Love thy fellow gardener and bless my blooms

MOST of the gardeners I’ve met are busy people who are more than happy to share their expertise and their garden despite the fact that by the time you have finished visiting them, you will have a basket full of plants that you have taken from their garden that you want to try in your garden.

You might think that if one did this, all the time gardens would slowly morph into the same sort of garden. But it doesn’t happen because we are all different and our properties are different. Some have big trees, others have views and others more water.

Some gardeners like building things, some like their gardens to ramble while others don’t like to see a blade of grass out of place.

As a result, gardeners love to view other people’s gardens to see what they have done to overcome problems they have encountered and to see how different plants react to different environments.

My garden was on show and I went through a series of emotions. Firstly, I got grumpy that my garden wasn’t looking tidy enough. This resulted in unnecessary tongue lashings of people working in the garden; then anxiety when I visited one of the other gardens being viewed and discovered that her garden was much more organised than mine. I then relaxed as Judy and I showed different groups around our garden.

At the end of it all, I had a great feeling of having made new friends with whom we can share our love of gardens and gardening. I also got motivated to introduce great ideas I got from other gardens I viewed and from people who visited our garden, and to get busy with aspects of the garden that had been put onto the back burner. I love gardeners because they remind me how much I enjoy my garden and they make sure that my job is never finished.

We can always aspire to be better . . . and then sit back, and enjoy it! If you have any ideas please contact simon.oliver@seeff.com