Authors: Margery Fish
We Made a Garden (15 page)
There are two ceanothuses that come into this group, which are particularly good for our purpose—
C
. Chas de Fosse, so deep a blue as to be almost violet, and the soft pink Marie Simon. They are dwarf growing and flower in the latter part of the summer.
Caryopteris clandonensis
is a lovely little shrub that never gets too big, and its silver leaves and blue flowers are something to look forward to in the autumn. The stems are very brittle and it is easy to spoil the look of the bush if it is in a position to get rough treatment. It likes being trained against a wall, and this is a very good way of getting the very best out of it.
Cetatostigma Willmottianum
is another late flowerer, and though it is not quite hardy it does well in a sheltered position.
Viburnum Davidii
is low and spreading and excellent for the front of the border, or planted to crouch over a wall.
V. fragrans nana
makes a neat little bush and smothers itself all through the winter with its heavenly scented little pink flowers.
There are two osmanthuses which do not grow too big.
O
.
ilicitolius
has holly-like foliage and flowers in October.
O
.
Delavayi
has small box-like leaves and tiny scented white flowers in May. The red flowered
Spiraea
Anthony Waterer grows about three feet high and its foliage changes colour pleasantly as an added attraction.
I am very fond of the variegated form of symphoricarpos. Its delicate gold and green foliage looks lovely among the flowers, and for a pleasant flower arrangement try it with the sour-lemon heads of fennel and the silver and gold of
Helichrysum trilineatum.
Some of the smaller shrub veronicas are neat and give different colours in evergreen foliage. Two grey-leaved varieties that are about a foot in height are
V
. (
Hebe
)
carnosula
and
V
. (
Hebe
)
Vageana
,
V.
Autumn Glory is about two feet and has dark foliage as a foil for its violet-blue flowers. I am very fond of
Veronica
(
Hebe
)
cupressoides
, which makes a lovely rounded bush about three feet high and has a delicious scent. The tiny mauve flowers are not important but they add a little quiet interest when they spangle the feathery grey-green foliage.
There are many others, in fact there are so many shrubs that one has to be very firm with oneself not to overdo them. Herbaceous plants are the real mainstay of my borders and my real love but the shrubs are necessary to give that solidity and permanence that makes a good all the year garden.
When I first started planting my borders my husband’s insistence on well-grown plants and my own love of flowers all the year round made me look for two qualities in the plants I chose. I knew I could not stake as much and as individually as Walter thought was neces sary so I tried to find as many plants as I could that did not need a great deal of support. And as I planted an all-the-year-round garden I looked for things with as long a season of blooming as possible.
Of course, there are exceptions to these essentials. Delphiniums and lupins are seasonal and brittle, but one can’t do without them. A garden couldn’t be contemplated without paeonies, which last only a few short weeks and need strong supports, nor would we exchange the short-lived fragrance of lilies for the longevity of less voluptuous plants.
There are some things one must have and, if there are as many of the plants that fall into my category, to plant among them it is easier to keep the garden looking attractive all the time. We all know that line about ‘looking nice last week’ or ‘in two or three week’s time’, but the garden of our ideals should not need apologies, it should look lovely and inviting every day of the year.
I like the things that once they start will go on blooming until the end of the season. Nepeta is an example of what I mean. It begins blooming early in the year and if it is treated properly will go on until frosts come. Proper treatment is trimming off the tired flowers as they finish so that there is a constant succession of new growth. The best way to do this is to work from below. Lift up the lady’s skirts and cut all the old growth from underneath. New shoots spring up from the centre of the plant and give a succession of fresh bloom. At the end of the season most of the growth can be cut off but it is wise to leave an inch or so above the crown of the plant to protect it against hard weather. Nepeta is quite hardy if it has this protection but I have known zealous gardeners who have lost all their plants in the winter by cutting them down right to ground level.
The soft haziness of nepeta is particularly good in a garden like mine, where there is a great deal of stone. It blurs hard outlines and planted close up to a stone path will spill happily across it. To me a border of nepeta as a flower bed is rather dull and a waste of good ground, but it looks lovely against a stone house, on top of a wall or foaming from wall crevices. The large variety, Six Hills, makes a handsome mound in an expanse of paving, and I am fond of filling gaps between tall plants with the large flowered
N.
Souvenir d’André Chauldron, quite a distinct form with more upright growth, and a very strong nepeta scent which some people do not care for.
Nepeta nervosa
is different again, with soft blue pointed heads on upright stems. Like the others it blooms over a long period and is a useful little plant in a narrow border, as it is the most compact of the tribe.
Geraniums have all the qualities I look for. The tall
G. armenum
, with its black-eyed flowers of wicked red, has interesting cut foliage and needs no staking. It doesn’t bloom for quite such a long time as the low growing
G. Endressii
, whose grey-green leaves are spangled with dainty salmon pink flowers all summer long.
G
.
macrorrhizum
grows to about a foot, its leaves are scented and it comes in rosy-purple, white or pink.
G
.
Reynardii
is less spectacular, perhaps, with its black-etched off-white flowers, but what beauty in the crinkled grey foliage. The trailing
G
.
Traversii
is lovely falling over a wall. The woolly silver-grey foliage and clean magenta-ish flowers are a happy combination, and happy, too, is the way it continues to flower until late in the season.
Not everyone agrees with me that
Achillea Millefolium
Cerise Queen is worth growing, although it never stops blooming. The complaint is that though it starts as a vigorous crimson it fades to a very sad pink, but it is just that variation in colour that appeals to me as it recalls the fascination of old chintz. It does need a little support, but one operation does for the whole season. Several of my half hoops control a large planting, and before I had them I used to make a cat’s cradle affair with green string and short, slender bamboos.
