Tag Archives: Tikorangi: The Jury garden

From an earlier era

The marquee displays at the 1960 Chelsea Flower Show

I had told myself for decades that one of these days. I will sort through the family slides. Not so much a day, it turned out, as a couple of weeks but I am close to the end.

Both Mark’s parents and Mark himself photographed on slide film in the days before digital cameras. It was always an expensive medium to work in, probably even more so in the days when slide films had to be sent to Australia to be developed. There were boxes and boxes and boxes of slides. Forty years of them.

Labelled ‘Captain and Mrs Ingram, Benenden’. Initially I assumed this must be from Felix’s trip to the UK a decade later, Captain Ingram being none other than renowned plant collector and ornithologist Collingwood “Cherry” Ingram. The photo is more Mimosa in style and Mark says he is pretty sure his mother visited the Ingrams on her tour.

I decided early on that I would scan and keep the historic images of the garden and the property and those of identifiable family members but the close-ups of flowers could all be discarded, as could random landscapes and events that meant something at the time but are of no discernible relevance now.

My task became a lot more interesting when I came to the slides that Mark’s mother, Mimosa, took and now I worry that I may have been too ruthless in my selection of those to scan and keep and those to discard.

Mimosa in front of the Papal Basilica of St Peter in the Vatican, 1960 photograph (not a slide in this case)

Mark’s mother only left the country once that I can see. But that one occasion was a big trip – Le Grand Tour, in fact. Mark has always been a bit vague on her absence, it being ‘quite a long trip’, he thought. I was a fair way through sorting the slides before I realised what a huge experience it must have been for her. She spent about two months voyaging there and back and five months exploring the UK, Italy, France, Austria, Germany, and the Netherlands.

Astilbes in the marquee at Chelsea
Astilbes and lilies
This display of roses was somewhat less than glorious but look at the serious garden visitors behind

It included the Chelsea Flower Show where she was clearly impressed by the marquee displays which were of the very highest standard. She didn’t take many photos of the outdoor gardens. It seems that the showpiece outdoor gardens have evolved quite a bit in the last 65 years. Perhaps they are more fashion-forward these days?

It would seem that the outdoor gardens had more to do glorious floral displays than design

I wanted to date her Chelsea visit and I can now say that it was indeed 1960, as I thought. We also happen to have the menu cards from the trip over and back. We forget how recent long-distance air travel is and how extraordinary it is that we can travel all the way across the world in just over 24 hours in the air. Mimosa sailed out of Aotearoa New Zealand just before Christmas 1959, on board the SS Australia, a long-distance passenger liner operated by the Italian company, Lloyd Triestino, with an Italian crew.

The large format covers for entertainment cards and the menus changed daily, clearly designed as souvenirs – and successful souvenirs in that we still have them!
A very Italian experience

This solved one mystery. I was a little surprised by this somewhat raunchy image until Mark and another both suggested it was related to ‘crossing the line’, ergo, the equator. I found the programme for the event. One wonders what form the 10.15am Discorso di Nettuno e battesimo deo neofiti took (Neptune’s speech and the baptism of the landlubbers) but it all happened on January 12, 1960. Those relatively uninhibited young men in the photo appear to be the Italian crew. The voyage terminated on January 27 at an Italian port, having travelled via the Suez Canal.

Rather more risque than the farm boys from Tikorangi that Mimosa would have known

It must all have been quite the culture shock for a middle-aged woman from Tikorangi but Mark tells me his mother prepared for it all by putting quite a lot of effort into teaching herself Italian. I am not at all sure how one would even plan a trip of that length, in pre-internet days but even more so as a woman travelling on her own with no prior experience. I doubt that she would wing it, as we have done, and she probably travelled with a great deal more luggage than we have ever taken.

The return voyage was likely less exotic, on board the R.M.S. Rangitane, owned by the New Zealand Shipping Company so it likely transited the Panama Canal which, according to my mother, was very dull compared to the Suez. She boarded the Rangitane on or about June 3, 1960 and they docked in NZ on July 6. The menu cards from this return voyage show a diet that was considerably less adventurous than on the Italian liner.

