This post was inspired by my awesome, ungainly Joe Pye Weed. It seems a fitting reminder of the wonders and challenges of the summer garden. Surpassing our 6’ tall fence in height, with flower clusters bigger than my head, it is a wonder to behold. The bees and butterflies love it – when I approach it hums with life. But it is an experiment for me – a plant I’ve never grown before – and it’s in the wrong place.
How many people see what’s not working in their garden in the height of summer? Those long days invite us outside. I make early morning perambulations to find any tomatoes ready to pick. It’s hard for me to move on to other activities if I haven’t said good morning to the garden. We love to bring dinner outside and eat on our patio. Our dog Nyssa would like to have full indoor-outdoor privileges, just like a cat, and takes pleasure sunning on the patio stone or sleeping in the thyme. How can you not notice if your Caryopteris has grown like a muscle on steroids and threatens to choke out everything in its path if you’re out there several times a day? I never realized that in perfect garden soil they would become behemoth! Or that the Joe Pye Weed is really meant for the very back of the border, where it can compete with the Italian Cypresses and the Witch Hazel to be a backdrop to other more modest plants.
How many people see what’s not working in their garden in the height of summer? Those long days invite us outside. I make early morning perambulations to find any tomatoes ready to pick. It’s hard for me to move on to other activities if I haven’t said good morning to the garden. We love to bring dinner outside and eat on our patio. Our dog Nyssa would like to have full indoor-outdoor privileges, just like a cat, and takes pleasure sunning on the patio stone or sleeping in the thyme. How can you not notice if your Caryopteris has grown like a muscle on steroids and threatens to choke out everything in its path if you’re out there several times a day? I never realized that in perfect garden soil they would become behemoth! Or that the Joe Pye Weed is really meant for the very back of the border, where it can compete with the Italian Cypresses and the Witch Hazel to be a backdrop to other more modest plants.
I know, as a Landscape Architect and garden designer I should always do my homework and place each new addition with knowledge and planning. But who does that all the time? And what gardener does not spend some time EVERY SINGLE YEAR moving something to make it fit better or compose more graciously?
The challenge is the waiting. Don’t do it now. You who, like me, see something that’s not quite right and just want to fix it now. Resist the temptation. It’s too darn hot. Oh I know, we have had two or three mild days. But they will pass and the heat will be back, and the plants you move in the height of summer are unlikely to survive. Even regular water is most often not enough to compensate for the stress of root disturbance and the work to re-establish them during the heat. This has been one of the hardest simple lessons I’ve ever forced myself to learn.
Because once you notice how very wrongly something is positioned, it sticks out like a sore thumb. If you are like me, it is jarring to see it every day and not do anything! It feels like the plant is taunting, saying, “I double dare ya!” But if you want that plant, you will become immune to its taunts. You will wince, take a deep breath, and envision a nice cool, damp fall day, you in jeans, socks and gardening clogs, and maybe even a raincoat, cutting the plant back a bit to help it on its path to re-establishment. Then digging in moist, not soggy, soil, a nice generous root ball that you hoist gently and move to its new home. There, feel better? So does the plant, and the taunts die out in a sigh of comfort and happiness. And that's what our gardens can do for us, too.
The challenge is the waiting. Don’t do it now. You who, like me, see something that’s not quite right and just want to fix it now. Resist the temptation. It’s too darn hot. Oh I know, we have had two or three mild days. But they will pass and the heat will be back, and the plants you move in the height of summer are unlikely to survive. Even regular water is most often not enough to compensate for the stress of root disturbance and the work to re-establish them during the heat. This has been one of the hardest simple lessons I’ve ever forced myself to learn.
Because once you notice how very wrongly something is positioned, it sticks out like a sore thumb. If you are like me, it is jarring to see it every day and not do anything! It feels like the plant is taunting, saying, “I double dare ya!” But if you want that plant, you will become immune to its taunts. You will wince, take a deep breath, and envision a nice cool, damp fall day, you in jeans, socks and gardening clogs, and maybe even a raincoat, cutting the plant back a bit to help it on its path to re-establishment. Then digging in moist, not soggy, soil, a nice generous root ball that you hoist gently and move to its new home. There, feel better? So does the plant, and the taunts die out in a sigh of comfort and happiness. And that's what our gardens can do for us, too.
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