Tag Archives: tussock grassland

The tussock walkway, one year on.

I see it is exactly 364 days ago that I published a piece on deciding to establish a tussock walkway. It is entirely coincidence that I return to it today.

From a different part of the garden, that is Carex buchananii at the front with the orlaya and verbena and Carex comans behind.

I have no idea if other countries talk about tussock or tussockland. Overseas readers may like to enlighten me. Maybe it is our term and other countries have prairies, steppes and grasslands? Our tussock areas are our native grasslands and I am not even sure that many New Zealanders realise that our native grasses are not only largely unique to us but also varied and interesting with many good garden candidates. Contrary to what some think, a tussock is not a specific grass, it is a term for the growth habit of a number of grasses that include our chionochloa, poa, festuca and – sometimes – carex.  

Not exactly well furnished yet but on the way

I opted for carex in this area, specifically Carex buchananii and Carex comans ‘Bronze” because I had them to hand. I will admit that they got off to a slow start because I shifted them, divided and replanted in high summer. While well watered-in, they had to endure a long, dry summer and autumn and not all of them lasted the distance. But it will not matter. They are seeding down with great gusto, on a scale I had not expected. Not only do I anticipate it being a fully clothed tussock area by this time next year, I think I will have to thin them. Most of these look to be the more upright C.buchananii at this stage but I am hoping for some of the fountaining C.comans as well.

That is a whole lot of self-seeding happening in a short space of time

The purity of vision with which I started – that of a rippling grassland of bronze tussock with no defined paths – has been watered down a little. When we broke up the two concrete paths that defined the site of the old propagation house that formerly filled most of this space, I made the call to get Lloyd to lay some crazy paved stepping stones through it and that may be a good call in terms of keeping some clear pathways, given the dense seeding of the plants.

Adding native celmisia to the Carex buchananii

Next Mark asked me, “What are you going to do to add some seasonal interest and colour?” And those words are the death knell of pure visions. I added some celmisias – our native mountain daisy – and I really like the look of those with the carex. There were some legacy plants that survived the removal of the propagation house and I feel Cordyline stricta can stay, even though it is Australian. Another tropical-looking cordyline has popped up and it may or may not be C.petiolaris. A bit of seed is blowing in and I will have to manage Verbena bonariensis  and the white nicotiana because, while a few plants are charming enough, we don’t want them everywhere and they seem to want to be everywhere. And I admit I planted a swag of dwarf narcissi. For spring interest, you understand.

An Australian interoper – the blue flowered Cordyline stricta (not Ralph)

Zach refers to this area as ‘the prairie’, albeit a very small prairie. I shall keep referring to it as the tussock walkway because the grasses at least will remain the dominant plant and they are native tussocks.

More a tussock walkway than tussock lands, with a postscript on nativity scenes

What to do with this new space? The end by the shed will be screened with a hedge of Camellia Fairy Blush but that must wait until autumn now.

A nearly blank canvas! I thought I had done with these when I planted the last of the summer gardens. Then we created a new space when we moved both the propagation shed and Mark’s plant treasure house. What to do with this area?

Sometimes it takes time for a plan to become clear. We cleaned up the area for the garden festival, covering up the bare ground with wood chips and I looked and thought. And looked several times a day and thought. It is an access way and we have decided to leave some of the building supports in place to hold the lapagerias up. The lapagerias – Chilean bellflowers – suffered shock when they were suddenly exposed to bright light but they are putting on fresh growth now.

Looking back the other way from the shed. The railway track concrete paths should be lifted in the next week or so.

I found a hearth belonging to the previous house on the property – a single bay villa from the turn of last century. Mark vaguely knew it was there but he couldn’t remember the exact location. It seems to be the site of the old copper for boiling up laundry so is more likely to have been a detached wash-house than the actual residence. Somehow it seems to have some historic interest though I am not sure yet how to incorporate that.

The twin concrete paths are a legacy of the propagation shed and will be lifted, possibly broken up and used in crazy paving elsewhere. There is screening hedging to go in at the end nearest our big shed but that will have to wait for autumn, now. But what to do with the rest of it?

The empty space runs behind the summer borders
Flanked on the other side by the freeform bee and butterfly garden we call the Iolanthe garden

It wasn’t until Friday that my plan became clear. We favour complex plantings but this transition area needs a simpler solution. On one side, it is flanked by the twin borders which are controlled complex plantings. On the other side, it is bounded by the Iolanthe garden – the bee and butterfly garden with its wilder, free-form complex plantings. What we needed, I decided, is a simple breathing space in the middle.   I have written about green breathing spaces before and their importance in garden design. We don’t want mown lawn in this space, but we will go with grass – or grasses, to be precise. Not green grasses, though. Tawny brown grasses.

More tawny than bronze, Carex comans ‘Bronze’ looks better to my eyes when each plant has its own space rather than growing together

Enter our native carex, also referred to as sedges. I happen to have both Carex comans ‘Bronze’ and Carex buchananii which need lifting and dividing. They grow quickly and have a tendency to seed down but that will be fine in this situation. I measured a C. comans ‘Bronze’and I can tell you that it only takes two years to get to around 80cm across when given space. I plan to plant at metre spacings to give each plant room to stand in its own place and I figure I have enough to cover about 30 square metres. C. buchananii, being an upright grower, needs to be planted a bit closer but between the two, I am hoping we can cover most of the area. There will be no formal definition in layout – the paths will be the same woodchip as the mulch around the plants so it will be seamless to the eye.

Carex buchananii also looks better with more space than I have given it here

Mark referred to the potential experience of walking through our own tussock so I looked up and indeed, in NZ, tussock refers to a number of our native grasses, including carex. We won’t have a green breathing space, but we will have a small tawny brown tussock grassland. Now I just want to start planting and get it done. Watch this space.

Hilary’s nativity scene in natural materials

Further to last week’s post on nativity scenes, a reader sent me photos of her natural-styled nativity scenes. Her first was freeform, her second designed to last more than just a day to two. I was delighted to hear from somebody else motivated to create their own.

If you, too, find nativity scenes an interesting diversion, google ‘cats in nativity scenes’ or click here. I like cats, even though we made a decision, based on environmental concerns, not to get another cat when our Buffy came to the end of her days. Determined cats photobombing nativity scenes rival cats destroying Christmas trees.

I will restrain myself, however, from sharing the edible nativity scene that came down my Facebook feed. A dinner table centrepiece, it was constructed from… frankfurters and bacon. Even for a heathen like me, it was perhaps a step too far. But it was funny.