My daughter has finally fulfilled my dreams of gardening in her beautiful “wild garden” next door.
As long as I can remember, I have dreamed of creating beautiful flower gardens — both in my waking hours and in my nighttime dreams.
As a little girl, I had a dream one night of the most beautiful “giant” pansies! For years, I have been searching for beautiful pansies and the perfect flower garden.
I always thought my garden would have lush rows of hollyhocks, cosmos, bachelor buttons, snapdragons, old-fashioned bleeding heart, asters and zinnias in a rainbow of bright colors.
When we first moved to Kansas in the late 1960s, I began to create my “dream” gardens.
First preparing the ground, then planting the tiny seeds in rows and then splurging on my favorite perennials, I faithfully watered and weeded and expected the profusion of color I had seen in my mother and grandmother’s gardens.
But, unfortunately, Kansas is not upstate New York, and it requires different cultivation of flowers.
Then, about 20 years ago, I read Violet Stevenson’s “The Wild Garden.” I knew immediately that Kansas is perfectly suited to the “wild garden.”
Last Saturday, I sat in my daughter’s “wild garden,” enjoying the sun and the riot of colors. There were huge sweeps of sunny yellow daffodils and purple vinca, and groupings of pink hyacinths, bright blue scilla and purple primrose.
The forsythia was at its peak, the coral blossoms of the quince were exquisite and the birds were singing with joy.
Her garden was so beautiful and looked so easy! But I knew better.
A wild garden is not a wilderness, said William Robinson, the man who first popularized the wild garden concept.
The wild garden features native flowers and other adaptable plants, is very sparing of water and tries to create a retreat for butterflies, birds, small mammals and beneficial insects.
But creating a wild garden takes a lot of work and some resources.
For example, my daughter planted 200 Asiatic lilies last year, but did nothing like Robinson, who once planted 100,000 narcissus on his English manor property!
It was the height of the Victorian patterned gardens. But Robinson had another idea — why not let native flowers grow in a wild setting and plan your gardens around the natural features of the land?
Robinson, who was also a journalist, began writing his ideas. In 1870, at age 32, he wrote the very successful “The Wild Garden.”
His writings revolutionized British gardening. The informality in design and natural planting which he advocated was the foundation of the English cottage garden.
Until the day he died at the age of 97, he was still throwing seeds and bulbs from his wheelchair. Gardening was his life and kept him young.
Robinson reminds me of another famous gardener — Thomas Jefferson. Late in life Jefferson said, “I am still devoted to the garden. But tho’ an old man, I am but a young gardener.”
How about you? If you want to be young, why not plant a garden?
F Marie Snider is an award-winning health-care writer and syndicated columnist. Write Marie Snider at thisside60@aol.com or visit her website at www.visit-snider.com.
create (anonymous) says...
I have begun my first lasagna garden this year. I have great hopes. No, not hope. Belief. I believe, I strongly believe it's gonna work out quite well. If only the wind would quit and the sun would shine. Ah, Kansas in April. Had to cover my foot-tall peony plants tonight.
April 11, 2008 at 7:50 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )