Make Beautiful Dirt

By Pat Howell

First, a report-back from The Tundra: In the February '03 Voice, Easy Gardener wrote about her treasured shrub, Daphne odora: 'The 5-year-old evergreen shrub, Daphne odora, usually shares her exquisitely fragrant blooms in February. She's in a very protected site, and so the leaves are showing no evidence of cold-burn. They are deep green with handsome yellow margins, and have only a few of the tell-tale brown blotches of cold-burn. Daphne the Younger is planted in a more exposed site, and yet there is no evidence of cold-burn on her leaves. The buds were close to breaking when the cold hit. Will there be blooms this year?'

We are happy to report that Daphne the Elder bloomed exuberantly and prolifically on March 22, at least a full month later than usual. Definitely as fragrant as ever. One stem perfumes the entire room. Daphne the Younger is progressing at a slower rate, but has buds that will open this week!

Another good sign is the arrival of that sunny winter pick-me-up, the winter jasmine. She definitely prefers a sunny spot, though it need not be large. Normally blooming in January (March 20 this year), her blooms are a butter yellow, much more pleasant than Forsythia. A happy sprawler, Jasmine can tumble over a high wall or bank, or be tied upright to cover a trellis, fence, or house wall. Anywhere she grows, her fresh, Irish-green stems look glossy and healthy even in the depths of winter, despite their lack of leaves. These are narrow and very dark green, divided in lacy threes to make a filigree of foliage in summer. Even though winter jasmine cannot offer us the heady, exotic scent of its summery cousins, its glowing good looks are reward enough in these bleaker months.

If late frosts threaten to blast opening buds, a light cloth (an old sheet or shower curtain) can protect them even from the sudden arctic express. The cloth can be left in place for weeks without harm (only if it is cloth; no plastic, please), to be removed when the weather improves.

There are other welcome signs of survival in all your gardens, all as appreciated as Daphne.

This year we are going to be putting more emphasis on elements of the sunny parts of your gardens. Who can resist bouquets of sun-craving peonies, Iris, daisies, daylilies, coneflowers, yarrow, Chysanthemums, Asters, maybe even roses?

Most people think that selecting plants for sunny gardens is easy, and that the shady spots are the challenges. But we know this is not necessarily so. There are many solutions for shady spaces. Easy Gardener hopes that you've found some helpful ideas for your shady gardens in the past years' articles. We're not abandoning discussions of shade-loving plants, just broadening your horizons. And Easy Gardener enjoys and appreciates your questions anytime, about shade gardens or otherwise.

Whether you are creating your first real garden or renovating a neglected older one, you can have terrific fun doing it. After all, the garden exists to please and nourish you, the gardener. If we become slaves to the garden (or to ideals of garden perfectionism), gardening starts to feel like work. Work it is, of course, but at its best, gardening is peaceful, healthful, and therapeutic work.

Because garden making is a lively art, it is sometimes messy, as any creative process must be. Relax. Enjoy the process as much as the product. If you haven't already, you will soon discover that there will never really be a final product. Fortunately, the more a gardener you become, the gladder you will be that there is only and always a garden in progress. For lifelong, bonedeep gardeners, nothing could be more satisfying—or more fun. And, the best way to obtain the garden of your dreams is slowly, for time is the gardener's best friend.

The key, the heart, perhaps the very soul of gardening, the best garden advice I know is this: Make Beautiful Dirt. The idea seems too modest to have such powerful repercussions, yet adopting it will positively change your garden as no other single factor can. Many of us are gardening in used dirt, tired dirt, dirt that as given its all long ago. The gardener who turns nasty dirt into beautiful healthy soil is rewarded by a healthy garden and disease-resistant plants that can thrive without chemical assistance or toxic interventions. It's that simple.

Summer heat always comes as a shock to some plants, but when unusual weather patterns make the onslaught sudden, even sun worshipers may be taken aback. Whenever hospital emergency rooms fill up with sunburned humans, gardens throughout the region are likewise full of vegetative sufferers that don't even enjoy the option of sunblock. If you want and expect your plants to make it through another tough summer, start now to build that beautiful soil to help them. Growing healthy plants in healthy soil provides the necessary leg up. A generous mulching will put them over the top.

If garden making is an art form, garden design is a craft, governed by rules of proportion and scale. We all know that available garden space grows during the winter, fed by longing and imagination, then shrinks like a pricked balloon come spring.

When it comes to creating a satisfying, artful garden in your backyard, all can be a bit bewildering. Do you copy the English, emulate the Japanese, or try to figure out something of your own, being ever mindful of the climate where you garden? The point, always, is to make a garden that pleases you personally, in as many ways as possible. Develop a palette of favorite plants, and it only makes sense to include as many of your own cherished ones as possible.

Start your list.

Pat Howell is a Takoma Park gardener and landscape designer/garden-builder, and welcomes comments, advice, suggestions, complaints. She is available for hand-holding and answering questions through Deephaven Landscapers.