YORKTON - Today, gardeners, let’s have a ‘tossed salad’ of gardening ideas—a little of this, a little of that-- a visit where we discuss several different things, all of them “flavourful’ to gardening conversation!
We were in Winnipeg recently, and no visit to that beautiful city is complete without a trip to Assiniboine Park and the English Garden. What a lovely spot! As we strolled the paths, we noticed some interesting things. One was the amount of coleus in all kinds of colors that were used in the flower beds. To note: the beds were in full sun, and the coleus seemed very happy! I always thought that coleus like partial shade, but these coleus were just beautiful and seemed to be doing well.
Also in the sun were large beds of hosta—another plant that we always consider a shade plant. I think they are usually happy in partial shade, but there are always new varieties, so it’s an example to us that just because we don’t have a shady spot, it doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy the elegant hosta.
Driving around the city always affords chances to observe plantings of all kinds. Great planters in public spaces, with a wonderful selection of plants and grasses. I especially loved the planters that were like giant soup bowls, very classic looking. We drove through Tuxedo and River Heights areas gave some inspiration for planting, and some interesting observations. A lot of use of grasses and small shrubs repeated along driveways or pathways; if planters were used, they are large (we saw a couple of these large planters that looked about five feet across and maybe four feet high, wow, planted with large tangerine cannas) and using flowers in just one color, that was very striking.
Another plant delight was a visit to The Leaf in Assiniboine Park. This is a beautiful building, with a roof that looks like a hosta leaf, that contains four biomes of plant type, including tropical plants, mediterranean plants, and a butterfly environment. This was fascinating, such amazing plants from around the world.
On the ride home, between Winnipeg and Portage, we noticed a beautiful shelter belt along the highway. The shelterbelt was three rows deep with a fine variety of trees: I spotted pines; a shrub with white flowers, viburnum; a purple-leafed shrub or small tree, maybe a flowering crab; a column-type poplar…and there may have been more. I did some homework about this, and the project is intended to help reduce dangerous driving conditions in winter from blowing snow along the Trans-Canada highway. The plant choices are cold-hardy trees and shrubs that can withstand prairie conditions, plus they create summer habitat and look wonderful. What a great idea that could be adopted for many places.
This might sound like a tour of Winnipeg, but I share it with you because no matter where we are, there are opportunities to observe plants in new and interesting ways. We see a little of this, a little of that, interesting plants, interesting containers… a ‘tossed salad’ of colors and ideas that we can use in our own gardens here at home. Be open to these ideas, they make gardening such fun!
Thank you to our friends at YTW for their fine work! Remember, our Hort Fruit, Flower and Vegetable Show is on Wednesday August 6. Visit the hort society at www.yorktonhort.ca for more details and have a great week!
