JAPANESE MAPLES & THE BEECH BORDERS

The Beech Borders: so named because they lead down across the lily-pond, across the valley and up the cutting through the poplars where the blue hydrangeas are massed on the axis from the biggest of our beech trees. Under the beech there’s a bench looking down these borders, and behind the tree a semi-circle of what was envisaged as pleached limes. Currently they are sapling-like lime trees, not quite beyond pleaching, and interplanted with witch-hazels. Oops. Confusion in the nursery. And one of the random qualities I love about Sequoia’s gardens! (See the blue hydrangeas here and the bench under the beech here. And in the process see the garden in other seasons! )

At an angle to the axis, tapering down to a point, grow a line of Japanese maples, Acer palmatum, one of our earliest and most successful plantings. They were planted along the stream from the fountain from where we get our house-water. In the above photo you can see the pipe which takes the water from the collection tank near the fountain to the storage tank from where it is pumped up to the house tank.

When I laid out the Beech Borders I planted a second row of Japanese maples in exact symmetry with the the existing ones. They seemed impossibly far of to the left of the axis, and stuck out in the unwelcoming veldt. But they are beginning to make a statement in their own right, as can be seen in the above photo, even if they don’t yet relate – 8 or more years later – to the axis. We are looking back up the slope from the bottom here.

Thirty years on the original trees are majestic, every bit as lovely – nay, more so! – than those we admired at the neighbours, sometime in the mid-seventies when we still thought them crazy to have allowed the garden to take over the farm. (See my post on Cheerio Gardens.)

Here we are looking down that line of Japanese maples, the pipe again visible, with a snakebark maple (Acer davidii) blazing bright yellow in the foreground. But it is in the close-ups that the true beauty and grace of these trees can really be understood…

There. The peak of my year in the garden…

Change of pace now as we stand near the bottom of the Beech Borders and a little off the axis, looking across the water-lily pond to the original grove of swamp cypresses (Taxodium distichum). In the background my exclamation mark gum about which I recently posted.

And  we wind up our autumn walk looking across the lower terrace, with more swamp cypresses, Liquidamber formosana and cannas that look good surrounded by autumn colour. As does Mateczka.

 

WHAT MAKES WINTER–AND MONTY DON–SO SPECIAL?

Saturday I did You Tube, the light sliding in. Sunday I did detail – and completed Monty Don’s The Ivington Diaries.

I have two disconnected issues top of (horticultural) mind at the moment, yet there is definitely a link. On the one hand there is the infinite and obsessive fascination with my own garden in every season and every mood, and the desire to describe it and record it. And on the other hand there is that rare occurrence, especially when one is skidding down the wrong slope of fifty: I have found me a hero.

Over a year ago a dear friend, mother of varsity friends, lent me her copy of Monty Don’s TV series Around the World in Eighty Gardens. I was smitten. Not so much by the gardens, as by the man, and his passionate fascination with what makes gardeners tick, and gardens resonate.

I could relate. And I could learn. And above all, I could appreciate his intensity. I immediately sought out his  books, finding first  The Complete Gardener (I think –I’ve lent it to a friend.) It is a highly personal ‘how-to’ book. Then Louis gave me the book version of the DVD series, Extraordinary Gardens of the World; an extraordinarily beautiful book. Then I went onto the net and ordered The Ivington Diaries, compiled from 15 years’ diaries of his own garden.

This is a unique account of one gardener’s responses to his garden, and his life. I kept marking pages to get back to. I used extracts in class to illustrate style and structure in writing. I moved with him through the garden as it developed, saying sometimes yes!  and sometimes really?, and all the time I felt as if I’d always known him.

