Skip to main content

Featured

The Garden House (Devon, England)

The destinations are beginning to blur but looking at the tour guide booklet, I see that we are now in Plymouth. Today, we visited two gardens designed by Keith Wiley.  The first is The Garden House , where Wiley worked as Head Gardener for 25 years (from 1978-2003). The 10-acre estate was purchased in the 1940s by former Eton schoolmaster Lionel Fortescue and his wife Katherine. It was formerly home to the  vicars of Buckland Monachronum. The Fortescue's renovated the gardens and ran a market garden business and raised cattle.  The remains of some of the original buildings in the vicarage still stand in the garden and serve as a romantic backdrop in the Walled Garden - I loved the way they had massed ferns together. Just stunning! Surrounding the walled garden and venturing out away from the house are more naturalistic plantings  - Today, the head gardener is Nick Haworth, who was previously head gardener at Greenway , which we visited earlier.  Keith Wiley lef...
1 comment
Read more

Out With The Liriope


There are plants that grow really well here in the Pacific Northwest and then there are plants that grow really, really well. I've tried to be careful about the plants I've put into this garden but there are always those that you don't suspect will create a problem. In the case of liriope (also known as lilyturf or monkey grass), we used it to border the boxwood hedge in front of our house. There it increased in size pretty rapidly but it wasn't infringing on anything and I would just mow it down every spring.  

I brought home a few pots from the nursery last year and planted them along the border of the sidewalk in front of house. It is a northern exposure with tricky lighting - it is generally shady but begins to get sunnier as summer progresses. It is also a fairly damp area. A downspout from the gutters deposits rainwater here. I catch some of it in a shallow dish for the birds but there is a lot of runoff.

I noticed that the liriope has spread a significant amount in one year and when Michael suggested taking it out, I reluctantly agreed. He is a neat freak but I have to say our borders are weed free because of him. He relishes jobs like this and eagerly volunteered to do the deed. 

Just look at the roots!


Now there is room for more plants, which is exciting. I'm not sure what yet - maybe some Japanese Forest Grass since there is some near the front door and I love it. There is room though for some other plants as well.




Text and photos by Phillip Oliver, Dirt Therapy
Email Post

Comments

  1. Lisa at GreenbowJune 6, 2020 at 8:21 AM

    Way to go Michael! It is always fun to discover new territory to plant. I have a few lirope but they haven't done much over the years. This variety is variegated clumper. It doesn't get any love it just exists. I like the way it isn't fussy about soil etc. The rabbits eat it down every winter. I don't have to cut it back.

    ReplyDelete
  2. chavlinessJune 7, 2020 at 6:52 PM

    It's fabulous that someone else volunteers to do the hard work, and you are left with the fun task of picking new plant . Lucky you!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment