23 July 2012

Non-edible front garden

After complaining about the Drummondville situation the other day, I actually dug some vegetables out of my front garden over the weekend. They were a load of Egyptian walking onions which had been given to me by an ex-neighbour and which had taken over a large proportion of the bed they were in, without being hugely useful as a vegetable and looks-wise, to be honest, they were quite unappealing. Once they were gone, I emptied a layer of my worm composting bin over the area and then had to think about filling the gaps.

The bed is under an overhanging roof of the house and gets full sunshine for most of the day. I needed plants that would tolerate the heat and dryness and wouldn't mind a relatively poor soil. After my trip to Hampton Court earlier in the month I was inspired by the yellow and blue gardens there. I already had a coneflower at one end of the border, so I was happy to have some more pink in there as well.

Garden centres are usually selling perennials off fairly cheaply at this time of year (bonus!) - which of course means that you end up buying more than you meant to. I came back from our local one with the back of the car laden with echinacea, coreopsis and salvia plants. I particularly liked this little Coreopsis rosea, 'American Dream':


Now all I need is some rain to water them in. [Sound of hollow, slightly manic, laughter]

No comments: