LysmachiaMoon's blog: Speed gardening

You've heard of speed dating? I've invented "Speed gardening." It's weird how a gardener can get inspiration. I was watching BBC Gardeners World from a few weeks ago (catching up), and they were at York Gate garden. It's a magical place, and one I've seen featured before. The first time I saw pictures of York Gate, I fell in love and in a big way, it's the inspiration for a lot of my garden here. But time has a way of dulling inspirations and I have to admit I'd mostly forgotten all about York Gate until I saw it again on Gardeners World.

Sometimes seeing great gardens depresses me. I've been working at this garden for 36 years now and it's so far from "finished." Two acres, one woman with a full time job, not a whole lot of $$, very little time and virtually no help...it's not easy. I guess I should be glad for what I have accomplished, but I still wish for more. Anyways, seeing York Gate and thinking about how I would love to have something like that ...well, sitting there mooning over somebody else's garden isn't going to get YOUR garden planted, missy.

I drove straight up to the recycling center, got a load of mulch (not the nicest...mostly it's just raw wood chips, but we take what we can get), came home and carted it all down to the South Long Border where I've been digging out blackberries and weeding, etc. There's a big section of the Long Border there that's more or less empty except for some spring daffodils and a patch of astilbe. I decided last week to put Chinese Forget-me-nots and miniature comfrey into that section because both these do very well in dry shade once they get established. Plus, both are growing rampantly into the paths around the Pond Circle, so this would be a "light two candles with one match" situation, which is great for a time-pressed gardener like me.

I know myself pretty well. Normally, I'd have gone over the bare border and removed every last tiny bit of wild strawberry, weeds, etc. Then I'd probly have called it a day and planned to start digging out the plants from the Pond Circle tomorrow. And then, doubtless, something else would rear up and I'd put that off and a couple of weeks would go by and nothing done. So I decided to act like this was something so time sensitive that it HAD to be done today, this afternoon, within a couple of hours. I decide to try Speed Gardening.

First, I hoed off the empty bed and scraped away the weeds. Good enough. Then I started digging planting holes; nothing fancy. Just plonk, lift, turn, done. The trick is to count. I dug 12 holes. Then I went to the Pond Circle path and lifted 12 clumps of forget-me-nots. Got a bucket of warmish water. One cup of water tossed into each of the holes, then each clump plunked into the bucket for a count of 10, then tossed into a planting hole. Then backfilled and closed up each hole. Then each got another cup of water, then mulch tossed around. Then another 12 holes dug, etc. etc. All in all, I got about FORTY plants moved in 2 hours, a border about 8 feet wide and 20 feet long pretty much filled and mulched. I tried to lift each plant with a good amount of earth on the roots, and I think pre-soaking them for a few seconds will get them off to a good start. And not only is most of the Pond Circle path cleared, I also was able to reset some of the brick edging where it had leaned over.

I was frankly amazed at how fast I could work if I didn't faff around trying to be tidy and not get my pants muddy. I think it's easy for me to sort of daydream while I garden, fall into a slow rhythm while I admire the passing butterflies and sniff at the last of the roses. This is ok sometimes, but it won't get the garden moving forward at the pace I'd like.

Tomorrow, I'm getting everything potted into the ground. I have about 20 plants that I've acquired over the summer and I want them in the ground before it gets much colder. I already know where most of them are going; the ones I'm not sure of, I'll pop into the cleared veg bed to hold over winter (in the ground, out of their pots).

Speed gardening is for me!

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