Making Veddw, 8 – The next version of the Veg Plot: no veg!

I think the worst thing was working in the garden until 9 o’clock or later

and then realising that if we wanted supper we would now have to pick, de-slug, wash and cook veggies. Almost as bad as trying to grow them. I think Charles got really tired and fed up, trying to keep it all looking good. So what to do with the Veg Plot? Anne needed more inspiration.

The ideal would be something that looked good for a long time and which I could grow from seed. So – foliage. And had we grown a cardoon? I’m not sure, but what I came up with was cardoons and heuchera Palace Purple. The latter much despised, of course, but easy from seed. We have loved the result. Though we still have not managed to cover all the space in the beds. (But I have a Plan)

As you can see, we also added a few decorative, non edible extras.

And, eventually, from babies, four standard hollies.

And look at the wonderful topiary.

Yep, you’ve guessed it.

Charles grew all those things from very small. And tended with love and much careful shaping and trimming, sigh, then –

we got box blight and holly blight.

Gardening is so happy making, don’t you think? If you want to know more about our experience of box blight there’s lots on our website. Here. And here. And here.

 

And bravely burning.

Well, as my headmaster used to say ‘it’s good for your character’.

The holly has been more interesting than the box.

It keeps attempting to regrow. When it first hit it was clear Charles was not going to be able face cutting the standards down. So I suggested growing ivy up them, on the basis that when it reached the top it would likely bush out, as ivy does, and could replace the holly balls.

So: one grew the ivy up it. The holly on that one has not reappeared.

Long time, no bushing.

Two of the hollies came back to life like this! With ivy covered stems.

It’s that beehive again. Needs repainting.

And one holly came back to life but the ivy died. So we now have three standards and a pole.

Which looks bonkers.

Winter view from the drone.

Suggestions welcome.

Sigh.

So, what else?

I do feel that gardens need something other than troublesome plants,

and in the absence of tons of money I have made plywood cutouts for various places in the garden. This was the first one in the Veg Plot.

Another use for the enamels.

I quite liked it, though before long the earing fell off. It was replaced several times before rot saw the lot off. To be replaced by the dove.

I’ve always wanted, where possible, for such images to mean something in relation to the garden. The head clearly didn’t, nor does Octo in the Meadow. But doves pigeons are definitely part of our garden.

There it is in context.

Then you also have to have fruit.

And hard as it is now to believe, we got ourselves a fruit cage.

Don’t it look posh?

So we played at imprisoning squirrels.

Which chewed their way in and out. So that we also imprisoned birds. It’s strange how I remember chasing frantic birds out of a small door more than any delicious fruit. In fact, despite conscientious research we never found that anything we grew tasted better than what we bought. Which was, to say the least, disappointing. (As were cabbages the size of tennis balls). (o, and asparagus beetle.)

The Fruit Cage had to have the top taken off every winter in case snow would squash it. Charles was always dismissive of this need. Oh, it won’t snow. No. So, annually, when Charles was snuggly at work, I would be out in freezing snow removing the top of the Fruit Cage.

Snow in 1996

Eventually there came a year when I decided sod it when Charles went all skeptical about snow. And it came and it destroyed the Fruit Cage. Huzzah!

So we had another new garden to make,

because we were done with fruit as well as veggies by then. I’ll spare you the making of that, but we continued the theme of the silver grey and purple of the cardoons and heuchera with acer, cotinus , berberis of some kind and Eleagnus Quicksilver . The latter is a shrub which truly does scent a huge part of the garden when it is in flower. It suckers, which helped fill the border, and gives us ones to give away. And it looks a bit disconsolate by August. Wouldn’t be without it though. (There isn’t an eleagnus disease, is there???)

There are herbaceous plants at the edges, bronze fennel, Japanese anemone, and geraniums. There’s also Persicaria Red Dragon, which a certain friend of mine, called Marianne, wonderfully calls ‘Blood Wedding’. She has no idea why.

Japanese anemone and bronze fennel in the Fruit Cage Border – I love this combination.

And here is Blood Wedding (!)

Better than red currants???

Charles:

I’m a bit tired right now as I’ve just spent a couple of hours having a massive bonfire of hydrangeas which we have cut down (not removed because of disease for once, but a redesign ). But I do seem to have had a lot of cathartic bonfires and remembering that I had to cut down all my lovely topiary in the Veg Plot distresses me still. Nature is bloody annoying. I spent ages repairing holes in that fruit cage. I probably let the snow collapse it on purpose (subconsciously, at least).