Garden Bones

Elisabeth — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:01:00 GMT

Gardeners always talk about the "bones" of a garden. It sounds good, but what does it really mean? Just as bones give structure to the human body, landscape "bones" give structure to the garden. "Bones" include the layout, the hardscaping and plants like shrubs and trees that provide shape and interest year in and year out. This time of year--when annuals are dead, perennials have died back to the ground and deciduous shrubs and trees have dropped their leaves--is a good time to see your garden's "bones".

Deciduous shrubs can help give structure to a garden, especially if their branches form distinctive shapes.

Evergreens contribute substantially to the "bones" of a garden. From the tallest Norway Spruce to the shortest carpet juniper, evergreens maintain not only shape but color in every season. No garden should be without them and the variety of sizes, colors and shapes is astonishing. For every standard yew, boxwood, arbor vitae, juniper, rhododendron, euonymus and holly, there are many variations. People with small gardens or collections of containers can choose from an every-expanding range of small cultivars to use as accents. Right now evergreen varieties with a greenish gold cast like Thuja occidentalis 'Yellow Ribbon' are popular. They are great for lightening up dark places as well as providing bones.

Look around your own garden. If there aren't enough evergreens make a note to order more in the spring.

Public Plantings

Elisabeth — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 20:44:00 GMT

There is nothing that speaks to the popularity of gardening more than the changes in public plantings over the past ten years. When I was growing up, businesses might have a few colorful annuals in pots or small beds in the spring and summer. The spent annuals were cleaned out just before or after the first frost and the pots and beds remained empty until spring. Shrubs were relatively few and far between and were mostly common evergreens.

Now, however, public plantings are much more diverse. One supermarket that I know of combines various grasses with Stella de Oro daylilies and sedums, and another has planted a front strip with repeat-flowering, groundcover roses. The local pancake house has brought together annuals with low-growing, flowering shrubs whose berries also provide late fall and winter color. Hydrangea quercifolia or oakleaf hydrangea pops up everywhere, with its gorgeous flower pannicles and lovely, ruddy autumn leaves. I know of a winery that adorns its front beds with a combination of mass plantings of lavender and Gaura lindheimeri or apple blossoms grass.

It is as if business owners, along with the rest of us, have grown wise to the appeal of the life and color inherent in increased plant diversity. With lots of sources of good, inexpensive plant materials, public plantings can only get better and better. It's an inspiration.

Growing Wise : landscaping

Garden Bones

Public Plantings