This month, rather than posting wide shots of all the major areas of my garden, I thought I'd provide a visual history of one area, specifically the back garden. We moved into our current house just before Christmas in 2010 but I didn't do much with the back garden until early 2012, when we expanded the back border that ran inside the
Xylosma hedge that sits atop the back slope. I launched into this project without taking any "before" photos. The best I can do is to show you a photo of the back patio with a view of the lawn and the narrow border in the distance.
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| This photo, taken in January 2012, shows a back garden dominated by lawn with just a slender border inside the hedge |
However, I did take a few photos of the area after the lawn was removed.
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| In March 2012, I pulled the border out 6 feet at its widest point in the middle, narrowing at either end following the general contour of the original border |
By early May 2012, I had the area planted. As I had a group of friends coming to see the garden in early June, I hustled to fill in the space. In retrospect, I should have moved more of the smaller plants forward and filled in behind them with taller specimens. My husband is always concerned that I'm going to block the view of the harbor but I think I could have worked in more 4-5 foot tall shrubs without doing that.
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| My plant choices at the time were limited by what was readily available in the local garden centers. Many of these plants are long gone but some, like the Achillea 'Moonshine, Stipa tenuissima, and Abelia 'Kaliedoscope' are still there. |
My first wide shot post in September 2013 focused on the backyard border.
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| In 2013, just a small bed surrounded the fountain in the foreground |
My wide shot post of the backyard in September 2014 reflected a major expansion of the bed surrounding the fountain and further reduction of the lawn area.
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| The fountain bed was extended both outward and along the length of the pathway leading to the garden on the south side of the house |
The September 2015 shot shows the same view minus one of the 2 peppermint willow trees (
Agonis flexuosa) in the background.
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| I miss the tree, especially during heatwaves. By comparison to last month the borders look less substantial, which is partly the result of summer-time die-back and partly due to an intensive effort to clean up the Stipa tenuissima (Mexican feather grass) in both borders. |
The impact of water rationing, begun on a voluntary basis in 2014, and continued by state mandate in 2015, shows in the side-by-side comparisons of the back border.
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| Viewed from the left side of the backyard border, the end-of-summer garden in 2013 (left-hand photo) was much greener than it was in either September 2014 (center photo) or at present (right-hand photo) but there's a noticeable difference even between the 2014 and 2015 photos |
Next month I'll feature past and present comparisons of other areas of the garden. My thanks again to Heather at
Xericstyle for starting this meme, providing me with a pictorial history of my garden's development.
All material
© 2012-2015 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party
