Since young adulthood I always envisioned a home of my own with a private, secluded garden fashioned after my own design and plan. After 35+ years of planning, owning, cutting out scrub growth, planting and rearranging I now have what I like to call my "secret garden". I got the idea as a young lad in the fifth grade when a class project was the book
The Secret Garden written by Frances Hodgson Burnett. As a class project each student was required to alternate reading from the book. Then I first saw the 1949 movie version on our 16" Motorola TV in 1954. The child actors in the movie portrayed Mary, Dickon & Colin restoring a garden behind an ivy covered wall. And the rest of the story is now 60+ years of nostalgic history since the book and movie.
The only original plants remaining in the picture above are the white oaks. All conifers, perennials and shrubs were added by me. The Eastern Hemlock was collected by me near Houghton-Hancock in Michigan; and actually traveled into Ontario across the International Bridge. I collected and still have three of these. The persimmons I grew from seeds collected in southern Illinois, and the flowering crab apples (four total) are from grand-kids' school projects. The Black Hills Spruces (3) are from a National Arbor Day promotion. Some of the daylilies in the center background are my own hobby seedlings. At the risk of being long-winded & boring I'll leave the rest for the imagination.
