The naked banana

‘Gardening is playing with colours’ Oscar de la Renta

Welcome to my blog to promote my open garden that this year is on Sunday 19th July.

I open the garden to support the NGS charities and to share my garden with others. A so-called friend once suggested opening your own garden was a terribly vain thing to do but nothing could be further from the truth. I never thought my little garden would be accepted into the NGS. Over the past three years over 500 people have been kind enough to visit/revisit my garden and I’m still a little surprised when anyone says they like my garden

I was born in Jamaica and wanted my garden to remind me of my roots. But it’s not an exotic garden because I also love English cottages gardens. I wanted the fusion of the exotic living cheek by jowl with traditional cottage plants.

Thinking ahead to this year’s opening also means looking back and every winter means some things have struggled whilst others have surprised by simply surviving.

This winter I took the brave decision to not protect my larger banana plants [Musa Basjoo] and my tree ferns [Dicksonia Antarctica].  With the expectation of one tree fern (that damage that could be due to a lack of watering) this experiment seems to have gone very well as the bananas are once again beginning to show signs of life.

The Ensete ventricosum [Ethiopian banana] however, were protected by the top & tail method I’ve grown to embrace and would recommend to anyone. To the joy of everyone in my house the smaller banana plants are once again back in the garden after their annual bathroom winter holiday.

The realities of gardening means each growing season starts with the boring job of improving the soil as a little time now rewards later.

So in preparation of moving and replanting my gardening year started with shoveling manure.

What is it about gardeners never being satisfied? This year like every year I’ve moved and replanted a host of things that have either got to too big or no longer work in their original spaces.

‘The true gardener, like a true artist, is never satisfied.’ H.E. Bates.

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