110 | Summer Fails 2021

 

Achieving a picture perfect garden has proven much more difficult than I first thought and though perfection isn’t the aim, creating a sensory pleasing garden is. There are so many things that must be taken into consideration - understanding the nature of the garden and it’s constraints, coming up with a coherent planting and design scheme and keeping on top of its maintenance. For some, these things come naturally. For a newb like me, not so. Here are my top ten gardening fails for summer 2021!

10 | curtailed kerb appeal

For 3 years we were greeted by a tired looking, sun bleached artificial heather plant in a worn out hanging basket. It looked great for the first six months when we first moved here then slowly went downhill after that. Each year I’d promise myself that I’ll get some real plants out front and each year old “crusty heather” (sounds just as peculiar as busy lizzie, creeping jenny and dusty miller) stayed.

I had to end the cycle and this was the year. Being the budding planthusiast that I am, I created a mood board and had a plan. To make sure I saw it through, I asked hubby to put crusty heather in the bin in mid spring. By the start of July, instalment one of three was finally in place - an easy fill hanging basket filled with petunias and promise. At the end of summer, instalment one of three was the only instalment there was. I never got the chance to follow through with the plan as any moment I got for garden chores was desperately spent trying to pot up perishing plug plants. 

Next year I’m sure will be the year where our kerb appeal finally goes from crass to class!

09 | empty planters

This follows on from entry number 10 above. I JUST DIDN’T HAVE THE TIME!!! To be fair, I managed to get just about all of the planters filled bar one - one very important one. The back of our garden is in deep shade by the time summer rolls round due to the ornamental trees that were planted in and the huge existing sycamore trees. In the far corner of the garden stands a very tall blue ceramic planter. 

Last year I potted up some white busy lizzies and it totally brightened up the area so I decided that that would be the plant of choice going forward. I sowed said busy lizzie seeds in early spring and had said busy lizzie plug plants ready to get potted up but said busy lizzies sadly withered away in their growing on cups because I didn’t get a chance to plant them out.  The tall ceramic planter was left barren with the exception of some ivy which made its home there. I had my spiller but no filler or thriller and that corner of the garden didn’t have its sparkle this year.

08 | clumsy colour palette 

Nature is captivating! There are flowers in every colour imaginable and plants with different textures and shapes. It’s hard not to want them all and therein lies the problem - wanting every plant that exists. Unfortunately, this doesn’t make for a great planting scheme and though each plant may be beautiful on its own, if all brought together without a plan in mind becomes chaotic and unattractive. My colour palette soon became a rainbow palette. What resulted this year was a garden that had no colour coherence and vibrant colours clashed with subdued tones. 

With that said, I don’t regret the choices I made. This year was about growing plants I never grew before which meant that I had to grow lots of varieties and what was often the case was I grew plants I had no intention of growing - after thoughts - and that would’ve automatically meant that some things would clash. It may be a fail in terms of creating a traditional tried and tested colour palette but it has been a successful year for growing different plants.

07 | terrible turf

The lawn looked promising in spring but as summer rolled around it was apparent that it was in serious need of some TLC. I had a plan of action and a couple back up plans:

• Plan A | scarify, aerate, re-seed, top dress and fertilise the lawn. These are all the steps I took (bar the latter) last year and the lawn improved ten-fold. This year I had to scrap Plan A due to a new addition to our family. 

• Plan B | re-seed and top dress the lawn. I managed to do this but it was a fail. Germination was poor and what did sprout eventually died back because I couldn’t get out every day to keep the seedlings hydrated.

• Plan C | mow the lawn as often as possible and allow the clippings to remain on the lawn. Try and water in times of dry spells. I really tried sticking to this but there were so many weeds this year and I just couldn’t keep on top of them.

The result - a lawn that was peppered with an unusually high number of ants mounds and patchy with weeds and thatch that gave it a tired appearance and was no longer an inviting destination but a thoroughfare.

06 | seedling cemetery 

As good as my intentions were to plant out ALL of my seedlings, I just didn’t have the time. I got most of them into growing on cups but there were some that were still in the seed trays. Tall white snapdragons that typically reach heights of 3ft by the end of the season were still grouped together in tiny 10x10cm cells struggling to survive. Busy lizzies had huge thick stems with small under developed leaves desperately trying to complete their sole objective of going to seed. Lupins were stunted and couldn’t trash their full growth potential this far into the season. 

In early spring, they were all located in a south facing window growing beautifully and to schedule. By late summer they were housed in the conservatory and had been there for two months. It really was a sorry sight. 

My hubby, bless him, would’ve been convinced that they were fine and just needed a bit of water but that’s because we’re different plant people. I knew there was no hope.

Their final resting place was in the compost bin at the far end of the garden. 

05 | “burnt out” busy lizzies

I remember thinking to myself that I packed in way too many plants when potting up my tall patio container but I just couldn’t see past it’s initial puny appearance and wanted to instantly have a full display. Fast forward 3 months later and the busy lizzies have far outgrown the space. I was convinced that enough drainage holes were drilled into the bottom of the nested planter but now I suspect that the plants are sitting in water and the busy lizzies are dying from root rot! Either way, what was once a beauty to behold has now become a patio planter of pure misery.

04 | unhappy “snappy”

The first time I saw snapdragons were from a YouTube video which I’m now finding impossible to find again. They were lush, perky and full of deep crimson upright blooms. I knew I had to grow some for myself. Advice given by the seller were to stake them but I thought this advice could be ignored. Nuh uh! My much anticipated snappy snapdragons weren’t snappy at all. Most of them looked like they woke up and couldn’t be bothered to put in their snappy false teeth. Heavy rainfall and strong winds left them battered and bent and it took some time for them to recover and eventually bush out by which time the summer was over.

03 | incompatible companion plants

Pictures of a bed of zinnias, snapdragons and verbena inspired my white polar bear zinnia and orange wonder snapdragon combo. I was sure that following something that clearly worked for someone else would work for me too. Wrong. The zinnias are way too tall and tower above the snapdragons - and not in a good way. I thought my biggest problem with this combination would be their differing watering needs but that wasn’t an issue in the slightest. What I didn’t anticipate was that they just wouldn’t look pleasing together.

03 | zapped zinnias 

I thought I got away with dusty

02 | no sparkle “sparklers”

When I was placing my order earlier in the year for my summer annual seeds, I was just about to checkout when I saw some petunias called “sparklers”. The colours were vibrant and what’s more, the shape was totally unique. They didn’t take on the typical bell shape that petunias are known and loved for. Instead they looked like stars in shades of pink, purple and violet. Beautiful and vibrant. In reality, they were more on the dull side and a tad underwhelming.

01 | per-no-la (failed pergola-esq inspired design idea)

I wanted to have a cosy seating area where we would be surrounded by beautifully scented climbing petunias cascading down on either side from the trellis and fence whilst concealing the banal PVC drain pipe. What I got was 

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