I feel so blessed to have a garden in these days of isolation, but I’ve found it quite challenging to work out exactly in what form the benefit comes. I think (so far just think…) that it may be for me the sense of purpose and drive that gardening has added to these days that otherwise lack any externally imposed time-frame. And maybe it’s that sense of slow, incremental seasonal change that marches on reassuringly in the garden, when everything else has ground to a halt. I’m not sure. Would love to hear how having a garden works for you in these strange days
(pic is of my vegetable garden, finally tidy and trimmed)
How has having a garden helped you most over this time of isolation?
Discussion
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I’ve thought about this a lot in the past. Why are gardeners such a sanguine lot? Is it the constant act of creation and destruction in gardening? Sex and death?
The closest I’ve ever come is that gardeners are always looking forward. There are the tasks we have to ‘do now’ but in doing them you’re always thinking about what’s coming up next. Always looking forward. And things never stop needing doing.
But it’s also got an element of control in it, especially in times like these. When there’s so much that is beyond our control, the simple emergence of a flower or seed that we planted makes us take root again.
I agree with James that a garden gives a sense of continuity and a reason to get up in the mornings. I always have to think of my father who was an avid gardener until he died at the age of 97. He always had something that needed doing so that in his 80s he would still be climbing into his old walnut tree to prune. When the ambulance finally came to take him to the hospital and as he was being wheeled out he called out to his daughters “don’t forget to water the garden”! He lived for his garden and now that he is gone the soul of that garden has also gone. I think I may have inherited some of his love of gardening as I need to go out there every day and visit with my plants, pull out a few weeds and just enjoy the different smells and the feeling of being with nature..
I love this idea. Gardening is filled with those moments that are a perfect balance of realisation and anticipation. And maybe they’re loaded with the accumulated past joy as well…
Love your rosemary screening Michael of what I always consider to be an ugly element of todays gardens…the ubiquitous colourbond raised beds. It is making me think again for my new garden. Trimmed or not it has to be better than the bare look and the bees love it too.
Hi Julie, the hedges around the raised beds in my veggie garden are English box. They’re planted into terrible yellow clay under the gravel, in which rosemary wouldn’t have the hope of surviving. In something better drained, rosemary would be brilliant.
A sense of freedom, privilege of space and the humbling nature of that.
Some joy as I am new to this gardening journey as I see a glorious climbing rose flowering like crazy out my window as my 3 and 4 yr olds scream and shout, allowing a pleasant mini moment of escapism.
That moment of excitement as I think I finally may have sited a new beneficial insect in my garden or a red wattlebird arrived to scope it out for the first time!
A huge sense of overwhelm! As I seem to be inundated with scale, mealybug, citrus leaf miner and goodness knows what else across the garden and feel overwhelmed at where to begin to bring everything back into order. The list of ‘to do’ in the garden feels immense right now
mini moments of escapism, looking longingly out of the window, from one world into another. I remember that
Our isolation has come at a good time where I live in SW Western Australia.
The weather is cooling, we have had a little rain and those autumn jobs are just dying to be done. How can anyone sit inside and ignore them. Its adding discipline to my day and allowing a justified healthy sleep at night.
Meanwhile as usual my brain is in overload with new ideas. Can my body cope! What isn’t there to love about gardening at anytime
Yeah, I got grumpy when I heard radio talk-back hosts discussing the challenges of being encouraged to ‘stay indoors’, when the instructions where to ‘stay home’, and for these individuals, they meant the same thing. I’ve hardly left home since the start of this, but even then, I find myself resenting every minute that my work requires that I’m indoors. I just want to be out there, 24/7
I live South East of Hobart which is (believe it or not ) very dry. Some recent rain has greened everything up in time for isolation. I had a craniotomy just prior to the shutdown and my garden has been my savior on two fronts. I noted your thoughts on only growing vegies until Christmas which I have adopted. I have used the time to relocate my vegie garden. It’s a similar set up to yours but doesnt look as good. Would you share any tips on what you have planted around the area?
