Do you prune lavender cautiously or do you cut back hard? See what works for us! Also are ‘thugs’ a good thing and how is the re-vamped border doing?
00:00 Where is The Middlesized Garden and what climate does it have?
00:39 Have one big ‘wow’ factor element in each season
01:18 How to prune lavender so it lasts a long time
02:35 The north-facing shady border
03:03 The back border – the battle of the ‘thugs’
05:11 Re-wilding or neglect?
05:29 The re-vamp of the main border…
06:28 How far apart to plant perennials
06:36 Shopping for plants – how to choose the best plants for your garden: https://youtu.be/L2Wz3TKR82U
07:05 Fill gaps with annuals (plants that grow, flower, set seed and die in one year)
08:27 Re-vamping the border playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrZRLHPUbGmAfSAmm4LpMyQQrvQAQNZkM
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34 Comments
Hello, I garden in 9b Southern California. It’s about to get HOT but in this unusually cool spring and mild start to summer I’ve gotten a lot accomplished. While I can’t use many of the plants you discuss I find great value in your suggestions and advice based on your experiences, thank you💐
Yes. I've been buying perennials but rather than planting during our dry summer, I'm keeping them in pots to plant in the fall. Great video as always.
Hole, holy, wholely. All at the same time.
Great video Alexandra, thankyou. I have to admit i tend to cram things in a lot closer together! Im too impatient but like rearranging things so suits me. Im constantly experimenting with cuttings, so some things settle in & others don't quite make it! Ive got shrubs, perennials, annuals, bulbs all mixed in my borders. You're quite right, some of the annuals grow exponentially & I got fed up with the tall purple poppies this year & yanked some out as they were blocking my view from kitchen window! Ive been thinking more about winter interest, & noticed how beautiful your garden looks in the winter pictures. I love lavender & have it round a tree with rosemary, love reaching out to pick some of each for instant aromatherapy as i pass!
I dont think I could ever tire of traditional English lavender ~ there is something so comforting about that depth of scent, and the colour is so heart-lifting when in full bloom. It seems to have an enveloping character…like a giant fragrant hug! Yours looks sensational Alexandra.
Always inspiring to revamp a border. I am a gardener for several clients, so my garden is always last to get planted, etc. Because of my work, I plant all through the summer. Acclimate the plants for a while, then plant. I have found they are happier in the ground than they are in the pots. As for lavender pruning…I have had a stand of lavender for more than 20 years. I prune them hard in the late winter…literally an inch or so above the ground. They come back every year and have reseeded happily through my garden. I do this only to the Lavandula angustifolia varieties. ❤
Thank you for all your videos. Giggled at the old plant young dog label!
Yarrow and lambs ear are thugs in my garden
I so enjoy your sense of humor:) I hadn’t thought of having one show stopper in each season. Those topiary trees are certainly marvelous. Digging out perennials is hard on the body, so, would cutting back new foliage on perennials as they emerge, and through the season be an alternative?
I too appreciate your honesty when chatting with us about gardening. It's a process and not all experiments are successful. And sometimes there's a surprise, when something that looks dead comes back. The neighbors have acanthus plants and I'm dying to dig one up and move it to a shady spot so the leaves won't die. Right now they are all brown and laying on the ground, with only the flower spikes remaining. I think between apple cider vinegar and smelly pine cleaner I've managed to discourage the possums, skunks, and raccoons from eating my rose and Boysenberry shoots. The fact that things are getting dry and hot should help as well. The roses were quite prolific this year, and the smell was wonderful; the critters thought so too. 🙁 For many years I used systemic rose food and never had this problem. An endless experiment! Good luck with your thugs…I'd love some red poppies.
Such good advice to have a wow focus for each season.
Wow lovely purple flowers ^^
Like 778
My friend, have a good day
Amazing video and encouraging. Thank you .👍
I can relate to so much of what you shared in this video. Thanks for your work and honesty. Wishing you success in the continued plant policing 😅😂
I enjoyed that. Straightforward and honest and amusing.
I like the English tendency to self-deprecate – makes a change from the tendency of some to overindulge in superlatives and self-congratulate.
