Taking over a new garden
Overgrown garden
In the late summer of 2007 when we moved into the new house the garden had grown wild. Some places you practically needed a machete to pass through. Many different trees and shrubs competed for the light in too small a space.
Rural garden design
The style of the garden’s design could be described as rural. There was a big variation in plants placed in large curvy beds along the square-shaped grass lawn. This kind of garden design is very time consuming because of the variation in plants and the big lawn. Here are pictures of the garden as it looked in the winter:
Two old apple trees
Apple trees clinging to the neighbour’s garage
It was obvious that the previous owner had done a quite a bit of work designing the garden – in recent years, however, it had grown out of control. Many years ago two apple trees had been planted right next to the wall of the neighbour’s garage. The trees were supposed to have been on espaliers, but now they were four metres high. Generally the plants were located right next to house walls and boundaries.
Back yard seen from the North
The backyard
The relatively small backyard was dominated by a large berry garden: gooseberries, raspberries, black currants and red currants. Too many to pluck and especially the raspberry plants arer very dull to look at in the winter.
The backyard seen from the South
The small grass area next to the berry garden was almost completely infected by moss. Not exactly an emerald carpet, more a mixture of weeds, moss and a little grass.
The front yard with the gentle slope
The front yard
The primary challenge for the garden architect was the big front yard that inclines approximately 1,8 metres from the patio to the hedge by the road. The west turned, and windy, patio lay high and could be seen from the road – it needed shelter.
The small patio behind a mixed border
The patio
The front yard featured a flag pole and sundial in the middle of a big lawn. The lawn was surrounded by borders, the largest consisting of a messy mixture of perennials; roses, paeons, poppies among others – and lots of weeds. The patio, quite small, is hidden behind a large border ofperennials and evergreen shrubs, but nevertheless very unsheltered.
The beech hedge
Boundary towards the road
The garden wall down by the road consists of a beech hedge, which has been kept quite low - 1,2 metres. We would like a more sheltered front yard and would therefore want it to grow higher. The law requires that it must not become much higher than 1,8 metres.
A beech hedge offers beautiful golden brown leaves in the winter. In the spring it drops the leaves for a short period to be followed by the most adoring spring green leaves.
Compost container
Compost
The local authorities have supplied garden owners with a, rather ugly, grey compost container made of plastic. We are supposed to recycle the organic garbage. It would be a good idea to build a cover for the container – for instance a willow screen. It is worthwhile to make room next to the container for cut branches and leaves to be put in the container a long with the green kitchen garbage.
Japanese Elkhorn Cypress
Large evergreen shrub
At first we took it for a Thuja or arborvitae (from Latin for tree of life), standing at the corner of the patio. However, it happens to be a Thujopsis Dolobrata, the evergreen Japanese Elkhorn Cypress. The foliage is similar to Thuja, but larger. The scale-like leaves are green above and have whitish markings underneath.
Apricot tree
Apricot
Against the wall on the south western corner stands what we assume is an apricot tree - Prunus armeniaca, "Armenian plum". It is a small tree, 8 m tall, with a trunk of 30 cm diameter. The flowers are very pretty, with white to pinkish petals; they are produced in early spring before the leaves. The fruit is similar to a small peach, but unlike the peach, the apricot can easily survive cold winters. However, it will be harmed by spring frost, as it tends to flower very early. |
