Frumps, Fogies, Failures

So, I’m back stateside but not quite home as yet. That happens this coming weekend. However, reality is beginning to set in as my mind goes over the tasks awaiting. Bills, unpacking, laundry, grocery shopping are the usual back-to-the-routine activities that facilitate the reentry into ‘normal’.

Given that this is already the third week into September, it’s also that time of year when I review the garden. Fall planting is about to commence and one needs to know what has worked and what has not. Each year I’m tempted to be bold and rip out entire sections to experiment with improbably ambitious dreams but then common sense gets in the way and tries to curb my enthusiasm. I’m not entirely comfortable with being just ‘sensible’ or the garden remaining as is. All gardens need to evolve and, I need to have a bit of a challenge – an experiment of sorts to push beyond my comfort zone. After all that’s how the ‘meadow’, espalier and vertical garden were conceived. Each of which give me great joy and inspiration.

Last fall saw the installation of the big sculpture Wind Song. This year however, with numerous other projects demanding my time and energy, I’m not planning on anything ambitious. I’ll certainly be planting hundreds of bulbs as usual but otherwise, I’m only going to examine the garden in terms of which plants I’m unhappy, bored or downright out of love with. They will have to go. More happy-making and/or edgy replacements will be found.

Here is my list thus far –

Frumps – ‘firebird’ geraniums. I had thought it would be fun with its fringed edged flowers but instead, it has looked rather dowdy. Did absolutely nothing except sit in the window-boxes. No pizazz at all. I will replace ( actually, revert) with my much loved and briefly neglected ivy-leaved geraniums. I’m also hoping to source Geranium phaem ‘Samobar’ and Papaver cambricum for the meadow – they appear rather elegant and airy. Precisely the look I myself aspire to achieve some day.

Fogies – Blue lobelia. I’m still fond of them but they tend to succumb to summer heat very quickly and start looking brown and crispy. They’ve been a ho-hum mainstay too long. Instead, I’m going to try a blue Streptocarpus. Although they are usually seen as indoor plants, I saw them in pots and window-boxes at a friend’s garden earlier this year and thought they were lovely.

Failures – Eremurus! This was my third attempt with the fox-tail lilies. Only one out of six bulbs planted emerged and bloomed. I’m done with them. Too expensive and too picky. Next year, I’m going to delight myself with a host of sunflowers in that same spot – dependable and downright brilliant. It is impossible to look at sunflowers and not smile.

No doubt, as I get over jet-lag I will come up with more candidates to vote out. A trip to the nursery will surely give more inspiration. Stay tuned!

Doesn’t this a whole lot better than …

…this?

The lone, pathetic eremurus.

Don’t you feel uplifted looking at this instead?

(c) 2017 Shobha Vanchiswar

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