An example: on 30 September 2001, recalling a conversation about 9/11, he writes: Someone said that things like gardening and cooking seemed unbearably trivial at times like these, almost disrespectful…But I am sure that this is not just wrong but a real misreading of the times…I am sure that certainties will now seem doubly precious. Verifiable honesty matters more than ever. The flash, the glib and all things phoney will be exposed in this new, rawer light as the dross that they are. Growing things, making something beautiful, eating simple, fresh food – these things matter now more than ever. I often think of how Aldous Huxley, after years of intense exploration, came to the conclusion that all religious and spiritual learning could be summarised into two words: ‘Pay attention’.

Pay attention.

I like that!

Monty Don – The Ivington Diaries, 2009, Bloomsbury, ISBN 978 1 4088 0249 6

 

STOP! FROM THE BEGINNING PLEASE!

Autumn is not getting it right this year. Could we please try again. Not next year – NOW!

No, Jack. YOU stop. Stop finding fault. Stop expecting perfection. Stop that irritating gardener thing of “You should have seen it last week”. Or last year, in this case. Or, in fact, the year before. Because THAT autumn was ravishing. Last year was good and this year… well, so you are disappointed… Get over it. Enjoy it whilst it lasts; it is still far from over.

But yesterday this was the view. And today, when the garden club was visiting, I brought them along here… and the effect had lessened. It should not yet have peaked, but leaves were browning and falling.

Yesterday morning before I went to work (a little later than usual, so there was time for a quick walk), this was what I saw. But this afternoon all of that side of the valley was already in shadow, and they looked across at it with the sun in their eyes. Yes. For once the sun was shining -  and  I moan about it.

I must NOT complain. This is the view that made me set off with my camera yesterday. Not many people start their day like this. And one and all in the garden club told me today how lovely my garden is, and how blessed I am. They are right. So I should not complain. But please: may I KNOW? Know that this autumn is not the greatest. Know that both nature and I can – have – done better. One compliment, though, stands out above all the other: a dear friend who visits the garden regularly, whose photos in fact adorn my cards that I use with gifts and to welcome visitors, told me she had never seen the gardens look so cared for. Not manicured, because like me she likes gardens a little dishevelled: cared for. That compliment I must carry over to my staff tomorrow. They are the ones who achieved it, and every walk I take, I feel it too, and that makes me eternally thankful to them. I have told them so, but when I report back to them tomorrow I will make it abundantly clear how much her comment says of the success of their task.

This month the theme for Gardening Gone Wild’s “Picture This” photo competition is: “Light – look closely”; all about light in close-up and macro photography. I’m doing just that. This is my first study – the last rose of summer, an unexpected blossom on ‘Mothertjie’ where she grows into a tree at the waterlily pond. Study is the wrong word. It was really a snapshot to record the event, which I then prepared as though it was a competition entry. We are not there yet. But ‘Mothertjie’ is rather lovely, none the less.

 

WEEKLY PIC: DECEMBER10 WEEK3

In Afrikaans Hydrangeas are called ‘Christmas Roses’. After many weeks of promise they now swell into maturity. I could have kept this subject for the Christmas week, but that is also the week for wild flowers, and so my Christmas post will feature wild flowers in the garden instead. You can rest assured though – this week’s hydrangea flower will still be there by Christmas… in fact it might even still be there, burnished and patinaed, by Easter…

 The top photo is the sight that currently greets me outside my bathroom window – a mauve Hydrangea macrophylla backed by a purple Buddleja davidii . Many of our hydrangeas are magnificent shades of blue because of our acid soil – pink hydrangeas take extra effort! The photo above is of Hydrangea serrata in the Rondel Garden, surrounded by Tradescantia in various shades of blue, mauve and white. It is a combination I intend repeating in the shade in the Long Border near the new visitors’ parking area.

 Possibly my most successful use of hydrangeas is in the cutting through the poplars at the end of the Beech Border axis. One comes upon them suddenly when walking along the road on the opposite side of the valley, and look across them up to the seat under the beech. I wrote about that part of the garden here, and last summer I wrote extensively on hydrangeas here and here.

