When it snows, most gardeners fret over the white cover. I, on the other hand, love an all-white landscape. It’s clean. It’s simple. It hints at some peace and purity. But as I further survey the whiteness blanketing our gardens and yard, I start to notice that our gardens actually lack some winter interest.
So over the years, we added some plants mainly for their structure, so at least our garden would have some interest during the low times of gardening, those months when the last colorful fall foliage has fallen through to the slow stirring of the garden into life in early spring. These are the low times of our gardens, yet the best time to plan ways to improve the overall look of our gardens.
Like classic houses, good gardens should have good bones. The best time to find out if our gardens have good bones is between the end of Fall and the start of Spring.
Our gardens, from late Fall to early Spring, become almost like an empty canvas devoid of the creative masterpiece and colorful and beautiful paintings; yet the canvass holds a great promise of something beautiful. Our gardens during this period can be devoid of the gratifying elements of blooms and vibrant leaves. And when the gardens and lawns are covered with snow, we quickly notice where we can inject some form and structure; adding winter interest is the short-term objective, and having an all-year-round beautiful garden is the overall goal.
Over the years, we have added structural elements to our gardens. We have planted a row of boxwood to create a curvy border in the front and the side gardens. We have added weeping dwarf Japanese maples at the ends of the sinewy rows to act as punctuation marks. These sections of our gardens look the best, I believe, more so during the low times when blooms and the summer foliage are absent. The rows of boxwood double-duty to hide the carcasses and mess of slumbering summer plants behind them.
We have planted dwarf Alberta spruce, one at the front roadside entrance, another at the corner bed where two roads intersect, and two more at the back of the front garden. These spruce have been the anchors of our front garden.
Giving visual support to the dwarf Alberta spruce during the low times are rose bushes with their red hops left and a large patch of heathers that blooms at different times of the year. Right now, the winter heathers are blooming, and the spring heathers are budding.
The winter heathers throw out their midwinter blooms to give some visual perk to our winter gardens
A row of rhododendron shrubs underneath our neighbor’s old pine trees manage to keep the boundary line gardens looking good the whole year. When the rhododendrons bloom, this section of our gardens is our favorite area.
Evergreen shrubs, like rhododendrons, azaleas, Japanese aralia, Mexican mock orange, assorted topiaries, and Japanese aucubas also provide winter interest in various areas of our gardens. These evergreens provide visual candy when the rest of our gardens are somewhat of a ho-hum.
We still have a long way to go in making our gardens look awesome the whole year, but we’re slowly getting there. The winter snow blanketing our gardens is just one catalyst to visually analyze our gardens and think of additions to get to having year-round beautiful home gardens. We shall get there. Yet we want to make the journey as delectable as the destination. Just throwing in a positive vibe, you know.
* * * * *
The article is on my other website; here's the link: Creating winter interest – Miscellaneous Blog (wordpress.com)
Or, read a related article on my other website; here's the link: Snow White, Snow Bright, Snow Fright – Miscellaneous Blog (wordpress.com)
Yorumlar