Neatness.....a swear word in the garden?
I grow plants to be fully appreciated for what they are. Not with any intention to be "neat". A nice mounded hebe is spoiled by a thug next door to it for example. A beautiful conifer overwhelmed by a vigorous dahlia then has no distinct form. A hosta grown over by an energetic rambling geranium is spoiled.
Some plants look good "mixing it up"........a blue geranium running into a group of rudbekias.......but "neatness" enables the protected plants to look good in the winter time.
I guess I am a "neat" gardener. I like to see an echinacea, for example, showing off its flowers......and foliage.....without another plant merging with it. Associations can still be arranged....and look better......if space is allowed between them for each to display its own individual beauty.
So, is neatness a swear word for you folks? If you like your plants tumbling into one another to form a tapestry of colour then I guess you will say "yes....neatness is not proper gardening. It's not as nature intended"
So, who are the neat gardeners? Why? And why not?
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I have always been annoyingly tidy. My wife would say I'm just annoying! For good or for ill I'm always going to be neat in the garden as well. I just can't help myself. I have to constantly resist the temptation to strim the grass in the churchyard down to the ground. Whilst I know it looks just a nice (if not nicer) as a wild flower meadow with just a couple of paths mowed through it and is far better for wildlife it takes me all of my will power not to reach for the strimmer.
I'm certainly not neat. In the garden or in my appearance or anywhere that I can think of.
It's not a swear word though. Just beyond my capabilities
In the sticks near Peterborough
Verdun, any tips on having everything I want ( all usually similar heights!) AND maintaining neatness rather than 'finding a space just about right'???
I'm not neat. I have every intention,,,, but then the sneaky plants get away from me with their exuberance.
My garden is small enough to keep neat, although this is still time consuming.
I like to maintain some distance between plants, even if just a few cm, if only for airflow and to stop disease.
I like to see every plant reach its capabilities but sometimes its a little too much so I step in and 'tidy' them up
Neat? I'm not even tidy
the under-gardener is forever complaining that I have left a trail of implements behind me as my mind wanders from job to job and I get distracted. I have this peculiar idea that at some point, the garden will be 'finished'. And when it is finished, I will tidy away all the stuff that I have left out in the course of doing it. But the garden is never 'finished'. I am trying really hard to 'do' tidy. 'Neat' I fear, will be a long time coming.
is this what you mean-seriously, de gustibus........
I am not neat I am artistic, or at least thats what I say I am. I do like a nicely cut lawn edge though, it seems to enhance the messiness of everything else.
I do agree with you Verdun, in that I think certain specimens should be able to stand out from the crowd, but other than that I like the wild look, or the jungle look in the hot border.
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
I'm not neat or tidy, probably overwhelmed! An acre of garden & a big veggie plot, housework, cooking, social life, horses, dog and not getting any younger. And I get distracted, I see a weed, not where I was weeding but elsewhere so first bit doesn't get finished and I'm bound to leave a tool behind, always mislaying secateurs. Or there is a rose to smell or a new flower out, then the phone goes and I never do empty that wheelbarrow, well I do when I next need it! I don't even through away potting compost bags, they might come in handy one day.
And if tools break they get left in the tiny shed or the lean too in case I get around to mending them. Need a decent outbuilding for all the "stuff";
Oh Busy Lizzie - that's exactly what I mean! I have two weed grubbers, and I've lost both of them in this way. I refuse to pay a tenner for a third one (the other two will turn up when the vegetation dies down in the autumn) but it is not the same trying to wrestle a dandelion root with an old chisel