Erigerons are very good value too. True they never give a second time such a riot of bloom as that with which they open their season, but there is a pleasant trickle of flowers all through the year. I enjoy the sometimes despised
E. philadelphicus
, which hangs its buds modestly but lifts up its head to face the sky when they open. The way to grow it, I think, is to plant the clumps close together in a mass, so that they are a haze of soft pink. This erigeron is prone to seed itself rather indiscriminately but an odd clump that comes up in paving or at the edge of the path is usually very welcome.
Of the other erigerons the best-known is probably the pinky-mauve Quakeress, and her white counterpart. There is also Pink Pearl which is less exuberant, Mrs Beale,
azureus
,
speciocus
, Moerheim Beauty, Beauty of Hale and many others.
E.
Mesa Grande is a great stand-by as she will bloom till November, getting deeper in colour as the season advances. To keep up a generous succession of bloom it pays to cut off the flower stalks near the ground, instead of just snipping off the dead flowers.
E.
Darkest of All is a lovely newcomer in deep violet, with a greeny-yellow eye, but not quite so lavish with its second thoughts as some of the others. Nor is the salmon, E. B. Ladhams, a regular second bloomer, although one occasionally finds a late flower or two. The rock erigeron,
E. glaucus
, shares the long season habit with its sisters, and is a useful plant when a wall or rock garden pocket calls for something bold and substantial.
Of all the flowers I know I think penstemons fulfil my requirements as well as any. For some reason they had the reputation of being not quite hardy, but I think they have outgrown that libel. You may lose them if you savagely cut them down early in the winter, but if this rite is delayed till all danger of frost is over there is no likelihood of trouble. I agree it is very difficult to restrain one’s itching secateurs when the sun shines and the ragged brown leaves defile the landscape, but it is worth the sacrifice.
When people ask me what they shall plant in a narrow bed in front of a wall or stone balustrading I always suggest penstemon. They provide colour for a very long period and there is nothing lovelier against stone than the nodding bells of lavender and pink, white and crimson. The only attention they require during the flowering season is to have their dead heads removed, they require no staking and are not fastidious as to soil, position or climate. With luck they go on for many years, but there are sometimes casualties, and in time the veterans become unshapely, like the rest of us, so it is well to have a few cuttings in the store cupboard.
Penstemons are very useful for enlivening dull patches in the borders. Some of them will grow tall if given encouragement and they should be planted near the back, where their height will be attractive. The blue
P
. Alice Hindley reaches three feet and the small belled coral
P
.
isophyllus
grows even taller and is really best trained against a wall. I have seen it growing most attractively against a cottage porch. For a dark corner there is the lovely
P
. Hon. Edith Gibbs, cream flushed with pink.
Some of the smaller flowered varieties have great charm. My favourite is
P
. Hewell’s Pink Bedder, with its graceful branching habit and soft salmon flowers. Its white counterpart is rather more dwarf, and so is
P
. Purple Bedder, a deep violet which is almost iridescent. It is hard to describe the moonstone tints of
P
. Stapleford Gem. I used to call it Moonlight before I discovered its right name, and I have met it as
P
. Sour Grapes.
P. campanulatus
Evelyn, which made its appearance as a rock garden plant a few years ago, is even smaller, but holds its own in a flower bed if planted in a group. Its big brother,
P
. Garnet, is a magnificent fellow who turns himself into an enormous bush if left alone to grow fat. The large flowered form of
P
.
heterophyllus
, with its bronzed leaves, is not fussy about soil, but its more aristrocratic relation
P
.
heterophyllus
True Blue, does not care much for lime, and behaves best in an acid soil. I give her plenty of peat and she responds like a lady.
The real rock garden species can be difficult. Sometimes they will grow in ashes if they refuse all other inducements. There is one exception and that is
P
. Six Hills, which is so anxious to please that it simply smothers itself with translucent blue flowers, and sometimes overdoes it to such an extent that the poor thing dies in giving. But its obliging nature helps when it comes to striking cuttings, so really there is no excuse for losing it.
When it comes to colour schemes in the garden there is one thing to remember and that is that the deeper the colours the more careful must be the planning. We all have our preferences. Mine are for the pastel shades, for with them it is possible to have a riot without disagreement. Pinks, lavenders, soft blues and lilacs, with plenty of cream and white never clash, and for emphasis a great pool of crimson here, some deep blue there, and a touch of violet now and again will carry one through. Orange and strong yellow, the egg yolk variety, I find difficult and there are not enough primrose coloured flowers for my liking. But some yellow one must have. Have you ever struggled with an elaborate mixed flower arrangement without a touch of yellow and wondered what was wrong? One way to deal with the necessary yellow is to flank it with white; white and yellow live very happily side by side.
Some people segregate delphiniums, but to me they lose half their charm by being so treated. It may be heresy but I find delphiniums grown by themselves cold and rather repelling, just as a flower arrangement of delphiniums by themselves lacks warmth. Very little is needed to work the charm and it is only necessary to see delphiniums mixed with scabious to realize it.
There are some colours that don’t fit in anywhere. Very strident orange is one, and sealing wax red another. I tried over the years to place
Lychnis Chalcedonica
(Jerusalem Cross) in pleasing proximity with other plants, but I never succeeded. The poor unsuspecting creature was moved from one position to another until I think in time she’d learn to walk. She was pushed further and further away from the heart of the garden until she landed up where she has now lived for several years—in front of a
Clematis Jackmanii
, almost out of the back gate. She was one of the very few perennials I successfully grew from seed, so I cannot let her go out of the gate and my life altogether.