How do you say goodbye to a garden? With tears? Gratitude? Undiluted sorrow and regret at having to leave an old friend, resignation, or a strangely heady feeling of relief at no longer being responsible for its sometimes burdensome demands? Or perhaps it’s a complex mixture of all the above, an odd hotchpotch of emotions akin to a painful break-up?
It’s not, after all, like moving house where we can box up all our favourite belongings and pop them into the removal van to be unpacked at the other end. Georgian billionaires such as Bidzina Ivanishvili aside, the average human being has neither the resources nor the inclination to excavate the giant root-balls of much-loved mature trees and shrubs to transport them by road and river halfway across the country to their new abode. Even if we did, the act of doing so would feel as if it contravened the most essential laws of nature, to say nothing of breaking property law (unless specifically agreed, large established plants growing in a garden are treated as fixtures and fittings that should not be removed).
Anyway, it’s also true that the new abode might not be to their liking, whether it’s too small, exposed, dry, wet, cold, or has too acidic or alkaline soil. Just like us humans, plants also have their preferences as well as their foibles, something we gardeners ignore at our peril. Plus even if we could provide the same kinds of growing conditions that they enjoyed in their old garden, to start afresh with an almost-clean slate is an opportunity full of new possibilities and potential.
On the other hand, there will always be those plants that we can’t bear to be without. It could be a much-loved rose bush grown from a cutting taken from the garden of a friend or family member. Or a treasured fruit bush received as a gift or a decades-old variety of perennials passed down through generations. Along with these kinds of plants, there are also those other hard-to-get, exceptionally garden-worthy varieties carefully acquired over years that we’ll always be loath to lose.
When I moved garden myself a few years ago, I brought a medley of perennial, biennial and bulbous plants that included trusty varieties of dahlia, verbascum, sweet rocket, roses, Canterbury bells, campanula, narcissus, anemone, sweet William, geum, phlox, scabious, erigeron, echinacea, aquilegia, pennisetum, delphinium, linaria, bupleurum, eryngium and snowdrops.
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I’d like to say that it was a carefully planned, well-ordered process but in truth, it was the opposite. Some good friends helped us to hastily dig them up as clumps that were then stacked in strong trays and bunged into a piled-high trailer. Unpacked in an exhausted daze at the other end and footed into temporary beds, it took us months to find them all a suitably permanent spot. Months, too, to realise that we’d left too many other old favourites behind in the rush. Moving garden, as I only fully appreciated retrospectively, is a process that requires lots of careful list-making as well as months of careful planning.
If the prospect is looming large in your own life, then this is a great time of year to start. Try to begin with a careful audit, taking note of all the plants that you’d like to bring with you in some shape or form as well as those that friends and family might like. Try also to be realistic in terms of the kinds of growing conditions that your new garden can offer them. For example, plants that love a deep, friable, free-draining loam and a sheltered, sunny spot are not going to prosper if given an exposed, windy new garden with heavy, wet soil. Ericaceous plants will not flourish in lime-rich soils, while those that love shade and moisture won’t thank you for giving them the opposite. That said, many species are obliging and undemanding enough to tolerate a variety of growing conditions just so long as the ground is well prepared in advance.
Importantly, bear in mind that favourite trees and shrubs can often be propagated. Early November is the perfect time to take hardwood cuttings of these as well as fruit trees and bushes. If possible, give some to good gardening friends both to spread out the burden of propagation as well as increase the chances of success. These same friends might also greatly appreciate the invitation to take some cuttings of their own with which to stock their gardens, another magical way to see your plants living on long after you’ve moved home. Layering is yet another useful propagating technique suitable for woody species at this time of year, where a part of the low-hanging branch of a tree or shrub is gently fixed in place just below the soil to encourage it to root. With tricky species, try using one of the purpose-made plastic propagation pods or globes designed to make clever use of the age-old technique known as air-layering.
This is also a good time of year to collect ripe seeds of many favourite plants. Just make sure to harvest on a dry day and to allow the seed to dry indoors before storing it in clearly labelled and dated envelopes. One of the very first things that I did in our new garden was to sprinkle handfuls of home-harvested seeds of nigella, linaria, ammi and Californian poppies on to the stony, sunny beds around our old farmhouse, a place where not a single garden plant then grew. Within weeks the tiny seedlings started to appear. By the following summer, they were in full bloom, and ever since then, they’ve self-seeded generously.
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Late autumn/early winter is also a great time to lift and divide many kinds of perennials. Like that biblical tale of the loaves and the fishes, in this way, you can get anywhere up to a dozen small plants from one large, established clump, plenty for you to take with you as well as to leave for the garden’s new owner. Potted into small containers, these can be sunk in the ground until you’re ready to pack them up, a much easier and more portable way of transporting old favourites.
Finally, bear in mind that bulbous species are the easiest to overlook at this time of year as well as the most challenging to locate. If you plan on moving house before they reappear above ground next spring, then you’ll need to carefully excavate the ground around established clumps. Use a trowel or garden fork to quickly lift and divide them, potting on some of the divisions into clearly labelled pots and replanting the remaining bulbs for the garden’s future owners to enjoy. Again, sink these pots back into the ground until you’re ready to transport them to their new home, a good way to protect any newly potted plants waiting in the wings from extremes of cold and heat as well as to reduce the need for watering.
This week
Take advantage of dry days to weed beds and borders, paying particular attention to resilient perennial weeds such as dock, dandelion, scutch and buttercup. Left to overwinter, they’ll develop sturdy root systems, spread, self-seed and be much more time-consuming and troublesome to control next year. Bare-root season is now in full swing (see last week’s column), making it the perfect time to plant a wide variety of trees, shrubs, hedging, perennials and fruit bushes in a very cost-effective and planet-friendly way. Stockists include all good Irish garden centres as well as a range of specialist online suppliers.
Dates for your diary
Throughout November, there is a series of one-day, hands-on workshops throughout the country on the art and craft of hazel coppicing and hedge laying, provided by the not-for-profit organisation Hedgerows Ireland to help support and protect Irish hedgerows, see hedgerows.ie; Saturday, December 7th, Sunday, December 8th, and Saturday, December 14th (10am-1pm), The Grinding House, June Blake Garden, Tinode, Blessington, Co Wicklow, seasonal Christmas wreath-making workshops with garden writer Fionnuala Fallon, see eventbrite or @theirishflowerfarmer for details/to book tickets.