 

 

ON THE WHOLE MY OWN OLD ROSES

The Beech Borders are going fortissimo. In the foreground Spiraea x bumalda ‘Anthony Waterer’, an excellent companion to pink roses is starting its long season. Behind it on the very left is Mme Ernest Calvat. To the right of it pale pink New Dawn cascades into  Berberis thunbergii var. atropurpurea, a wonderful foil for it. To the right of the spiraea Belle de Crecy is a perfect colour-match. In the background Ispahan, past its prime, still puts on an amazing show; below it is still in its prime.

 Ispahan  seen in close-p above is a Damask Rose from the Middle East which has been grown for nearly 200 years. It is closely related to Rosa damascena  from which Attar of Roses is distilled. Belle de Crecy, below, is a  mid 19th century Gallica.  The way its quartered blooms seem to have neon highlights and become overlaid with grey shadows make it one of the most desirable of all old roses.

  I cheated and picked the umbel of Anthony Waterer  to show how well these two plants blend. One of the bought roses, Gertrude Jekyll, a David Austin English Roses and thus a recent introduction, is there as much for the associations with her name as for the way she blends in – and continues flowering once the Old Roses are just a memory!

 Duet is a bit of an oddity here. A 1960 Hybrid Tea rose, it is everything the Old Roses are not – including scentless. But I love it. And so it lives rather uncomfortably, surrounded by the lush profusion of this part of the garden.

 Several years back I planted  many cuttings I had grown from my collection of Old Roses in the Rondel Garden ( now sadly depleted) in the area around the Beech Borders. Many are obvious as they form part of the actual border. Others were planted amongst wild grasses nearby and left to cope as best they could. This summer I was surprised to see how many had survived – and well enough that I know with a little more attention they will thrive. Even more heartening was the fact that several were varieties I had lost in the Rondel Garden and forgotten I had successfully propagated!

 Rosa roxburghii or the Chestnut Rose, called thus because of its prickly calyxes, also has a pale, flaky bark. There are some authorities who believe it isn’t even a species of Rosa. But I couldn’t agree with them!

One of the most exciting discoveries was Variegata di Bologna; I had completely forgotten my success with this Bourbon Rose. Bred in 1909 it is beautiful, but needs complex tying in to flower to its maximum potential. The mother-plant in the Rondel is surviving – just…

 Pink Grootendorst looks more like a carnation than a rose. It is a Rugosa hybrid from 1923 and a very easy rose with which to succeed. Like all rugosas its stems are immensely prickly – in fact it is the only rugosa I have succeeded in growing from cuttings and I (rather randomly I guess) blame the prickles!

 I need to get on with my day, so I will leave my remaining pics for a further post. But let’s end with another of my joys,  one of which I have three examples but have lost the mother plant. It is rather a curious rose, thrust at an unsuspecting world between the wars by Nancy Lindsey, the gushy daughter of Norah, the talented and fascinating Edwardian society gardener, and the heir to Lawrence Johnson (of Hidcote Manor)’s French Riviera property, La Serre de la Madone. It seems to be agreed that it is old, although it repeat flowers quite well. It is compact and gloriosly scented. It is not a Damask and not a Portland. To me it seems most like a Gallica. And Miss Lindsey’s purple prose (for which she was famous) for once describes the rose rather well, even if it is a bit of a red herring as to where she got it. Oh yes: it is called Rose de Rescht.

 

 

WEEKLY PIC – NOVEMBER10 WEEK1

Roses in the Beech Borders

There is no doubt about it – this week belongs to the Beech Borders, planted with pink roses. There are lots of old fashioned roses, most of which we grew from cuttings, with the Damask rose Ispahan dominating at present. But you will also find Belle de Crecy,  a Gallica, Jacques Cartier, a Portland, Mme Ernest Calvat, a Bourbon and New Dawn, a climber from 1930. Other roses include more modern roses and David Austins like Gertrude Jekyll as well as two rather feeble little pink roses which I grew from seed. The Beech Borders reach down from the seat under the beech tree to the waterlily pond, where more roses climb into the small indigenous ‘blinkblaar’ tree, Rhamnus prinoides. Then the axis cuts across the valley and up the other side, where a swath of blue hydrangeas will later flower in a cutting through a forest of poplar saplings. You can see it here in a long blog on hydrangeas. Below is Ispahan. And in due course I will add more rose pics!

