Depending on where you live, December is probably a slow time in the garden. The stalks and other debris left over from the gardening season just past may still haunt the landscape like horticultural ghosts. The sustainable gardener living inside your head knows that at least some of that debris will serve the habitat needs of the local birds and small animals. The guilty gardener dwelling in the same head space will probably anticipate the headache that will happen when spring clean-up time rolls around.
Looking Both Ways
No matter which of those forces speaks the loudest, December is a time to look backwards and forwards in the garden. The catalogs that proclaim the arrival of next season’s delights have already started arriving. Many of us will be too busy to pay attention in the frantic run-up to winter holidays, setting those wish books aside for dark January evenings and weekends. In the meantime, we make our houses look more like gardens, hanging seasonal greens, filling spaces with festive plants like paperwhites, poinsettias and amaryllis, and working to keep the houseplants alive until daylight begins its yearly return.
In the Rearview Mirror
Though time is precious right now, it is helpful to think about what worked and did not work in the natural life of your garden. Whether that “garden” is an array of potted plants on a terrace, an acre of garden beds, or an indoor houseplant display, it is probably home to notable successes and a few notable failures. I like to start with the successes, like the asters that bloomed last fall in such profusion that they looked like an Impressionist painting, or the flowering quince that produced twenty fragrant fruits despite the fact that it is supposed to be purely ornamental.
I celebrate the happy accidents and surprises too, delighting in the rose bush that appeared to come back from near-deadness, and the miniature iris that has multiplied so much that I have had divisions to give to a friend who admired the plant. (Any development that inspires gifts to gardening friends counts as a garden success.)
Weathering Success
Think of the times during the past year when weather worked to advantage. In my yard, a long wet spring may have made for a depressed gardener, but it was great for the water-loving hydrangeas. The absence of a late cold snap also meant that those well-hydrated plants did not lose any buds to freezing temperatures.
The wet spring, followed by a relatively early summer made for abundant tasty blueberries. I enjoyed a few of them and the birds feasted on the rest while I was away for the Fourth of July weekend.
Living with the Wildlife
Some of us, reflecting on the past season, think about the intrusion of deer, groundhogs, aphids, Japanese beetles and other animal and insect pests. But if we are counting up our successes, we should also reflect on the abundance of bees, butterflies and other pollinators. If even one hummingbird sipped nectar from your butterfly bushes or potted lantanas, you can celebrate a small garden miracle.
Sustainable Landscape
You can check the mental “garden successes’ box if you did something to make your garden more sustainable. Laying organic mulch, limiting or eliminating the use of pesticides and herbicides, planting pollinator-friendly species, or finding ways to reuse or recycle plastic pots are all small steps towards the bigger goal of making our gardens and, by extension, our world, healthier.
Turning Defeats Into Victories
The only value in failure is learning from it and doing better in the future. Last summer, some of my friends’ tomatoes were affected by blossom end rot, a common problem caused by insufficient calcium in the soil or growing medium. If something like this happened in your garden last season, you can lament the loss of produce, but plan for better results next summer by adding calcium to the soil and watering consistently.
If disease is a problem among your ornamentals and food plants, do not waste time lamenting your “black thumb”. Go online or seek out an experienced gardener and find out what you can do going forward. If the disease affecting your plants was contagious and invariably fatal, like rose rosette disease, remove the affected specimens without guilt and replant with species that are unaffected by the ailment.
Sins of Omission
Most of us find ourselves guilty of sins of omission, like not weeding, watering or tidying enough, or buying plants or bulbs and not getting them in the ground in timely fashion. If you are indulging in this kind of guilt and recrimination, spare yourselves and anyone else who has to listen to you. Think realistically about your garden and the time it takes to keep it productive and attractive. If you really don’t have enough time, maybe you should rethink your plant choices, and opt for flowering shrubs instead of annuals and perennials. Enlist help if you can get it, or, rethink your notions of “neatness”. You don’t have to cultivate a jungle, but you can relax a bit about getting every leaf or weed out of the beds. If a plant is just not working, or takes too much work, give it away or compost it. There is always a remedy, especially if your garden “failure” has taken root in your head, as well as in your beds.
And remember that unless you are a professional gardener, you are working for yourself, not anyone else. If your garden makes you happy, it is a success—now and in the future.
