YORKTON - It’s time for a mid-season check, gardeners! Take a pen and paper, or your phone or iPad, and make a leisurely but observant tour through your garden.
This is the time to take note of what worked well for you and you want to repeat next year, and what didn’t.
If you have container plantings, write down or take a photo of what’s in your favourite containers. Sometimes certain combinations just work, not only in terms of color harmony but also size of the plants. You know how garden magazines talk about the “thriller, spiller, and filler” method of container planting. The ‘thriller’ is the tall plant that is like the focal point of the container, perhaps a tall grass or corydon; the ‘spillers’ are the delicate plants than cascade over the edge, like lobelia or sweet potato vine; and the ‘filler’ is what is in the middle of the two: perhaps petunias or geraniums or marigolds. Note for next year: salvia are absolute bee magnets. Both white and blue salvia bring in the bees, and look amazing, so add them to your list.
We have some favourites in our containers this year: we planted a black urn full of vanilla marigolds, and the black and white combo is stunning! The vanilla marigolds are beautiful, and they keep blooming and blooming. We had great containers of burgundy corydon, creeping jenny, and variegated ivy. No blooms, but the lime green and burgundy are a knockout together. We also used bidens in one container, and they are small but showy, well worth a planting again. Grasses are our favourites by far, because we love not only the continuous motion of the grasses in the breeze, but the elegant colorings of subdued greens, silvers, and ochre shades.
Out in the garden, we had great crops of Royal Burgundy beans, and they are so beautiful in a dark, velvety purple color. They turn green when cooked, but are tender and delicious. With cucumbers we have gone back to Straight Eight, the variety that Mom always used to plant, and it didn’t disappoint.
Our raised beds were a new experiment; we planted zucchini along one edge of one bed, and it must really like that spot because it is growing to beat the band! It might be a little too enthusiastic for that spot so we will have to re-think it for next year. One first effort that didn’t work out in the raised bed was a tomato variety that gave us the impression that it would be small and petite. It turned into a shrub in no time, was taking over so it had to go.
Another corner of the garden was full of surprises! We had several roses growing there, and unknown variety that had beautiful pink blooms with the scent of the old hansa favorites. There were doing very well, blooming profusely, creating a heavenly scented corner, when all of a sudden (you know what “all of a sudden” means in the garden: you don’t go out there for a couple days and suddenly things are out of control!) the roses were tall and completely blocking the path. Meanwhile, behind the roses, a silver-foliaged plant appeared from nowhere, towering almost as high as the fence. It looked like a rue plant, a volunteer, and we can only assume the seed was dropped there by one of our feathered friends. It was pulled out, the roses cut back by more than half, and we made a note to keep an eye on that enthusiastic corner next year!
Every day is an adventure in the garden! Go out every day for a quick meander; it’s interesting, relaxing, and rejuvenating for the soul. And make notes for reference next year!
Thank you to our friends at YTW for their fine work. Gardeners, visit us at and have a great week!
