Author Archives: Abbie Jury

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About Abbie Jury

jury.co.nz Tikorangi The Jury Garden Taranaki NZ

Book reviews

There must be a demand for modern books about our native flora because this month has yielded up three new publications.

100 best native plants for new zealand gardens (do not ask me what happened to capital letters. I am just a retired school teacher who still understands the grammatical difference between less and fewer) is a fully updated edition of a very popular 2001 book by Fiona Eadie. Notwithstanding the lower case book title, this excellent book combines passion, scholarship and practical gardening experience. It has a wealth of information about the author’s current pick of her favourite New Zealand plants (25% have changed, apparently, since the earlier version which reflects her move from Auckland to Dunedin).

I do like a book which doesn’t patronise by dumbing everything down to the lowest common denominator but which can instead combine popular appeal, enthusiasm, technical knowledge, information and botanical detail in one package. Each plant has a couple of photographs (assorted photographers – the quality is a little variable), botanical name, common names, a general description and sections on likes and dislikes, pests and problems, care and maintenance, landscaping suggestions, similar species and named cultivars.. The information is accessible and useful. There is plenty of information without drowning the reader. From acaena to xeronema, this is a good book to have and encapsulates some of the unique plants which make our gardens different from the rest of the world who have yet to see beyond our cordylines and pongas.

The Cultivation of New Zealand Grasses by Lawrie Metcalf is also an update of an earlier publication by the same author with revised text and fresh photos. Lawrie Metcalf is widely respected for his passion and his scholarship. This is the definitive reference book on our native grasses – their propagation, care, use in the garden or landscape, their botany and an A to Z listing of the different varieties. The topic has not been dumbed down for the masses but it remains perfectly readable and easily understood. It is a little shy on photos but if grasses are your thing, either professionally or as a hobby, you will not want to be without this book. And if grasses are not your favourite plant, it may inspire you to look beyond their use in motorway sidings and traffic islands.

Living with Natives, edited by Ian Spellerberg and Michele Frey is a curious publication to come from the Canterbury University Press because it is basically a coffee table book unashamedly targeting a populist market with no pretence of scholarship. It is a collection of 44 short essays by an eclectic mix of New Zealanders ostensibly about their love of native plants. The problem is that by no means all of the 44 have something worth saying. A house guest at the weekend who is passionate about natives (the plants, I mean) and is a botanist, gave up when she read the piece where Bob Harvey thinks his kauri is beginning to recognise him.

However, it is a nicely put together book with lovely photos by John Maillard and some of the contributors do have something to offer including some helpful advice and hints rather than platitudes or clichés, so if you like coffee table books, you may find it an interesting insight into different people’s love of our country. I just think it would have benefited from more rigorous editing.

100 best native plants for new zealand gardens, Fiona Eadie (Random House, $44.95) ISBN 978 1 86962 150 6

The Cultivation of New Zealand Grasses, Lawrie Metcalf (Random House, $34.99) ISBN 978 1 86962 148 3

Living With Natives, edited by Ian Spellerberg and Michele Frey (Canterbury University Press, $39.95) ISBN 978 1 877257 68 1

Sustainable gardening

I have been married to the same man for over 35 years now and he has spent much of that time curbing my tendency to hyperbole but I am about to open with a sweeping statement this week.

The single biggest issue that is dominating garden writing and garden theory at this time is that of sustainability. Through all the media, garden presenters, writers, planners, Uncle Tom Cobley and all are talking sustainability. Sometimes it comes in the guise of organics, but it is about a great deal more than just organics. And it has only come to the fore in the last few years but I believe that we are in a time of extremely rapid change again and the somewhat alien concept of sustainability in gardening will be accepted as the norm in a very short space of time.

Ornamental gardening doesn’t have a great history of being sustainable. Agriculture and food production is different. It is integral to human survival and even back in the days of subsistence living, it had to be able to be continued. The current strong lobby for organics in food production is really a turn of the wheel back to how things used to be done. It is only in recent history that we embraced the chemicals, pharmaceuticals, manufactured fertilisers and all the rest in a drive to lift production and to increase profits.

