We've had a few beautiful sunny spring days here at Struan Farm over the past week, allowing for garden clean ups to begin. Finally!
Sister-in-law Anna came to stay for a few days to keep John company while I was up in Auckland, and she dove right in (Robertsons have a tendency to do this, she even brings her own tools). I returned home to find her head down in the beds at the house with the trailer already full of weeds and cutbacks.
And so I've continued where she left off. The work is a combination of weeding, cutting back, and trimming brick edges. Also judiciously pulling out some self seeding flowers that have self seeded a bit too much over autumn/winter. Yes, basically dealing with too much of a good thing. We've got poppies, scabiosa black knight, nigella/love-in-the-mist, coreopsis, erygium, and green scabiosas popping up in the beds thanks to last year's plants. That last one is quite spready, with a deep tap root, and I'm pulling out all but a very few.
I love our "cottage garden" look, especially having lots of flowers, but it takes quite a bit of work early in the season to lay the groundwork for the rest of the year or things end up a jumbled mess pretty quickly. Also to manage transitions as things flower, peak, and finish. As the gardens at the house have become more established I'm adjusting what I plant where.
It's always interesting to see what survives winter depending on the frost too. I've learned it's a crap shoot with certain types of salvias and daisies. This year I lost a few huge purple salvias while others survived, as did the big daisies. And sometimes you simply need to pull things out when they get leggy and start over. Spring, time for new beginnings, right?
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