Taking Over An Established Garden

If you move or are asked to care for a garden that is already established, take your time getting to know it. The standard advice is to wait at least one full year before making any major decisions. This is because the garden may have some surprises—plants you are not familiar with that may bloom at unexpected times, either earlier or later than you had expected; bulbs you did not know you had, that could accidentally be disturbed or cut into as you dig in new plants or prepare the soil. If you are a beginner, you may even need to wait to see what turns out to be a perennial and what is actually a weed—there are still a few times when we give a plant the benefit of the doubt before yanking it out of the ground!

Simply taking some time to get to know the garden will be beneficial in other ways, as well. You can get a sense of the succession of blooms throughout the spring and summer season, and take note of anything that is lacking (either take note mentally, or note information down formally in a gardening journal or notepad kept for this task). Lacking elements might include areas that could benefit from bold mass plantings to add colour and drama; periods of time when there is a lull between blooming times of various plants; and areas of the garden that seem overgrown or else sparse and neglected.

Once you get in there and begin moving, removing, and adding plants, make sure to have containers on hand for any extras—if you divide perennials, you may very well have a host of extra plants that can be moved to other areas of the garden or else given away to friends, family members, neighbours, or other members of the community.

At our last house, neighbours of ours dug out two beautiful and fairly well established lilacs (luckily, roots and all), and had left them on their lawn for pick-up by the city, thinking they would simply dispose of them. We hauled them over to our house and planted them immediately, and were well rewarded for this “find” we took the time to inquire about before the city had removed them. Neighbouring gardening enthusiasts may very well have plants to share with you—it doesn’t hurt to strike up a conversation, share a few tips, and swap plants now and then with other gardeners in the neighbourhood. And if you see a neighbour in the process of doing a major overhaul on his or her garden and removing a considerable number of plants that look interesting (particularly if they look like they are being thrown out)--well, it never hurts to ask if you could take a few of them home instead.