But ornamental gardening is rather different. Historically it was the domain of the rich and the powerful minority. You want a sweeping, gently rolling countryside view from your terrace? Get Capability Brown in and move a few untidy villages out of the way. You fancy a pleasant and cooling water garden in the middle of a dry and arid area? All such problems can be solved if you have the money and the power. Even the ancient Hanging Gardens of Babylon were testimony to man’s control over inhospitable nature (apparently in the quest to please a foreign born wife). Versailles was famous for the ability of the gardening minions to totally change the colour scheme of the bedding plants overnight so that when the French king and queen looked out of their window in the morning, instead of pink petunias and purple cineraria, they were looking instead at yellow pansies and blue forget me nots. I once used to know how many thousands of plants it took to achieve this overnight transformation.

In recent times we have become a great deal more democratic and ornamental gardens are no longer limited to those with power and deep purses. But we have tended to take on the trappings, albeit in a miniature form. A water feature is almost mandatory, even if you have to install a pump to get the water to the right place. Statues, urns, sculptures – all hark back to the rather grander gardens of yore. So too the sweeps of lawn, vistas (though many of us have to borrow them) and most of the trappings of ornamental gardening.

It is all about controlling our environment. About creating something we find pleasing and holding the unpleasant aspects of the world beyond at bay so we can have our own tranquil haven where we are in control. At its best, gardening is about working with nature. Alas, more often it is about controlling nature and bending it to our will. And that is the bit that is not sustainable.

Gardening is about loving beauty as we see it individually. Save us from the utilitarian approach whereby planting ornamental trees is replaced solely by food bearing specimens. Yes, I enjoy the apples off our apple trees and the plants themselves are attractive enough, but they don’t make my heart sing like the sight of Magnolia Iolanthe in full bloom this week. I will happily harvest fresh vegetables, but I don’t want to wander around admiring them as I do the flowering cyclamen and daffodils. Growing fruit and vegetables is not a replacement for growing ornamental plants and creating a garden which feeds the soul.

But much of our talk here is focussed on how we can make our gardening practices more environmentally sound and what compromises we are willing to make in order to reduce our footprint on this planet. Truth be told, Mark is more prosaic in his interpretation of sustainable gardening. He sees it at a far more personal level of ensuring that the garden we continue to develop and extend remains manageable and able to be maintained to the standard we want in the long term. Part of that is shunning at least some of the questionable gardening practices, particularly the routine application of sprays.

I guess that adapting our gardening practices to be more sustainable and more environmentally friendly is all about individuals taking small steps rather than dramatic turnarounds. The domestic lawn is probably the worst crime. We are not willing to cast out the lawnmower (and we console ourselves that at least we don’t drive to work) but we do use a mulcher mower so the clippings are not removed. You can not keep stripping off the grass and expect the lawn to remain healthy so you either catch the clippings and feed the lawn or you mulch the clippings back in as part of the mowing process. Mark has a dislike of hormone sprays in the garden, so he has generally stopped spraying the lawn. We will take out the flat weeds by hand and have learned to live with some of the others.

Gardeners should be seriously questioning the use of plants which require routine spraying to keep them healthy. Strong, healthy plants will often withstand diseases and pests. If they won’t, maybe it is time to replace them different selections that will.

Mulching garden beds not only feeds the soil (reducing the need to fertilise), it also suppresses weeds. Being maniacal mulchers, we are now of the view that bare soil anywhere but in the vegetable garden is a black mark. Mulches also reduce or remove the need to water. Yes it rains a lot in Taranaki and water is rarely a problem in the north, but it is still hard to justify the regular use of water in an ornamental garden when it can be managed without. Delivering water to your garden tap still comes at an environmental and financial cost.

Learning how to make compost saves taking green waste to the rubbish transfer station (and buying in compost and mulch in return).

Small steps in gardening will not change our planet but it may just help to make us a little cleaner and greener. It is a myth that gardeners are environmentalists but it would be nice if we could be.

September 12, 2008 Weekly Garden Guide

While the rain has returned, last week was a good reminder of how fast we can dry out. If you still have plans to relocate trees and shrubs in your garden, don’t delay any longer. Move the largest ones first because they are likely to suffer the most stress.