Hi Alexandra, Thank you so much for your video. I feel so much better 😊 I have created a mixed border 2 years ago, trying to emulate what you've done in your lovely garden and following the varied advice videos you posted. But I was feeling very frustrated. Some plants take longer to settle and it leaves big gaps, poppies feel quite at home but they have bloomed as early as the end of May this year so now they have dried
uglily😮out and I trimmed them down, but there again : huge gaps.My dahlias are starting blooming but the ones I planted last year are already flowering while the ones that I planted in spring are still just in leaves but with buds. Out of frustration I went to the garden centre and did what you should not: I bought perennials (2 salvias and a rozane geranium) I am willing to extra water them but I know they might suffer. My house is in Brittany but it is a holiday home, so it comes with the extra challenge of not being around enough to look after it, or at times not bearing witness to some of the blooming….
To see that you are struggling in some parts of your garden make me feel less useless.😅
Great honest video, I often over plant, & then I'm running around when I have too much success, finding new homes in the exact positions. I guess, it does not pay to put too
much in Borders, just 'wait'.
Yup, love the honesty and humour, this kind of snapshot of a moment of a season is a great idea and one of my favourite videos of yours.
Thank you for sharing! I can always count on you to give me the bad along with the good. I love astrantia and want to add lots more to my garden! It does take a year to get established but then it will bloom it's little head off.
I absolutely love your videos as you are at once so knowledgeable, open to new ways, and realistic about what works and what doesn't. I was nodding throughout this entire video as while my garden looks different from yours (with some similarities), the same challenges and experiences apply. Thank you for this validation!
Liked the advice❤❤❤
Good morning Darling Alexander, I had such a good chuckle hearing you sort of complaining about just too much!! I am a gardener that also thinks let them self-seed but oh my goodness! That can become a disaster. Well, be that as it may, allow the fresh plants to become established and removed root and all the older plants, even if you cut the flowers after peak performance so that they cannot seed. Gardening is a big challenge but good fun. It is very disheartening for me when I spend money on the plants and they do not survive, what a waste I think. Alas, we are not in control of the weather, you should have placed those new plants in pots into the wheelbarrow and wheeled them away 🙂 a gardener becomes a quick thinker as well. The back north border looks fine just pull up the existing extras after a good shower, regardless the loss then it becomes easier. I have decided to finally remove the trees I mentioned previously they cause too much shade and the house is very cold in early winter mornings. We have had snow on the mountains and it was extremely cold, Monday and Tuesday were days for nobody to really be outside. Plants I enjoyed for a number of years have almost frozen, there are a few green twigs, but it's fine, I will cut back when it warmer, refresh the soil in the pots and carry on. Africa is not for the weak. So enjoyed the garden talk and doggy is looking beautiful, I can already see the change in growth she will be so lovely when grown up. Oh I have to add, you are looking very posh! Many blessings.
Your comment about a garden not being perfectly filled in or in bloom everywhere all the time is encouraging. Watching this video as well as past posts I’m learning to appreciate the ebb and flow of plants. After visiting the beautiful gardens in Japan I noticed the only way to achieve “perfection” is to avoid having too many flowering perennials at once. Every month there is usually only one that stands out and the rest of the landscape is very structured. It limits the part that is in transition to a contained area. But having lots of flowers is worth the trade off.
perfect puppy/plant easter egg in there 😍
thank you!!! always enjoy your videos
Thank you for being real in addition to having a great sense of humor, "at least that is what I'm telling my husband and anyone else." about re-wilding. Your garden is beautiful, and your ideas are wonderfully useful. Thanks again.
Great video. I feel your pain when it comes to Japanese Anemones. I have them too. I guess I always will. I dig/pull them out whenever I can, especially when planting something new, but, of course, as you say, they always come back. I would call them invasive because you can't get rid of them and they come up inside all the plants and shrubs. I have learned to live with them. They aren't the worst I have. That's too long a story!
If I buy something now, it's going into the ground now – plants dry out sooner in pots!
I stumbled into planting in Autumn when I realised how much growing time I still had before the frosts started, now I also take a look at where the plant will be placed, such as near a brick wall to get residual heat and how frost tender it is before purchasing. I’ve found I can plant almost year ‘round now until it’s more that it’s too cold for for me personally to potter in my garden, where as my shrubs and flowers still look beautiful. I’m very lucky to live in a temperate zone (although high summer can regularly be up in the high 30s and even 40s Celsius), but we have to irrigate to make it through. I do wonder how the zone will change as temperatures continue to increase.
I do love the descriptions of how your plants do over time. It’s helpful to think about how they behave as they get established. Thanks, Alexandra!
Thanks!
The lavender looks absolutely gorgeous. I did that to my lavender as well and I was surprised that it came back so nicely. Your veg garden looks very nice as wild as it is.
👍🏽♥️✌🏽
gorgeous works