YORKTON - Don’t you just love going on a garden visit?
It is always so very interesting to see what people have planted in their yards, how they have done their landscaping, what color combinations they have put together.
Years ago we went on a “Secret Gardens” tour in Regina, and it was just wonderful! The Secret Garden tour is happening again this year, if you are in Regina you might want to take part. Visit secretgardenstour.ca for full details.
I remember that what we enjoyed about that tour was the great variety of gardening styles.
Some were very formal and structured, others were more relaxed, and some were purely fun and imagination all rolled into one. What would you say that your gardening style is?
We have found that our gardening style has changed over the years, taking on new approaches, dropping others. For example, we plant a lot more containers now, enjoying the fact that we can easily move them around and create new looks. Another thing is that aside from our perennials, we don’t have any planting of annuals in our garden (except for rows of flowers in our bee garden). And in recent years, we have begun to use more foliage plants in containers; we like the quiet, serene look of foliage.
As we have visited other gardens, and guests have come to ours, we realize that there is a way to be a good garden guest. Just like visiting someone’s home, visiting a garden is a privilege and a special gift, because not only is the host gardener giving up their time, but they have gone through a lot of work to get their garden “guest-ready”. Gardeners take a lot of pride in their gardens.
What would you say is good garden-guest etiquette? One. Visit when you are invited. Surprise visits may be the one time when your gardener friend has decided to clean out the garden shed or do some other task that is not making their garden look its best; it is not the time when they want visitors, especially if you are seeing their yard for the first time!
Two. Don’t visit when no one is home, much for the same reason listed above. Gardeners like to share their gardens, for sure, but they like to be there to show you around and chat with you. It is their ‘outdoor living room’ , after all!
Three. If you are visiting a garden, especially of someone you don’t know well, follow your host gardener and stay on the path. Go only where they lead you.
Four. Don’t touch the plants without asking. We once had a garden guest, one of several people, who felt the need to dead-head the flowers in one of our containers as we were standing there talking. We didn’t notice till she showed us the crushed flowers in her hand, and the damage done. It was extremely disappointing because we weren’t neglectful gardeners with our deadheading but were saving those flowers to mature for seeds.
Five. Don’t try to slip slips! We watched an “Escape To The Country” from the UK recently, and a group of gardeners were talking about garden tours. One of the garden hosts said that he saw one of his guests, with scissors in his garden, cutting slips! When he spoke to her and she realized that the garden was his, she was properly embarrassed; he said he would have gladly shared if she had only asked!
Garden tours are a wonderful way to learn and be inspired! Enjoy these special adventures when you can, but be a good garden guest, not a garden pest! (Thank you, Keith!) Visit the hort society at www.yorktonhort.ca. Thank you to our fiends at YTW; have a great week!
