IN DEFIANCE OF A TRENDY GARDEN

Two things happened on the same day earlier this week that once again reinforced my "garden for yourself" school of thought.

First, I read Garden Media Group's analysis of the gardening trends they see for 2018. One of the things it seems to show is that the trend toward a less cultivated style of gardening is growing. I think we have Piet Oudolf and the new perennial garden movement to thank for that. A few weeds are OK, leave some things standing for the birds and keep nature in mind.

Then, as I was walking out the door on a very foggy morning, I snapped a quick picture of the patio garden, which is looking quite nice for this time of year. Like a lot of gardeners, I take a lot of closeup photos, often at the expense of the larger view (a forest for the trees, situation, if you will). So it was sort of nice to force myself to see this area in a photo and be generally pleased with what I saw.

So I started thinking about the garden trends I had just read about. Granted, this report is created with the garden industry in mind. It's meant to help people in the business better target their customers wants and needs and to help garden media understand what kinds of things consumers are interested in. Still, I can't imagine a major change in my overall gardening style happening at this point.

This was the first garden I "developed" when we bought the house and I've shared a lot of the failures and successes in it on this blog. I'd say there have been a lot more disappointments than pleasant surprises in this garden, a factor of my inexperience in its original creation and an unwillingness to start from scratch.

There are still challenges, but I think this is as good as this part of the garden has looked. I'm onto something—finally—and no amount of trend following is going to change that.

Of course I could always use that report to feel a little better about the fact that there is always a weed lurking in there. And there is, perhaps, one other advantage to embracing that report, as it relates to my garden. Earlier this year, when I shared a less flattering photo of this garden on Facebook, one reader told me, "Sorry, it just looks like a bunch of weeds." If I had known then what I know now, I could have told her I was just embracing a trend.

THREE PLANTS I'LL GROW THIS YEAR

Much of the past decade of gardening at my house has been an alternating pattern of creating new gardens and improving existing gardens. A couple years ago I realized that I probably have as much garden square footage as I can handle (and frankly probably too much) at this point in my life, so my focus has shifted to refining the existing gardens, some of which were installed in haste and not well thought out.

I don't regret just getting on with those gardens, because as we know, gardens are ever changing, one of many reasons why gardening never gets boring. I've made no secret of the fact that some of the first gardens I created were not really designed at all, but had random plants plunked in them. Now, as I revisit those areas, I'm taking a much more conscious and measured approach in my plan. My color and plant palette is more restrained (although still probably not restrained enough) and I give much more thought to plants selection.

Last fall I cleaned out a large section of what I call the patio garden, the most prominent garden we have. For years, much of that part was filled with rudbeckia and anemones that were allowed to spread out. Both are excellent plants that I wouldn't be without, but I struggled to make them work in that location and constantly struggled with plant combinations. I incorporated a fair amount of compost and leaf mold to refresh the soil there so a blank slate will await me in spring.

It looks like a complete mess in this photo that I took in fall, with overgrown annuals surrounding it. But I have a vision of a more refined space.

Although I've not worked up a complete planting plan for the area, I've selected three plants that will make up a bulk of the planting there (and that I'll repeat farther east in that garden).

Fall color: White Flower Farm photo

In flower: Grimms Gardens photo

The first is Amsonia hubrictii. This is not a new plant. In fact it was the perennial plant of the year in 2011, but for whatever reason I didn't take note of it then. Then last year, I kept running into it at various gardens and couldn't get it off my mind. It's the foliage that I love. Wispy, threadlike leaves create a cloudlike texture that I love. And it turns a brilliant yellow in fall, which will provide some much-needed color in that part of the garden.

Side note: The Chicago Botanic Garden did a plant evaluation of hardy amsonias. These are amazing resources so I always look for them when deciding what to plant.

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The second plant is Calamintha nepeta 'Montrose White'. Again, it's not a new plant, but was one I wasn't familiar with until last year when I attended a talk by designer Carrie Hennessy from Johnson's Nursery. It was named by Mike Yanny (who is responsible for developing some amazing trees and shrubs), whose wife got it from Montrose Nursery and saw how it thrived. It's deer resistant, doesn't flop, gets no more than 18 inches tall, and is said to bloom from June through frost. It's also sterile and is said to root incredibly easy from cuttings. What more can you ask for in a perennial? I've said it before and it still holds true: The bones of a practical garden need to be no-nonsense plants. That doesn't mean you can't have divas, but they can't all need coddling.

