Susie’s Garden
Ferns featured at Chelsea this year – but our garden expert was already a big fan of all varieties…
All about ferns
We made this garden from a derelict site, with David having to rebuild many of the stone walls and make new steps and paths. To take away that newly made look, I used ferns to add a feeling that the garden had been here for a while.
I tucked tiny maidenhair spleenwort ferns into gaps between stones and softened the base of walls with polypody ferns.
Lots of ferns were included in the Back to Nature Garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, a garden co-designed by the Duchess of Cambridge. They are strong on foliage, add texture and pattern, and are low maintenance too.
The Victorians were crazy for them and built special ferneries, both outdoors and in
glasshouses. Tender ferns make good houseplants but it is the outdoor hardy ferns which can be used to lighten dark corners and combine with woodland plants such as hellebores and primulas. They just need a damp but well drained soil with added leaf mould under dappled shade.
Some ferns are evergreen and have a long season of interest, particularly beautiful when unfurling in spring. One of my favourites is the shuttlecock or ostrich fern. It likes a damp spot – mine was struggling beneath some trees so I moved it to a more moist soil where it has romped away. It’s fresh green in spring with an elegant symmetrical shape and spreads by underground runners.
My garden is too cold in winter for maidenhair fern but for warmer areas, this pretty plant has a beautiful delicacy and will seed itself about. This is the fern often used in flower bouquets. One I do grow is the sensitive fern; it’s called that because it gets hit by the first frost of autumn. It has rhythmically spaced fronds and looks lovely in the shady border.
Then there’s the native harts tongue fern with glossy deep green leaves and the grand, impressive royal fern which grows to five feet tall. There are colourful varieties too such as the Japanese painted fern – a mix of silver, burgundy and purple – or the bronze-coloured autumn fern which has red new growth in spring. There’s a huge variety of colour and leaf form.