At what stage is it ok to just dig something out and admit it wasn’t supposed to be in your garden? Is it ever going to flourish if it’s been fed, watered and even moved to what the label implies should be ideal location and it still sulks away never quite dying but looking as if it’s going to any day?
I don’t like to give up on something I saw and loved and don’t want to feel like I’m committing a plant murder but really!! surely at some point it must be ok to fetch the spade.
When is it time to say goodbye?
Discussion
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If it isn’t performing or requires a lot of input to perform well, for me, means it’s not a good plant and gets removed immediately. I might try it in a different context in the hope it will do better, but those plants rarely do in my experience.
There is a time and place for sentiment in gardening, but when a plant fails to perform it isn’t it! Sometimes only ruthlessness will do. Jettison your guilt with the plant in question, you’ll feel better and your garden will look better for it.
Interesting conundrum! I have persisted with many plants over the years because I somehow felt it was sacrilegious to remove it! In my effort to simplify my garden I have removed a few things lately and wish I had done it sooner! Particularly a struggling Juniperus communis Compressa which looked ghastly and when I finally dug it up I discovered it had heart rot! Now I am being ruthless!
Apparently, back in Jane Austen’s day, the suffixless version of ruthless was a thing. I wish it still was, as too many gardeners are simply too ‘ruth’. The plants are there to serve our artistic purposes, and when they don’t, out they go. It’s never hard to find a more ‘ruth’ gardener still, who will happily take a plant off your hands, and then they can deal with the problem. I’d like to think that I’m like James (above), but I confess that I stuck with these really annoying grey-blue lomandras in my steppe garden for four years, when they never gave me an ounce of pleasure. They performed alright, and I kept them thinking that one day they might get interesting. They never did. the satisfaction of digging them out and throwing them on the fire heap was the greatest joy they ever provided
Here, here! Anytime is a good time, Alison. The first one will be the hardest, then it will get easier and easier. The moment that you realise a plant is not doing what you hoped for and have have the tool in hand, is the moment for it to go. Cheers.
And out they came. I was amazed (and not in a good way) at the lack of root growth so it wasn’t surprising that they hadn’t done anything. Was going to fill in the gaps before the New Zealand winter sets in, but looking again I think the space will allow everything else to fill in. Thank you for the feedback or I might have kept struggling on with them for ever.