The Generosity of Trough Gardens, Season to Season

Tiny Gardens' Trough 

at the Sedgwick Estate, Long Hill

Beverly, MA

Along low wall in rear garden ~ Spring

Sedums, conifers, ornamental grass ~ Spring

Top view ~ Spring

Detail 

~ Fall ~

~ Fall (detail)

Spring Comes Slowly

Finally! After many false starts, this weekend the weather turned enough to feel as if I could uncover my wintered troughs, pull them from the soil in which they had been safely heeled in for the winter, and begin to watch them do their magic. I bid them goodnight for the long winter's sleep last November. They been sleeping for six long months.

It felt a little like Christmas to pull them from their sleep and see how they did all winter. They look good, albeit a little undone. Now the strengthening sunshine will do its work and I can't wait to see those (now) hidden roots pop through with a new season's bloom.

Five Garden Highlights of 2012

Various mosses with
European Ginger and
Epimedium

5. Discovering the beauty of moss for troughs and other containers.

4. Missing only one on my shrub I.D. class mid-term: Forsythia!

3. Working for five months in formal gardens designed by Frederick Law Olmstead, famed landscape architect of Central Park and the Biltmore Estate (to name a few) where I discovered the joy and beauty of sedums and sempervivums.

Sempervivum arachnoideum

Sedum hispanicum

2. Successful propagation of a fig tree, miniature azalea, and galium (to name a few).

Buy it here

1. Discovering Zen Gardening and making Zen Trough Gardens.


All good wishes for the upcoming new year. And keep growing!

Growing Tiny Gardens: Fourth Steps, and Onward

Keep in mind balance, a color palette, and room to grow.

Choosing Your Plants for Your Hypertufa Trough

After having broken ground in preliminary reconnaissance of the market (step one); having built up inventory (step two); having gotten comfortable handling and working with plants and figuring out their growing patterns, kind of (step three); the time has come to work with the dirt.

Choosing plants for the trough is like weaving a tapestry: you think about balance, color, compatibility and complementarity.

First thought: Is the trough going to be a full sun trough or a part shade trough?
Second thought: Is the trough going to stand alone or will it be part of a larger trough installation?
Third thought: How much growing room will the respective plants require (read: how to space the plants) and what are the depth requirements for the roots?

Even if you have not achieved 100 percent competence in these matters, put something in the dirt. It's time to let the plants do what they were made to do. Your job is to watch, tend, clip now and then, and try again if the trough is telling you it's not happy.

Keep in mind a few key principles:

~ Odd numbers of plants create a more natural-looking arrangement than even numbers.
~ Introduce into your trough a mixture of vertical growers, sprawling flow-ers, and creeping ground coverage (each of these categories will be addressed in upcoming posts).
~ Try to stick with a color pallet. For example, dark bluish-green conifers work well with pink-tinged sedums and gentle mossy thyme. Bright green conifers work with reds and lime-green grasses or herbs.

Think of the trough as your canvass and the plants as your palette.

This smaller trough contains a vertical Mexican
Feather Grass (Stipa tenuissima), a sprawling miniature
Cotoneaster 'Tom Thumb', and a low-growing
red sedum (Sedum rubrotinctum), which adds
a splash of color.

Soft hues define this stunning trough design: Vertical Lavender,
low-growing, pink-tinged Sedum siebaldii and sprawling
beloved Sedum angelina

Aspiration: To create living art that evokes pleasure.
Garden Lesson: The true beauty of the trough will come in time, sometimes months after the planting. Bear this in mind. Plants grow. Plant your trough with care and forethought and then be patient while nature does its work.
Life Lesson: Be vigilant and dutiful in the choices you make ~ allowing for a flourish of whimsy and spontaneity ~ and be patient. Time does its work.


Go here to read First Steps and subsequent ones

Trough of the Week: Lilly

Lilly shines in a 14" x 14" trough

Question: What do you see in the picture above?

Answer: A universe of decisions. Meet Lilly Trough. Helping her reach her beauty -- even as she is rockin' it  in her non-blooming season -- was complicated.

First decision: I had to determine the size and shape of the trough mold I used. (Did I want edges? A circle? Oblong?)

Second decision: Proportions of the respective ingredients for the trough (cement, peat & perlite). In this particular trough I used less peat since -- another decision -- I attached a screened bottom, instead of  cement with drainage holes. (The screened bottom diminishes the weight of the trough and enhances good drainage - - a must for the sustainable trough garden).

Third decision: Proportions for the soil mix specific to the plants in this trough. Which brings me to the

Fourth decision: The plants. This trough has been made for full sun  ~ standard rock-garden fare. This means the soil mix must be a healthy gritty mix of a little compost, sand -- maybe even grit or small gravel. These hard-core stone-croppers thrive in harsh conditions, which is why I love Lilly. Her respective parts include:
     Upper right corner: Cerastium tomentosum ~ Snow-in-summer. (Blooms white flowers in summer)
     Lower right corner: Dianthus gratianopolitanus 'Bath's Pink' (Blooms pink in summer)
     Center: Sedum acre 'Golden Carpet' (Blooms yellow in summer)
     Lower left corner: Sempervivum arachnoideum tomentosum

Even off-season, Lilly shines! She's edgy, with a center of warmth, a good solid mix-up of moods and expressions, and she's got attitude.  She can be yours.

Fifth decision: What's she worth? Contact me here if your are interested.