 

TAUPE AND TAWNY – OR WINTER’S GRUNGE?

Between late afternoon and dusk I take a walk – and whereas on other days the drabness has depressed me, today its subtlety has filled me with joy. So I concentrate on capturing the colours of deepest winter in my photographs…

The last photo first – deep dusk on the stones of the path at the Cottage Garden

The Beech Borders first draw my attention to the photogenic nature of the theme…

The Beech Tree and seat, backed by a semi-circular hedge of witchazel and lime

Then the seat, and the textures in the composition keep me busy – meanwhile the dogs are ratting in the tall grass behind me, unconcerned that the walk is interrupted.

 I could of course claim that the colour scheme is considered and deliberate…

How could I a few days ago have found this sight depressing?

 A carpet of leaves, evenly strewn, and soft light – a glow…

And nestling in this season’s death lies next season’s birth.

 Beech buds seem to hold more promise than most other trees…

And the promise is reinforced by the spiraeas, sporting minute flowers even before all autumn leaves are shed.

 Each flower no more than 3mm 1/8in across

Whereas the memory of summer’s flowers are… well… faded…

 Verbena bonariensis’s tiny but intense purple flowers produce plentiful seed

…Some less so than others…

 Everlastings never quite lose their colour, the remnants of summer’s gold hidden in winter’s amber.

A lone grass seedhead sways  over the last leaves of the water lilies.

  Survivor of mower and marauder, strimmer and scythe…

The light off the Makou Dam is cold as moonlight.

 And earlier in the week we saw four otters play in the water

Browns seem to be plated in silver…

 Bracken leaf near the Makou  Dam

 In the arboretum the hydrangeas which once marched up the hill in blues and whites under a canopy of tulip trees now wear neutral fatigues.

  Though even now their colour contributes drama …

Witchazel is Old Gold in the gloom – highlight rather than colour.And  the leaves are the richest deep brown.

 

Texture is all…

Seeds and branches 

…And Mateczka’s colouring fits in perfectly.

 Here she is among the Swamp Cypresses at the far fountain.

Bark detailing becomes prominent, and the thin layer of fallen leaves and twigs contrast with the water in the stream.

 The darkest of the Japanese maples has quite a different winter charm.

Nearby the most dramatically wintery of our many tree ferns salute passersby.

 Almost evergreen in a frost-free climate, ours are decidedly seasonal!

Below I played with a different format – do you know how much purple there is in these browns!

Have I mentioned texture before…

Bench and stump in Quercus Corner; a good rest in the furthest corner of the garden.

 Heading back towards the House that Jack Built I photograph the hydrangeas along Oak Avenue.

 Is this what I really saw, or is the camera becoming creative with the available light? Fact is, the hydrangeas under the verticals of the trees made for an impressive composition…

Finally – well, near finally, for from here we move back to my first photo – we see the view from The House that Jack Built…

I have always called the bridge the icon of my garden – and for the first time in years the half-moon meadow is cleared and echoes the curve of the bridge.

 

HOORAH FOR HYDRANGEAS part 1

I promised a walk around my hydrangeas, so let’s set off… Under the oaks on Oak Avenue, near my stone cottage, there are many mopheads in shades of blue.

Because of my acid soil, blues are particularly good and I have shades from pale through powder to rich dark blue. A particular favourite is almost turquoise, an amazing colour in a plant. Those with a mauvish tinge would be pinker, even pure pink in alkaline soil.

 

After last week’s sunny hydrangeas, let me stress that these are planted under a dense but high canopy of pin oaks and gnarled Ouhout  trees, with little direct sun ever reaching them except in the early morning. 