Do you mean what I’ve planted surrounding the beds? The beds themselves I made out of two different colours of colorbond, in order to create a deliberate ‘fake’ shadow-line down each, and these are aligned for the pale side to face the mid-morning sun. That was a bit of a fail. Well, lets just say its kind of meaningless. But knowing that the beds would be empty for most of the summer, and that there’d be nothing but bare soil, I wanted to provide some permanent, interesting greenery. I also wanted this to be crisp and tightly clipped, in order to provide a sense of order for when the veggies were in full flow (and are invariably on the shaggy side). So I planted an arc of English box around most of the beds. Levelling the area initially meant exposing stiff clay soil, so I knew that my options for planting would be limited. The box has loved it. As has a huge echeveria that nestles in to the base of several of the beds. I also planted mint straight into the gravel, on the shadier side of one of the beds. These super-tough conditions keep it in check. I also wanted an ornamental grass or two in the gravel, but wasn’t sure which of the more choice ones would cope in the conditions, so I planted Poa labillardiere instead. I’m not a big fan of it, but it worked well. Since then, a Miscanthus has self-sown into the gravel, and has done very well. Possibly too well. In some of the grass around here, a low ground cover Phyla nodiflora, has established itself, without becoming too pesky, so I moved some of that in as well. The gravel-over-clay substrate is a really tough one, so it takes really tough plants to survive in there
I sowed a lot of vegetable seeds directly into some new vegetable borders. I’ve been working as a healthcare worker directly with potential Covid patients, so work has been reasonably stressful. Tiny though my seedlings are, they have provided an inordinate amount of satisfaction each evening as I come home to inspect them. Even their initial appearance was exciting, but the daily growth is impressive (thanks to warm days). I harvested pak choy at 3 and a half weeks and haven’t stopped since. In my flower garden, the wonderful diamantina climbers are covered in glory – huge red and white blooms. I now have ridiculous numbers of photos of them as each day they seem more abundant! I really liked the photo of your vegetable garden, Michael – there is something very satisfying about their circular repetition.
Inordinate satisfaction. Should be the name of my autobiography, for it sums up the disproportionate reward that I seem to have harvested from nearly all of my gardening.
And I agree with you about the repetition. That kind of repetition is such a strong part of creating unity in a design, and in this case, I wanted to have enough beds (there’s 12) to configure them in such a way as to create a sit-able space in the middle of them. That’s the another key design principle – that plant and garden bed placement is more about the spaces you’re shaping than the plants you’re planting
So thankful for my garden! New native tubestock in the nature strip, a new extension in the back garden with new metal edging, 3 big pears with soft under planting and a reno of the vege bed. Sure beats house cleaning!
It’s never boring being outside in the fresh air and soil and so good for the soul!
Couldn’t agree more
Like you, I love putting plants together to create beautiful arrangements and spaces, but I realized something else the other day. A neighbour passed me working in my front garden the other day, and asked if I ever just sat and enjoyed it, and I realized that it’s the working that gives the greatest pleasure. It’s completely absorbing, which is just perfect in these stressful times.
Not many garden benches in the gardens of keen gardeners are much sat – on! (I think I could have said that better!). But I’ve learned to sit, and learned it from a master-sitter. I wrote a feature to that end in the current edition of Gardening Australia
The beauty of creation brings a peace and a simplicity into every day.
sure does
I’ve always had a garden, but I have never had so much “time” in it. My mother aged nearly 102 years passed away at the end of February. She was a gardener as was her father, my grandfather. There is a sense of connection, continuity and calm as I tend to my garden with the hopes of flowers and fruit for my grandchildren in the future.
Beautiful summary: connection, continuity, calm
Morning from Sand Bay, Hermanus, South Africa! Only last week I discovered The Gardenist on YouTube, Michael, and thoroughly enjoy your approach to both gardening and sharing, and your style of presentation. It is nearly 30 years since two books turned me into a gardener: Russell Page’s autobiography and Jane Brown’s “Vita’s Other World” and in 1995 I bought a camper and spent 5 months studying the gardens of The UK. I went on to create and blog about nearly 6ha of garden in a beautiful valley In the mountains 1700km from where I now live in suburbia in the heart of the fynbos biome and 700m from the sea. My intention was NOT to be a gardener but spend more time in the magnificent natural environment. It was clear from day one that it would not quite be that way.