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And lastly, I think I'm going to put in some Hydrangea serrata Tiny Tuff Stuff. I was excited when this plant was introduced last year (or maybe the year before) and everything I've read about it seems positive. I felt like the amsonia and calamintha really needed something with a coarser texture in order to show off their finer texture attributes, and this hydrangea, which is small in stature, still has nice big, thick leaves.

This won't be it, of course. I'll need some taller elements and maybe something a bit spiky or strappier. I think Verbena bonariensis would look great dotted amongst them, and perhaps some  'Howard David' dahlias would work.  But these three will be the foundation for that area, one I'm comfortable with for their numerous traits and low-maintenance nature.

What's most important to you when it comes to choosing new plants to add to your garden?

GARDENING LIKE IT'S GOING TO RAIN

Quick giveaway notes: The winner of the Perfect Garden Hose is Linnae! Congratulations, Linnae. Check your email. The rest of the giveaways are still open. The next to close is the giveaway of the A.M. Leonard Deluxe Soil Knife. 

There is efficient gardening and then there is the kind of gardening you do when a rainstorm is predicted that night. The latter kind of gardening is bound to leave with sore muscles where you didn't know you had muscles, very dirty and utterly spent.

I gave the patio chairs a new blue hue. I wish it was more navy, but you take what you can get when it comes to spray paint. They were dry by the time the rain came that night.

That's the kind of gardening I did Sunday. I also had a few painting projects started on Saturday—spraying the patio chairs and painting the cellar doors—to finish up. Among the day's gardening accomplishments:

• I planted two small hornbeams that I picked up on a bit of lark (and to test whether they really are deer resistant before I invest in more). Hornbeams will pleach (grow together), so ideally some day they will form a bit of a raised gateway to the vegetable gardening area.
• I planted 15 or so bareroot irises along the little creek. I'm hoping they will love this spot and take over an area that is otherwise nothing great to look at.
• Stuck an equal number of small trillium bulbs in the shade garden (which needs tons of work; lots of plant labels acting as tombstones this year).
• Dug out all of the Russian sage (Perovski atriplicifolia) and the drumstick alliums (Allium sphaerocephalon) out of the skinny patio garden and moved them to the other side of the house. Also rescued a healthy clematis (I think it's 'Mrs. N. Thompson'), hopefully rescued another (maybe 'Westerplatte') and declared a pathetic little tangutica not worth the effort. 
• Potted up some of the ostrich ferns (Matteuccia struthiopteris) that are in the way of path in the woods to sell at our master gardener plant sale at the end of the month. 
• Dug out much of the "soil" in the skinny patio bed that has been giving me so much trouble and replaced with with bagged garden soil, top soil, compost and manure.

It might not be much to look at right now, but the new skinny patio bed is all cleaned up, soil heavily amended/replaced and mulched until it is planted later this month. The only thing I didn't move was a daffodil that's been there forever. It's the very first thing to bloom in the entire yard every year and I just felt like it deserved to keep its spot.

That last one was the real killer, but getting in there and really digging down offered some answers as to why nothing has been thriving there. About 6 inches down it is entirely sand. Over the years the soil in that bed has been mounded up as I added compost and mulch on top of it, but since it was planted I was never able to incorporate that in. Since it's already a little drier area because of the small eaves on the house, very little moisture was getting to plants, even though I watered somewhat frequently. When I dug up the Russian sage and the clematis, they all came up bareroot—no root ball at all. 

I mixed the whole thing up, along with the remaining sand, to a depth of at least 18 inches if not more. Because I don't expect to plant here until the end of the month, I also covered it up with a thin layer of pine bark fines mulch and it is now a lovely blank canvas. Or it was until the dog walked through it Monday monring.

I still have to do a small area on the other side of the cellar door, but that was quite enough for yesterday.

Back to waiting for rain though. Because we were supposed to get a rather impressive storm, the only thing I watered all day was the two hornbeam trees. Everything else—the bare root irises, trillium bulbs, alliums and transplanted Russian sage—was left to wait for the deluge. Skipping the watering step when planting something is a rarity but doing so allows you to fly through so many other tasks so it's a great coup when you can get Mother Nature to do the work for you.

We didn't get as much rain as I had expected Sunday night, but more is predicted this week. I gave everything a dose of water but I'm hoping Mother Nature gives everything a nice, big drink.