I loved this soft focus image from her visit to a seaside village in Cornwall. We stayed in a very similar fisherman’s cottage in St Mawes when we visited in 2009.

Mimosa was always interested in gardens but she mostly photographed landscapes and architecture. She had a good eye and, 65 years on, it was her people photographs that I found most delightful.  

A random shot, I assume, of Cornish locals, possibly inspired by the blue and red clothing composition. As Mark commented, these photos are all the more remarkable for the fact that with old cameras, the settings all had to be manually adjusted so she would have had to take a light reading with her light meter and then adjust for distance and focus as well. Photography was less spontaneous back then.

When the rainy weather sets in again, I will turn my attention to ordering the garden scenes that I have scanned in. It is interesting to see the earliest plantings and constructions and the various stages they have gone through in close to 75 years. It makes us realise yet again that a garden can never be frozen in time. Gardening is a dynamic response to a changing environment, in the longer term at least. Curated examples may appear here in due course.

From her visit to the Netherlands…. Clogs- dear. They are all wearing clogs.
Nothing to do with Mimosa’s grand tour, but this was probably my favourite of her images. It was labelled ‘Lou and Simon Urenui Domain Gala January ’67’
Or how about “Mr Ashton and his dog raising funds at the Wai-iti Life Saving Carnival”? The expression on the dog’s face is wonderful, if you are viewing on a large screen, as are the men wearing suits and ties at a beach carnival.

Our very own mountain daisy, the celmisia

The three species crosses resulted in broader leaves and silver colour all year round

Celmisias are our very own mountain daisies. They have never been a common garden plant because they aren’t easy in nursery production and rarely thrive in the average home garden. It is likely that their greatest fans are trampers and botanists but that should not blind us to their charm. Many people just don’t know of them. And I suppose, when you think about it, quite a lot of our native plants have white daisy flowers.

I was surprised when I looked them up and found a far greater number of species than I ever knew existed. Some dedicated botanists have clearly spent a lot of time unravelling this genus.

When Mark’s father, Felix, was still alive, he became very interested in seeing whether he could hybridise different species to get plants that would thrive in our lowland, humid conditions. Most celmisias are subalpine to alpine plants. I remember Felix and Mark heading up our maunga, Mount Taranaki, in search of the form which grows there naturally – Celmisia major var. brevis – and being thrilled to find some flower variations into pink. This was about 40 years ago, you understand, when people didn’t feel so bad about collecting plant material in a national park. They collected some plants, including a few of the pinks which they only saw growing in one area.

The first season after their relocation. I have moved them again because the grasses were overhanging them and these plants do not appreciate having to compete for space and light.

Felix set about crossing three species – C. coriacea which comes from Fiordland, C. hookeri  from the Otago area and the aforementioned C. major, in various combinations. Forty years on, we still have some of those hybrids growing and flowering in the garden here. It is the three way cross which gave us the broader leaves in distinctive silver all year round. Over the decades, we lost many of them, including all the pink ones, and have, at times, run close to losing the lot but for a bit of quick intervention. They have never seeded down for us; we have to increase them by division. They do set seed which we could gather and sow in seed trays but, in a busy gardening life, we don’t seem to get around to it. These are plants that need to be lifted and divided every few years or they rot out and fade away so we can never claim that they have naturalised here.

The area we refer to as ‘the grasslands’ when I first planted it in 2022 – one of the few celmisias to the right

When I planted my tawny brown area of two native carex grasses, C buchananii which is specific to our maunga and C. comans, I envisioned a simple breathing area of just those two plants. Mark looked at it and wanted more detail and colour. He suggested moving some of the celmisias which we were in danger of losing, into the newly cultivated area. So I did. There weren’t many left to play with. In the first year, I probably only had half a dozen divisions.  That was in 2022. It was like they breathed a sigh of relief and set about growing with renewed vigour. Last year I divided a few clumps that were large. This year, I divided most of them and I lost count around 58 or 60 plants. Some are small but they are surviving and I have done my best to give them optimal growing conditions. It was enormously satisfying. There aren’t many perennials I am willing to lavish such frequent and individualised care upon but the rewards feel worth it with the celmisias.