All along my plan was to focus on veggies, but Covit-19 speeded that up considerably. I had more time, no help in the garden ( I used to have help for about 6 hours a week) and above all I immediately went into a “Victory Garden” mindset. My nutrition might just depend largely on my garden in future years…
But I also immediately realised two things: the sense of both purpose and peace it brought. Secondly: my favourite chapter about Vita in Jane Brown’s book was the way Sissinghurst became her fortress and escape from a vastly changing world. I always realised that gardening was an escape from harsher realities for me (especially as I’ve tended to deal with them pretty head-on in the ‘real world’). In fact I’m working on a novel where that is a central theme. But it is all very much more real and immediate suddenly. In the garden I can control the uncontrollable. As far as we can do that. The realities of the disease and it’s social and political impact in SA are just to great for me to have any impact on.
Hi Jack,
I love this story. How fabulous would it be to compile a great collection of these garden journeys – from the early germination of interest through to full-on fruitful passion – and the books and travel that catalysed/nourished that pathway? I must read ‘Vita’s Other World’ again myself. I think what I gained most from reading both VSW and Christopher Lloyd in my own early years was the communication of a passion so strong that it validated my own. I loved that they loved gardening so much!
I’m interested in this notion of ‘escape’. One way of seeing it is that by gardening we can turn our back on the harsh realities, and therefore live in a kind of denial, but that leads me to wonder what the realities really are, and whether those living fully in what’s accepted to be the harsh realities are themselves living in denial of the deeper, richer, more stable truths of our total, humbling and (therefore) liberating dependence upon nature.
Really looking forward to one day reading your novel!
I’m in the Adelaide Hills and the weather here has been perfect for gardening. After years of a rickety wooden bridge, my husband is building a significant new one over a creek to access the other side of our block. When finished we will have much easier access to the chooks, veggie garden and fruit trees. Meanwhile I have been giving our decked areas and shade house.their annual clean up and coating of decking oil. Plus propagating plants for local bushfire affected areas. The garden provides us with much needed sustenance for the mind, soul and body during these crazy times.
I’m in the Adelaide Hills and the weather here has been perfect for gardening. After years of a rickety wooden bridge, my husband is building a significant new one over a creek to access the other side of our block. When finished we will have much easier access to the chooks, veggie garden and fruit trees. Meanwhile I have been giving our decked areas and shade house.their annual clean up and coating of decking oil. Plus propagating plants for local bushfire affected areas. The garden provides us with much needed sustenance for the mind, soul and body during these crazy times.
Can we please have a little video/photographic tour of this magical veggie garden? Drooling over here!
I’ll see what I can do. It’s hard to make it look equally good from all angles!
It’s up now, on YouTube, Lauren. Hope you got the link today
I have found our garden to be a brilliant way for me to get outside and do something fun, productive and creative with our children (1 and 4). Whilst the 1 year old seems to find great joy in picking things that aren’t ripe yet or pruning plants that I hadn’t planned on cutting back, my 4 year old has developed a new fascination in plants that has me frantically googling answers far more often than I care to admit. It is eye-opening to see our garden from a child’s perspective though and it’s challenged me to rethink my plant choices. Bulbs, for example, are so much easier for little fingers to plant than seeds are. They also give a generous reward when they shoot up from the soil and then burst into colourful flowers. Must plant more with them next year.
Hadn’t thought about that – the handling ease of bulbs for kids. And as you say, they arrive on the scene fully developed. A tulip will be in full bloom only a few weeks after it first shows it’s head above ground. Just got a delivery of about 1000 tulips for a client today. So envious!
Oh, so jealous! You may recall that I had tulips in my wedding bouquet. They’re my favourite.
Loved the video of your veggie garden Michael. Thank you very much!
Spending time in my garden has been the salve for my busy mind. Whilst there are always things to do and plan for, the sheer act of wandering and observing (plants, insects, weather…) allows me to slow down and enter that beautiful state of flow. More than ever, it is my sanctuary – I am one of those who have some underlying health issues that mean I have to be very careful. No time for sitting, but always time to watch
Love that last line. Could become the gardener’s creed – ‘No time for sitting, but always time to watch’
After such a terrible summer this time has given me space to remember why I wanted a garden so much .. we have had the most beautiful autumn and my baby garden is becoming a toddler which gives me hope for what it will become …. thank you ISO
I feel a bit guilty about this time of isolation. It’s turned into a time of quiet celebration. After many years, we’re having a kind, generous autumn. There’s been warm, sunny days. There’s also been rain in early and mid-March, with follow up throughout April. That trumps any inconvenience caused by enforced isolation. The absence of some of our usual distractions has resulted in the near-completion of some significant rock work around our garden. Now that almost calls for a party!(when the rules allow it, of course.)