There are several areas in the garden where hydrangeas play an important role, and we will stop to look at a few of them. The white hydrangeas across Freddy’s Dam were picked to show right until the last light and to reflect in the water. It is time I clear a little under the flowering cherries and lift the canopy, for the depth of white in under the trees is all but lost. On the other hand I love the denseness when you cross the bridge and climb up the sheltered path where foliage meets overhead…

Here they are again, seen from the bridge today, the ripples caused by Taubie dog taking a swim in the heat. In the foreground are several shades of Schizostylis coccinea, which is usually scarlet as the name implies. The scarlet species form grows wild on the farm, but these were planted.

The white can be absolutely pure, but it is never so for long. The immature blooms are greenish, as they mature they often get a blue cast, and as they are splattered with rain and start to age, first pink and then wonderfully rich wine-red and blue metallic colourations (that’s the only word for them!) appear. The pinking has started on some of the older and more exposed blooms in the previous photograph, and the masthead shows you what they look like by late April, 3 months hence.

One of the most satisfying gardening afternoons I’ve ever had was after a particularly frustrating day at school. I went home and instead of marking, threw two massive axes out into the garden. I had thought about it for long, but the sheer scale of the planning was exhilarating. The first follows the contour from below the Rosemary Borders and in the opposite direction towards the beech above the Beech Borders. The second runs perpendicular to it from the beech across the contour, through the Beech Borders, across the lily pond and then cuts through a stand of young poplars on the opposite slope, across a sweep of blue hydrangeas and onto an Acer saccharinum and beyond across the arboritum to the conifer planted by my mother at the official planting of the arboritum on my birthday in 1988. So many serendipitous placings came together on that day, some of which I had planned over years, others which were pure chance.

It took several years after old Frans planted the hydrangeas for them to make a show, and there was plenty of weeding to be done in the early days, but he kept at it, and for the past two years these hydrangeas have been of my favourite incidents in the garden.

Here they are again, this time from the other side, where one comes upon them suddenly in their gap among the poplars…

 

Here they are again, for I couldn’t resist including this photograph, taken this afternoon. And now, although we are not yet halfway through the walk, I think it is time to take a rest, and to continue our explorations later…

PS: This is my first post written using Windows Live Writer – thanks to our great guru and friend from Blotanical,  Jean from Jean’s Garden. The only problem was loading what was a rather large file through my iffy internet, more than made up for by the slickness of composing without the irritation of uploading. And I love being able to chose my font, the borders and the watermark. Now it is only the narrowness of the blog which irritates me – but try looking at it at 125% magnification!

 

 

A LONG WALK TO LOOK AT BLOWSY ROSES

I’ve been asked about my red foliage and my roses, so I’ll identify my roses in this post and tell you a little more about other plants. And I’ll take you to a number of other spots around the garden, but let’s start again in the Beech Borders.

All the roses you see here I grew from cuttings from stock first planted in the Rondel Garden in 1996. From left to right they are: the bright pink of the Damask rose Ispahan (early 1800s) which featured often in the previous post. A few blooms of the  Bourbon rose Mme Ernst Calvat (1888) peek out from behind it and look rather similar. The pale pink is New Dawn, one of the best climbers of all time. In 1930 it sported as a repeat-flowering version of a 1910 introduction – one of the most fascinating rose sports of all time, as for the rest they are identical. To its right the rich pink of the Gallica Belle de Crecy(+-1850s) All these roses are wonderfully scented. Towards the back, more Ispahan. The red shrub is Berberis thunbergii atropurpurea and the pink flowered shrub which I love to mix with roses is Spirea x bumalda ‘Anthony Waterer’. They too are grown from cuttings; when you garden on this scale doing your own propagation is necessary ! The background is a row of seven now mature Acer palmatum (Japanese maples – a glorious sight in autumn) and to the right is Acer davidii, one of the snake-bark maples.

