Notes from Uptop Garden

It’s over. The incessant preparations of April, May, and June, the 12-hour work days to get ready, the optimistic expectations…suddenly done. Heavy humidity has descended on the garden and the gardener himself, listless. Lethargy, a new feeling, creeps in. The will to maintain sometimes flags. But flag it must not for much will be lost in just two weeks of laziness. Yes, the weeds are growing just as fast as the perennials and shrubs. In a nightmarish abundance emerging from the soil, invisible seeds in that lush composted earth – so studiously tended until now – sprout out of nowhere. Seemingly overnight, the whole place is infected with purslane, quack grass, cinquefoil, deadly nightshade, ground ivy, deep-rooted red and shallow-rooted green clovers, hedera helix, etc….  Overwhelmed even by myosotis and violets, the gardener looks on with disdain and suggests that these little beauties of another day are just more weeds. To the compost they all go! To make things worse, the lawn, an Irish green only weeks ago, is suddenly stressed and is contemplating that dormancy is a better option for the weeks ahead: tannish hues creep in… and the weeds prey on the bald spots that develop. 

Not many gardeners view weeding and other pure-maintenance projects – so necessary in July – as a rewarding pastime. Over the years, I have come to enjoy my moments of on-your-knees, close-up viewing (Mirabel Osler has lyrically described these moments when her breath moves the plants) and general tidying up as pleasurable, if sweaty. Weeding is such a mindless task (so mindless I often remove a wanted seedling thoughtlessly) that one might think it is a perfect mate for double tasking. I have found, to the contrary, that even as I try to imagine a new problem to be solved in my architectural practice or a family situation resolved, my mindless mind wanders back to nothingness as I weed… and weed… and weed. Just weed…get the next one…and the next. I have come to realize this is a time of needed rest and rejuvenation for the body (worn out by the heavy chores of the last three months) and the mind. Maybe, in fact, it is required of the healthy human brain to be brain dead periodically, at rest. If this is so, may I recommend weeding?

Unless one has already headed to the hills (that, for Northeast gardeners, is August, the time for a sail or mountain hike), July is a time of reassessment of things accomplished – and not. Successes and failures are all evident now. Many perennials can even be transplanted now (unlike what the how-to books tell one) if care is taken to grab lots of roots, no sun allowed to see a root, and water applied copiously in the new hole before the plant is inserted – and is kept moist for several days/weeks ahead. A cloudy, cool day is best. Pruning is at its best now (no matter what you read about February and March: how can you tell what is dead or alive then?) and cutting back restores scale, sometimes momentarily lost in the robust month of June, to both the perennial border as well as shrubs and small trees. 

July represents a peaking, the crest of the hill seemingly has been reached after the bomb-bursting months of May and June. But not so fast: aren’t the hydrangeas just beginning to show off all their variety with such cool disdain for the scorching weather? Is ‘Incrediball’ blowsier and more decadent than ‘Annabelle’? What about Hydrangea aspera for cooling things down? And my ‘Blue Wave’ and ‘Nikko Blue’ are reliably in flower to add the blue to the red-white-blue Fourth of July fiesta. (For many years I kept some Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ (red) next to Hydrangea quercifolia (white) next to some “Blue Wave” hydrangea; while the patriotic point could be made to festive guests, the unappealing color combination finally became tiring and these patriotic friends were separated.)

Greetings Gardeners,

I am Frederick Bland, a New York architect who has been developing an extensive 1-acre garden in a small seaside village on the “banana belt” of Connecticut’s shoreline, 12 miles east of New Haven. Keeping extensive records, I estimate that well over a thousand species of trees, shrubs, perennials, ground covers, vines, and bulbs adorn the garden today. I am a collector but with my architect’s hat on, I am also a designer, a combination that I have come to find rare. The garden, called Uptop and started in 1993, has reached a level of maturity that has made it publishable and it has been included in Jane Garmey’s Private Gardens of Connecticut, an article by Tovah Martin in Connecticut Cottages and Gardens, and most recently in Fine Gardening Magazine. The garden has been a mainstay on the Garden Conversancy’s Open Days Program for many years. Additionally, I have lectured about the garden and turned these talks into a self-published little book, The Making of a Garden(er), An Urbanist Architect in the Garden, sections of which can be found online. For over a decade I served as Chair of the Board of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and continue to serve as Chair Emeritus. I enjoy writing, have written extensively about my observations of this and other gardens – and gardening in general – but always simply for myself. I have taken the bold (presumptuous?) step of deciding to share my thoughts with those who might find them interesting – or even objectionable and may wish to refute my thoughts. No gardener ever stops learning, for this pursuit – unlike, say, golf or bridge – is endless in its mysteries and elements of wonder, and seeks to make something, not simply fill time. These musings will be posted from time to time, as I feel inspired, with no specific timetable. Stay tuned….