Garden description: My garden is a joy. Most of our property is shaded by large, old trees, and we have ferns and lily of the valley with pots of caladium and impatiens. The flower garden is planted in our only spot of sunshine. It offers bright colors, pleasant scents and plenty of winged visitors .
Who are the gardeners: My husband helped me with establishing the garden and installing irrigation but I am the sole gardener, along with Mother Nature. She provides the surprises.
Why do you garden: I love flowers. And I like having cut flowers indoors. Flowers are expensive to buy so I decided to plant my own. I started reading gardening books. I never realized how many plants and flowers there were! I fell in love with it all. That was about 45 years ago and I have had a perennial garden wherever I have lived since then. Moving to Delaware after having lived in the midwest, I was like “a kid in a candystore”. The climate and soil here are marvelous, and there are even more options with this temperate zone.
How has gardening impacted you during this time: My garden has always offered me solitude, peace and quiet. The rest of the world is in the background when I am puttering around, deadheading flowers and yanking a few weeds. Nothing could be better in times like these.
What do you have in your garden? My garden is planted with a variety of perennials interspersed with annuals to carry it from season to season. I include flowers and shrubs that attract pollinators, such as buddleia, asclepsia, milkweed and echinacea. It starts out in the spring with grape hyacinth, tulips, peonies and creeping veronica, proceeds to the riot of color in the summer with phlox, liliums, scabiosa and coreopsis, and ends with the late summer asters and solidago.
Do you have any problems with disease or pests? If so, how are you dealing with this problem? the first few years of the garden, there were voles that attacked the roots of my plants. After doing some research, I planted the perimeter of the garden with grape hyacinth and marigolds, which helped a lot.