  • If you have deciduous perennial material (in other words it hides underground in winter – plants such as hostas) be careful where you walk on the garden or you may find you have just snapped off all the new shoots.
  • You are running out of time to sort out your lawns. Oversow bare patches if you haven’t done so already. Don’t delay on getting new lawns sown. The false bed approach to laying a new lawn is to cultivate the ground to its final tilth, let the first crop of weed seeds germinate, then recultivate (to kill the weeds) and sow the grass seed. This technique works well in the vegetable garden too. If you feel you must fertilise your lawn, use a natural product such as Bioboost.
  • Camellias can be shaped and pruned as flowering finishes and do not delay any work you want to do with shaping conifers as they will making their spring flush shortly.
  • If you have mixed or herbaceous borders which are relatively self maintaining, it still pays to fork over the soil between the plants to stop compaction and to lay mulch. Fertilise with blood and bone.
  • It is more of the same as last week in the vegetable garden. This is the most important time of the year to start your early crops and to prepare the beds for the planting of main crops in a month’s time. Keep on top of the weeds, cultivate the soil, add compost as a mulch. Research has shown that compost does not have to be dug in but does the double job of suppressing weeds as well when laid on top. There is now enough heat in the sun to hoe weeds and leave them to dry on top.

While on the topic of hoeing, we have a quote from American humorist Henry Beard this week (this one is for you to quote, Valmai).

Hoeing: a manual method of severing roots from stems of newly planted flowers and vegetables.

September 5, 2008 Weekly Garden Guide

What a lot can change in a week. Spring really-o truly-o has arrived and for us, the garden visitor season has started. There is a sense of slight panic as we tackle the tasks which we had hoped to get completed in winter. Do not delay any longer on winter pruning (all deciduous trees except cherries and related family members such as flowering peaches and almonds). And if you plan a hard prune and shape on evergreen trees and shrubs, including rhododendrons and vireyas, do it now. The plants will be ready to put on their spring growth and that vigour will help them recover from hard pruning or bad pruning.

  • If you have rhododendrons which are looking a little sad, taking out all the dead wood can improve their appearance quickly. If all or most of the leaves are silver, you had a problem with thrips last season (nasty little leaf suckers). You can not turn the silver leaves green again though the new growth will appear in green, to start with at least. In a small garden, you might as well take the whole plant out and replace it with something which is going to stay healthier and not need spraying. In a larger garden, open up around the plant to allow more air movement and light (thrips do not appear to like drafts) and give the plant a heavy hair cut. You can cut back to bare wood on a strong growing plant, to rejuvenate it. Sacrifice the flowers this season for a better looking, bushy plant next season.
  • If you are inspired by vegetables, get hold of the Kings Seed Catalogue (also available on line, we are told) for the most interesting range in the country. But shun the strawberry spinach which should be on every regional council banned list and soon.
  • It is a critical month in the vegetable garden. Get the ground ready for the summer crops which will be planted out in four to six weeks time. Dig in green crops, clear weeds, cultivate the soil, incorporate compost and generally get the soil rich and friable if you want good results.
  • If you are after early harvests, start tomato seeds, corn, melons, cucumbers, capsicums, courgettes and all the rest. But do it in pots under cover. A cloche placed on the intended site now will warm the soil faster for planting out your tender seedlings. It is much cheaper to grow from seed than to buy small plants.
  • Keep planting peas and potatoes from now on to ensure a succession of crops. Early salad vegetables can be grown under cloches to give them the additional warmth and protection they need.
  • If you have a glasshouse, you need to remember that a sunny day can overheat your tender seedlings remarkably quickly.

 Henry Mitchell summarised the panic of spring when he wrote:

There is nothing like the first hot days of spring when the gardener stops wondering if it’s too soon to plant the dahlias and starts wondering if it’s too late.

Growing Organics

Nick Hamilton with Philippa Jamieson (New Holland, $29.95)

Mark is decidedly sceptical of the claim that carrot fly don’t generally exceed 15cm of altitude and therefore planting your carrots inside a low box hedge or similar will reduce their infestation. But he is currently on a mission to decode organic gardening and to unravel its leanings to unscientific sweeping claims (somewhat like blind faith at times) so he read this book from cover to cover. It claims to be a very handy New Zealand guide to gardening the organic way. It isn’t. It is a British book, adapted to New Zealand conditions by changing south facing to north facing and June to December, with the addition of the occasional extra section such as one on possum control (maybe replacing a section on coping with moles and squirrels?).

What it is, is a handy and sound book giving a basic introduction to good vegetable gardening practice, along with a few fruits, particularly for those who live in cold climates. Good gardening practice is universal and not limited to organics. The section on organic pest control is very average at best and it is not going to help you to deal with infestations of insects in your brussel sprouts. It does, however, avoid the excesses of fervour sometimes associated with organics and encourages successful home production of food without the usual chapter on chemical controls. It is a book for the novice gardener but not a reference for the experienced gardener who is looking to cast out the use of chemical controls and wanting reliable alternatives.

ISBN 978-1-86966-224-0