The same area in 2025 but now with the addition of 58, or it may be 60, celmisia plants

It is mighty hard to be original in a garden. Pretty much everything has been done before, some time, some place. I always scoff silently to myself when I hear the occasional gardener declare that somebody ‘stole their ideas’ or copied them. “But who influenced you in the first place?” I want to ask (but never do). However, I doubt that the celmisia and carex combination will be replicated soon, at least not locally. It is a successful subalpine planting in coastal, subtropical conditions and I am moderately chuffed by its unexpected nature in that context.

Te maunga, our mountain, Mount Taranaki, as I drove to town on Wednesday. The snow cover is abnormally light for mid-winter. There may be no more skiing days this season.

More ‘invisible gardening’.

Green waste is removed by the wool bale full – too much for my wheelbarrow .

I coined the description of ‘invisible gardening’ in recent times. It describes when I spend many hours, often days, working through every square metre of a section of garden with meticulous care, removing huge amounts of foliage and debris. All the while, I know that the only people who will notice are the four of us here because, after all that, it just looks tidier. No dramatic changes.

I didn’t think to take a before photo of this stretch but this is the after shot. It doesn’t look as though it has had two wool bales of green waste removed.

I am invisible gardening my way along the lower borders of the Avenue Gardens where it meets the park and the waste is coming out in packed wool bales to be composted elsewhere. So far, I am up to five full bales. I figured it is a reasonably high level gardening skill to pick over an area and remove that volume without making the place look denuded.

By the time I was onto the next path, Ralph and I remember the camera. This is BEFORE ….
… and AFTER another very full two bales of green waste was removed

I was trying to remember when I last gave this area the same level of close attention. It will be three to four years ago. In the interim, it has had the once over lightly treatment once or twice a year- a bit of weeding and removal of fallen debris and spent foliage, but nothing detailed. We don’t apply fertiliser; natural mulch provides nutrition. And we will only spot-spray if there is a problem that has got away on us. We never need to water.

BEFORE…
and AFTER. Spot the difference. It is a bit subtle, but believe me, a lot has been removed in the clean-up.

It started me thinking how long a garden lasts if you ignore it or just give it the occasional once-over-lightly attention. These are woodland gardens under a canopy that is largely evergreen, which slows growth and restricts weed germination. I came to the conclusion that after about three years, the area loses its definition. This is because plants are no longer standing in their own spaces but have melded together, enmeshed, so to speak. After about four years, the detail starts to go. We like highly detailed gardens – many different plants in varying combinations and a good representation of treasures. By four years, the thugs are taking over (I have removed A LOT of clivia seedlings) and the daintier plants have been squeezed out or swamped. From there, it is all downhill.

Halve the time estimates for sunny gardens. In those conditions, plants grow faster and the weed explosion can be exponential.

I am of the opinion that low maintenance and good gardening are mutually exclusive concepts. You can have one but probably not the other. If you want a lower maintenance garden, stick to shrubs and swathes of the same plant. We want detail and complexity and we live with the resulting maintenance demands. Besides, a couple of weeks every three years or so doesn’t seem oppressively high maintenance.

The meadow in late spring

For readers who have followed our experiments in sustainably managing the park as a meadow, Lloyd mowed it all down this last week in June. The areas too steep to mow, he cuts with the weed-eater or strimmer. The timing is important because the bluebells and narcissi are all coming through. We will mow again in late January. With our high fertility and rainfall, we have to cut it right down twice a year. Grass grows every week of the year here, just a bit slower in winter. If we didn’t mow as we do, we would soon lose all the bulbs, the irises and other perennial meadow plants.

An FCC, no less.

