Garden OFTHE WEEK
plants, which is very good for them and it gives me lots to sell on the stall for my garden openings.”
She recently turned a shrubbery into a gravelled area for displaying pots of more tender gladiolus, agapanthus, galtonia, eucomis, Geranium
palmatum and G. canariense. “This display is always changing so I spend an awful lot of time moving pots from A to B,” Christine laughs. “In winter, they all go into the gazebo area, which we put a front on to keep it frost proof.”
She no longer grows any veg because “I’d rather concentrate on getting a full year’s colour out of my flowers, trees and shrubs”.
Wildlife is encouraged – a robin is nesting in one of her hanging baskets of fuchsias, set on a pillar. Keith has created an insect hotel from pots and cones; and there’s a bird box on the metasequoia “but that’s currently home to a nest of bumblebees who got in first”.
They’ve discovered that their garden used to be surrounded by fields before the neighbouring properties gradually sprung up around them. “I would’ve loved an open view,” Christine says, “but instead I’ve created my own view and I can also borrow my neighbours’ trees for added interest!”