TENDER LOVING CARE
Justine Picardie describes the soothing ritual of catering for her plants’ needs – and explains how you can do the same this winter
Epoque’, which has luscious, peonylike blooms, along with ‘Angelique’, ‘Carnaval de Nice’, ‘Blushing Girl’ and ‘Apricot Beauty’.
If you’re reading this in November, it’s the right time to plant tulips, although the conventional wisdom would suggest that other spring bulbs should have gone into the ground by now. Nevertheless, I planted alliums and camassias a little later than recommended last year, and they still performed well. Aside from their spectacularly bold appearance, the advantage of alliums is that the squirrels don’t eat them, and they are truly wonderful en masse: my favourites are ‘Purple Sensation’, ‘Purple Rain’ ‘Atropurpureum’, ‘Azureum’ and ‘Giganteum’. Camassias are equally rewarding; they look like a graceful, taller version of wild hyacinths, with intensely blue, star-like flowers, and seem just as much at home in our wildflower meadow as they do in the borders around the house. As with daffodils and crocuses, I prefer to see great swathes of these, rather than solitary specimens.
Once you have your bulbs in place, you can start filling in any gaps with perennials, and for me, no garden is complete without fragrant plants that will attract butterflies and bees. I’d begin with English lavender – specifically, the ‘Grappenhall’ variety, which is large enough not to be dwarfed by roses, and the fragrance is heavenly. Then I’d add Verbena bonariensis (six feet high, and covered in clusters of violet flowers for several months on end) and Nepeta grandiflora ‘Dawn to Dusk’, otherwise known as catmint, with its aromatic leaves and light-pink blooms. Alongside these, you could try Valerian officinalis (if you cut it back in late summer, you should get a second flush of white florets); Salvia nemorosa ‘Caradonna’, which has elegant spires of violet petals above grey-green foliage; and Veronicastrum virginicum ‘Spring Dew’, topped with slender spikes of pale-blue flowers. I’ve planted all of these in generous clumps, rather than lonely samples, mingled with Aquilegia; and done the same in my bed of herbs, where the sage is thriving amid chives, mint, rosemary, tarragon and thyme.
The other essentials are hardy geraniums, and you can’t go wrong with ‘Rozanne’, ‘Blue Cloud’ and ‘Summer Skies’; they form drifts of delicate flowers that weave their way through the borders and cover the bare earth. I’ve also discovered the delights of Thalictrum ‘Elin’ (or meadow rue) and Selinum wallichianum; the first is covered in clouds of tiny, amethyst-coloured flowers, the second in soft, milky-white umbers, and together, they create a pleasingly frothy display in late summer. And if you have enough space for it, I highly recommend the soaring Gaura lindheimeri, which has elegant stems adorned with pink buds that open into small white flowers; they seem to dance like tiny butterflies in a breeze, and last longer than almost anything else in the garden. In the remaining spaces between these handsome perennials, I’ve grown my favourite annuals and biennials: forget-me-nots (which, with any luck, will self-seed), hollyhocks, foxgloves, white cosmos and old-fashioned sweet peas that scramble up bamboo wigwams in a south-facing border. Finally, I think it’s important to have plants that will give you pleasure in winter. A garden shouldn’t feel like a fairweather friend, which is why evergreens are so vital. It may seem unimaginative to plant holly and ivy, but just remember how cheering these are at Christmas. Similarly, camellias and hellebores are heartening, as are the heavenly scented daphnes and sweet box (or Sarcococca confusa). And in the belief that daydreams should have a place in every garden, I’m hoping to create a glade of silver birches, with ice-white trunks that will shimmer even on the darkest days of January, rising above a magical carpet of snowdrops…