It is not every day that we hear the news that a Jury plant has been awarded an FCC – First Class Certificate – from the prestigious Royal Horticultural Society in the UK. In fact, it has never happened before. I remember, back in the days of writing plant descriptions for our catalogue, coming across the occasional FCC and being aware that it was prestigious but I had to seek clarification on the difference between an FCC and AGM (an award of garden merit, not to be confused with an annual general meeting). We have few Jury plants with AGMs, but not many.

Camellia ‘Mimosa Jury’

First class certificates are like the pinnacle of quality assessment – an award that is attached to that plant forever. Awards of garden merit can be bestowed and then, on occasion, taken away, being a recommendation by the RHS of top quality cultivars that perform well as garden plants in most situations. FCCs are quite a step above that.

It is Felix’s plant, not Mark’s, that has been honoured. Camellia ‘Mimosa Jury’ was named for his wife so we know both Felix and Mimosa rated it very highly. I see we first released it in 1989, some four years after Mimosa died. From our modest little nursery (very modest back then), it was distributed by others throughout the camellia world.

It is an exceptionally beautiful flower in the form that Felix particularly liked – described as ‘formal’ in form – in the prettiest shade of pink. It is not a big bloom like the highly rated ‘Desire’ or even ‘Queen Diana’ back in the day, but that makes it a better garden plant. And the FCC award recognises the merit of the overall plant, not a single show bloom.

Camellia ‘Mimosa Jury’, now recognised as one of the best but, sadly, no longer in our conditions

Sadly, camellia petal blight has robbed us of the once beautiful display in our conditions. None of the japonica, reticulata or hybrid camellias have escaped the scourge of petal blight which is particularly bad in our mild, humid climate. We haven’t planted a new camellia from those vulnerable groups in many years. Camellia petal blight has spread throughout the world; I am told it has now arrived in Australia which had managed to stay free from it for a long time. But it is not as devastating in other places, especially those with colder winters, lower rainfall and less humidity. Camellias in other places still perform and mass bloom in the manner we have not seen here for decades now.

It seems Camellia ‘Mimosa Jury’ is performing so well in the UK that it stands head and shoulders above most other camellias. Felix died 28 years ago but we will bask in the reflected glory on his behalf.

I don’t have many photos of Mark’s mother, Mimosa, from later in life. She died before the advent of digital cameras and existing photos are mostly studio shots from her younger days. Here she is, sitting in front of the house with early blooms of Magnolia ‘Atlas’, in the early 1980s.

Mānawatia a Matariki

Happy Māori New Year

We refer to this seedling as Hazel’s magnolia

Usually I mark the time of the winter solstice and Matariki – the Māori New Year – with a photograph of the first blooms of the season on our pink Magnolia campbellii, set against our maunga (Mount Taranaki), with or without snow. The snow came in sufficient quantity last week for the low altitude ski field to open for a day or two. This week, that snow has melted away, all but a smidgeon on the peak. Such is the situation with a mountain set right on the coast.

This year, I am marking it with a seedling from Mark’s breeding programme that we refer to as ‘Hazel’s magnolia’. Several years ago, when Mark was asked to do the casket flowers for an old friend’s mother, he constructed his arrangement with the flowers of this magnolia. Her name was Hazel. In a world hurtling at breakneck speed towards one disaster after another, marked by cruelty and inhumanity, the memory of Hazel seems especially poignant. Hazel was a gem in life – one of the kindest people you could ever meet, gentle, welcoming and with natural grace.

Remembering Hazel

It gives us considerable pleasure to remember Hazel each year with this magnolia. It is a one-off plant; we won’t officially name it or release it. It flowers too early in the season for commercial release and is not sufficiently distinctive to make the cut of the very few we name but that in no way diminishes our pleasure in the blooming each year around Matariki and the winter solstice.

It seems a vain hope that the start of a new year in Aotearoa will bring optimism, hope and a return to kinder, more compassionate times. Hazel’s magnolia is a reminder for us that these qualities are possible at an individual, personal level. May you have your own personal markers of hope for the year to come and the future beyond.