Garden parties

Hydrangea Society shows backyard beauties

Mid-June is a great time for gardens in the MidSouth. Now in their glory are summer perennials such as purple coneflowers, hardy geraniums, Stokes asters, various salvias and the wonderful pink and blue mophead hydrangeas that add to our landscapes and allow us to fill our homes with billowy bouquets.

It’s also when members of the Mid-South Hydrangea Society show off worthy gardens, sell distinctive varieties of their favorite shrubs and display stems of the noteworthy examples they are growing in their own yards at their annual plant sale and garden tour.

Now in its 11th year, the event begins with the plant sale at 9 a.m. in the parking lot near the greenhouses at Dixon Gallery and Gardens, 4339 Park. Shoppers are advised to arrive early for the best selection at the sale, which continues until 11 a.m. or to sellout.

Gardens offering tours from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. are:

McNeal and Pam McDonnell’s, 479 Cherry Road;

Tommy and Buff Adams’, 83 Wychewood;

Tom and Lucy Lee’s, 4285 Walnut Grove Road.

The event is free to members of the hydrangea society, who also may bring one nonmember as a guest. It is $10 for nonmembers.

Last year, McNeal and Pam McDonnell opened their impressive front yard garden to visitors and showed them the drawings of their plans for the back, which they and their garden designer, Dale Skaggs, described as starting as a “big mudhole.”

The transformation is now complete, with various garden “rooms” that give the family a space that is not only tranquil and visually stimulating but also useful for play, exercise, relaxation and harvesting fresh herbs and vegetables.

When it was still a mudhole, McNeal confesses to having a bit of “buyer’s remorse” for the house and property they purchased about seven years ago.

“The screened porch was so hot from the western sun we couldn’t use it,” he said. “Now the crape myrtles provide so much shade — we really enjoy it. Plants changed how we felt about everything.”

Skaggs and McNeal selected six single-trunk Sarah’s Favorite crape myrtles large enough to provide the badly needed shade immediately. Sarah’s Favorite, named for Memphian Sarah Touliatos, also pleases them with long-blooming white flowers, colorful fall foliage and mottled bark.

Before the landscaping project began, the backyard was similar to many others in Memphis — flat and with no topography to speak of.

Pam showed Skaggs photos of gardens with features she wanted, including a sunken vegetable garden and a lawn where their two active sons can play. He provided both areas by having tons of dirt hauled away and retaining walls built.

A round, raised bed filled with herbs is the focal point of the sunken vegetable garden, which is separated from the pool area by a low wall and arched iron entry and fencing that also serves as trellises for edibles and ornamentals.

High on McNeal’s wish list was a “room” with Asian ambience so his prized bonsai trees could be seen from inside the dining room and screened porch.

That project required some special expertise, so John Powell, a Japanesegarden builder and expert pruner from Weatherford, Texas, was called in along with Nick Esthus, curator of the Japanese garden at the Memphis Botanic Garden.

Powell guided the crane operators in placing a truckload full of boulders from the Hot Springs area of Arkansas. Three slatted panels made with ipe, an extremely dense and durable wood from South America, provide a backdrop for the trees and screen a paved parking area from full view.

Granite stepping stones surrounded by white gravel made of turkey grit meander by beds with azaleas, dwarf mondo grass and low, spreading Pacific juniper. Two black pines, expertly pruned by Powell, have starring roles.

Stepping stones provide transportation from room to room in the gardens. Softening their rigidness are tiny plants such as dwarf mondo grass, mazus, strawberry begonia and John Creech sedum planted between them.

Skaggs describes the property as a “plantsman’s garden” with cohesive design elements instead of a hodgepodge collection. Hydrangeas mingle with hardy autumn ferns, variegated Solomon’s seal, hostas and other shade-lovers.

A large planting of Little Lime hydrangeas punctuated by a few larger relatives, Limelights, won’t be showing their cream-to-lime panicles until midsummer. But there are numerous oakleaf varieties including the pink flowering Munchkin as well as the colorful mopheads now in bloom.

Distinctive trees include several weeping Alaskan cedars — including the two that seem to welcome visitors with outstretched “arms” as they drive in — a collection of tea olives, a Japanese umbrella pine, weeping katsura, Ruby Falls redbud and Evening Falls, a rare Japanese styrax with fragrant white bell-shaped flowers set against dark leaves with a purple blush.

Gardening is probably in McNeal’s genes. His parents, Bickie and Michael McDonnell, preside over an often-toured and muchphotographed garden in East Memphis. “As a child, I was more interested in activities like baseball than gardening,” he said. “But now I have an appreciation for it that keeps growing.”