My nephews aged 16 and 14 were here from Namibia last week. They crept down to The Embarkment to get to the water with good grace. They knew that cutting the plants that had fallen across the path was out of the question –  an Abelia x grandiflora and two roses: the common moss rose Rosa centifolia muscosa (before 1700) and the Four Seasons White Moss Quatre saisons blanc mousseux (1835)

Another of these impressively named roses holds its own across the water after (I must admit) being dumped there some years ago when the area was much more open in the hope it would survive. To its left Acer palmatum atropurpureum with Rhododendron luteum  and Exochorda x macrantha below and Salix babylonica ‘Crispa’, the lovely Ram’s Horn Willow to its right.

Here is a view of my house through the Four Seasons Whie Moss, the camera held above my head. If nothing else this photo proves that it was not pruned last year, but survives quite happily nonetheless! ‘Four Seasons’ is a bit of an exaggeration – it repeat flowers slightly in autumn. Which was, of course, very unusual when it was first introduced…

Whilst on the far side of the dam, a view of my house and yes, my vehicle: a Malaysian designed Toyota Condor 4×4 diesel: it works like a slave, can carry 7 passengers or a load of plants or cement or even take a full-sized mattress when I go camping. Irreplaceable, it has been superseded by vehicles that are hopelessly too sophisticated and expensive to play such a multi-purpose role! (Anyone from Toyota reading this??) White climbing Iceberg roses (1968 – had to add a date for this modern classic!) grow left and right onto my house, with a Clematis montana adding to the show on the right. Overhanging the dam at the entertainment area are two Félicité et Perpétue roses, a lovely old climber from 1827. Penelope, a Hybrid Musk from 1924, graces the Cottage Garden below the Condor.

Here is another view across the Cottage Garden to where we have just been; the green  rod in the right quarter has me baffled. I suspect it is a rather potent Watsonia – but it will come as a wonderful surprise when it flowers. (No, I’m NOT going to identify the trees to the right of the willow right now!)

Near the garage the Wichuraiana rambler Excelsa scrambles up into a pine; wonderful if the mildew doesn’t do too much harm to it!

As  I’ve said before, the Rondel Garden, home to my original old-fashioned roses, commemorating Sissinghurst in its name and Francois in its existence, is in need of serious replanning… This is Rosa moyesii ‘Geranium’. I’ve never seen a single one of the famed flagon-shaped hips on it. Climate? Or just my bad luck to have an infertile strain? Iceberg on the house.

Still in the Rondel, Pink Grootendorst (A Dutch surname meaning ‘big thirst’ – there are three members in the rugosa family!) has flowers frilled like a carnation and dates from 1923. To its left in the rugosa bed is Frau Dagmar Hastrup from 1914. Prunus cerasifera in one of its many forms provides a plummy background.

We now move to the end of the wisteria arbour in the Anniversary Garden where the Polyantha climber Veilchenblau (1909) lives up to its name which means ‘Blue veil’. Below it the wonderfully subtle strawwy yellows of Buff Beauty (a shrubby climber from 1939) can be seen. Veilchenblau is beginning to climb up into the Japanese maple. I can’t wait to see the effect five years from now!

I planted New Dawn in the Upper Rosemary Border by mistake, thinking it something else. It has scrambled about, reaching for the sun through the thick planting of smallish shrubs, and set off especially well against Abelia x grandiflora. The species Rosa rugosa has been a mixed blessing next to it, suckering whenever the roots are damaged during cultivation. However the flowers are a perfect colour match with Spirea x bumalda ‘Anthony Waterer’ and the rose flowers continuously, later producing startling orange hips at the same time as its magenta flowers. I enjoy the unsubtle colour mix and the birds enjoy the food. Win-win, I’d say.

Here is another view, taken from the Rosemary Terrace; I’ve written enough and you’ve read enough. No more details on the planting.

This is the first year I’ve even noticed the Tausendschön (Thousand beauties, 1906, a Polyantha climber) in the purple crab-apple. It must be five or more years since I planted it there. It repeat flowers in a good spot. This can’t be one. But it will grow through the tree and in years to come give greater joy.

