Wyn Drabble says he will prune his roses when the time comes but until then the garden will have to tend to itself while he hibernates. Photo / Supplied
Wyn Drabble says he will prune his roses when the time comes but until then the garden will have to tend to itself while he hibernates. Photo / Supplied
COMMENT:
If you’re anything like me, your attention to detail in the garden department lapses with the onset of winter.
Not now until the appearance of spring will the horticultural enthusiasm, the gardening zeal return to full bloom. Playing in the dirt has simply lost its lustre.
For some monthsnow, the enthusiasm will droop and discolour like the marigolds in pots as they quickly turn from orange to dark brown and hang their heads in shame. “Won’t someone please deadhead us?” they seem to be saying.
And the roses are developing big bulbous rosehips and awaiting their winter trim to ready them for their new growth later in the year. Some of the longer branches are bending towards the soil with the sheer weight of their burden.
I have identified a couple of plants — both useful in the kitchen — which seem to continue through the winter without any TLC, but such plants are few and far between.
Wyn Drabble. Photo / Warren Buckland
The mint just keeps flourishing (even though all authorities say it dies back over winter and returns in spring) and the rhubarb keeps producing new stalks even though it, too, is supposed to take a winter rest.
But it keeps producing only if this lazy gardener can muster enough energy to harvest the stalks and turn them into rhubarb crumble.
So at present the garden is not a pretty sight. What was, only a few months ago, a hive of activity and a riot of colour is now a hive of hibernation. And I’m hibernating too.
Yes, the roses will look neater after pruning but neater does not mean attractive. A pruned rose is still just an assemblage of spiky sticks.
And the pots will look more appealing when the lavender returns and the gazanias smile again.
Please don’t mention fallen leaves. Remember, I’m hibernating so they’ll just have to mulch themselves into the soil. I certainly won’t invest in a leaf blower. Leaf blowers suck!
No, wait a minute. If they did suck, they might be useful.
I found a New Zealand website that suggested eight jobs I should be doing over the winter. Eight! I’m supposed to be hibernating. How can I aerate my compost, clean my tools, prune for perfection and improve my soil if I’m hibernating?
Another website suggested I might even need to invest in cloches or protective tunnels to save some of my tender plants from frost. Sorry, they’ll have to look after themselves. I’m busy hibernating.
My gumboots stand like sentries at the back door and might feel undervalued over the next few months. Apart from the odd trek through the overgrown grass to empty the kitchen compost into the bin, they will be largely untouched.
Between uses, insect families will even have time to set up home in their darkest depths.
I know, of course, that the mood will change with the return of spring. “But each spring … a gardening instinct, sure as the sap rising in the trees, stirs within us. We look about and decide to tame another little bit of ground.” (Lewis Gantt)
I know that the drab winter assemblage of pruned roses and sad-looking flowerpots will once again turn into an appealing ROYGBIV floral dreamscape, though I accept it will never match the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
Until then, however, I need something to join the mint and the rhubarb to add a little green to the yard around us. But it must be something that requires none of the gardening get-up-and-go that got up and went.
After much deliberation and a modicum of horticultural research, I think I’ve come up with a suitable contender.
I’ve decided to go with ... weeds.
Wyn Drabble is a teacher of English, a writer, musician and public speaker.
