steps leading down to the lower garden

*Note: I'm not responsible for these design elements--just adding my energy to the mix. It's good to note features that one likes.

It's the combination of elements that creates magic spaces.

Cornered

Here's a daunting Before shot--everyone who saw this said "get rid of the rocks" because that's All You Saw upon arrival to this newly-built and "landscraped" home. The boulders didn't leave much room for a garden, and were too "en garde" to be avant-garde. But boulder-rolling isn't in my job description. The most I could do was soldier a few extraneous Smaragd cedars from the back yard and line 'em up against the wall, eradicate a few of the existing big-box-sale selections, and go for camouflage tactics. Kept the Japanese maple, daylilies, and California Lilac (Ceanothus), theVirginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia) on the stone wall, and Aucuba against the fence. The results are below: on planting, and a year later when it has filled in.




Funny how I got the shot when nothing is in bloom, but still nice foliage contrast, which is the point, right? Another couple years and the Heather/Kinnikinnik/Lithodora/Ivy will really soften the boulders. Mission complete.

Additional plantings:

Viburnum plicatum 'Summer Snowflake'
Rhododendron 'Ramapo' --purple-flowering
Blue Oat Grass (Helictotrichon sempervirens)
Coral Bells (Heuchera 'Palace Purple')--or any cultivar with purplish red leaves
Lithodora diffusa 'Grace Ward'--blue-flowering trailer
Heather (Erica carnea)--any pink-flowering cultivar
Ivy (Hedera helix 'Baltica')--small-leafed variety not as thuggish as big-leaf English Ivy
Serbian Bellflower (Campanula poscharskyana)
Kinnikinnik (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi)

New Digs

Befores & Afters--my favourite! Of course, to be effective, these must chronicle the passage of at least two or three years...

Here be witness to the transformation of Anne & Peter's new garden (see the previous post "Gardening with a Paintbrush" July 2008). The above two pics are circa 2006. Note the expanses of age-old English ivy and heather, and although you can't see it, a mature pine tree is surrounded by the stone pathway.

The ivy and heather were clawed out with the sanity-saving assistance of a friend's crew. More shrubs (the hazel and rhodi below) were removed in 2007. The winter of 2006/07 felled the pine, roots and all, right across the newly-planted garden aaarrggh. Peter removed other mature trees and reconfigured the stone pathway, built rose trellises, irrigation systems, veg garden, and on and on!

Most significant of all (to the floral side of things), Anne and I salvaged mature shrubs and perennials (with permission) from her previous garden, in the heat of summer, I might add--which goes to show that when you gotta do what you gotta do, you find out plants are a lot tougher than you thought. As a result, the garden was remarkably "instant" and we were terribly pleased with ourselves by the next spring.

I think the shots below are from late 2007...

An edge of Lady's mantle (Alchemilla mollis), Coral bells (Heuchera), seeded Alyssum, English lavender, Hebe, etc. contains a tumble of perennials and strategic annuals, biennials, bulbs, tubers, and on and on, plus hydrangea, roses, spiraea, choisya...too much to list for now. As you can see, the pine was replaced with a Katsura Tree (Cercidiphyllum japonicum) just to the right of the red Japanese maple. And Anne chose some own-root beauties from the Old Rose Nursery (on Galiano Island) which are now sending shoots to the heavens (my title bar photo). The photo below is from the past few days...

And below, one of my favourite shrubs--the Black Elderberry (Sambucas nigra 'Black Beauty')--finally grew tall enough this year to be a backdrop for the red dahlias. Plants having fun--Anne has taught me the art of staking/tying perennials So You Can't Tell. No cinching allowed.