Gosh, this walk is exhausting me! We are now up in the arboretum where I planted a number of tough roses some six or more years ago. The rather garish pink was incorrectly marked ‘Compassion’ but has proved itself to be tough alright. Behind it is South Africa. I will sing its praises (the best rose since Iceberg???) in a future post. A single flower is all that can be seen of Rosa chinensis mutabilis about which I will tell you more when I post close-ups soon.

And so down we go and across the Makou Dam to the old stone barn. Tausendschön,  the mother plant of many on the mountain, absolutely loves this sunny spot where I planted it nearly 20 years ago. Beyond it another repeat-flowering pink rambler-like climber grows on the fence of the vegetable garden. I’ve known this rose all my life here on the farm and in neighbouring gardens. Unlike most climbers – and definitely most ramblers – it has an incredibly long season, being one of the first in bloom and carrying on right into winter. It is very happy here where it steals the sun from the veggies, happier than its mother plant, and being a sucker for charm and beauty I allow it to keep pride of place.

We end our walk (pant, pant) at Trudie’s Garden outside the big house, where I reiterate what I said at the beginning of the previous post: I like roses where they can grow as huge as they like and flop over complimentary shrubs and be voluptuous and abandoned. This might be a rather more elegant lady, a prim and sophisticated hybrid tea called Germiston Gold, but she too benefits from the arm of a dapper shrub to show off her assets…

 

BLOWSY ROSES IN THE BEECH BORDERS

It is rose season at Sequoia Gardens, a time of extremes of joy and despair. It is not really a rose climate; it tends to be too damp when the roses are supposed to look their best. In addition this past season I’ve not always provided the necessary support with feeding and pruning (I don’t do any spraying anyway). But walking through the garden recently and looking at the scene below, I knew where the strength – and the future development – of my roses lay…

Fact: I will never be a neat gardener. Fact: my roses often need to fend for themselves. Fact: roses in an unneat garden having to fend for themselves are a disgrace. Fact: my roses often succeed in being superb despite all these facts! How and why? My best roses flop heavily onto other shrubs, or have a strong supporting cast when they aren’t capable of taking centre-stage. Many are once-flowering old-fashioned shrub roses. Many are tough as nails – what Ludwig, South Africa’s Mr Rose has coined Eco-Chic roses and marked with a red ladybird in his wonderful colour-catalogue. I must stop thinking along the lines of outdated rosebeds! (Except of course for Trudie’s Garden, where that is part of its charm, and where I do try to do the high maintenance thing.) I must accept that the Anniversary Garden is a 60% rose flop and fix it, not as a rose garden, but as a colour-themed garden with many roses. I must nurture the roses in mixed beds if (but only if) they are happy. And I must develop a large area where the old-fashioned roses can grow as huge as they like and flop over complimentary shrubs and be voluptuous and abandoned… the Rondel Garden is too small for most of the old-fashioned roses! And because of the editing nature of photography I can go SNAP! and make it look as though this has all already happened!

Already the Beech Borders display this philosophy rather well. Refine and expand will be the motto here – there is an area of some 30 by 70m next to this that I’ve been wondering about for years now…

It lies in the rectangle between the Standen Walk and the Beech Borders which you can see in this panorama…

At the bottom of the Beech Borders lies the Waterlily Pond…

And beyond that the New Dawn rose is spectacular for the first time this year….

Now let’s reverse back up the Beech Borders…

…until we are under the beech. The round pot contained Raubritter, the wonderful globular pink rose, to mark the intersection of the gardens. It died of neglect.  Down the bottom the magnificent tree fern is a bit of a bind because it narrows down the view of the pond. Ah well… count your blessings. It was there long before my garden, after all!

One of the tricks I wish to explore is the combination of red foliage with pink roses – in fact any foliage that compliments the blowsy badly behaved roses I adore. In my next post I will show you more in other parts of Sequoia Gardens!