Cutbacks in the lavender department

Freshly sharpened secateurs glinting in the sunlight, I approached my overgrown lavender in the front garden.  Loved by bees, but possibly not by mum's pushing pushchairs past its thrusting exuberances….

Today it was tamed back behind the railings with some judicious snippage and is now an even, lower growing hedge.  I never want to get rid of the flower heads, so tend to leave my lavender pruning until growth restarts in spring.  A quick haircut now, and it encourages the plant to grow more bushily and form that nice, dense, perfumed thicket which I love so much.

And what to do with my prunings?  Some are used as cuttings, in readiness for the next generation of hedging.  The current plants all started out the same way 10 years ago, so I don't think they've got too much longer before woodiness takes over completely and straggling sprawl sets in, so I need to get some replacement plants thriving to take their place in the next couple of years. The cuttings I took last spring are all looking happy in their pots and are bushing out nicely.

To take lavender cuttings, cut a 10-15cm length of non-flowering stem just below a leaf node, and strip off the bottom leaves.  Fill a small plant pot with gritty compost and push the bare stem of the cutting in at the edge (helps the cutting form better roots if it's at the edge, rather than in the centre of the compost).  One plant pot should accommodate several cuttings.  Water, cover with a clear plastic bag secured with an elastic band and leave on a windowsill or in a greenhouse.  Cuttings should root within about 6-8 weeks. You can tell when they have taken as new growth will appear at the top.  If you're not sure, you can always tip the pot carefully and slide the compost out to check if roosts are appearing.

As for the rest of my copious quantity of prunings, they've been used as mulch around my working area and the compost bins.  Never has the composting area smelled so fragrant!

You can never have too much lavender.  If you are lucky enough to have a south facing frontage, it is the most community-minded bit of hedging you could wish for.  Not only do the insects love it, the passers by never fail to comment on the menthol tinged fragrance at pruning time.  So generous is it when in flower, that I don't even object to the school children running their hands along it and yanking off the odd head or two to accompany them on their way to and from school.  Lavender smells gorgeous and its glory should be shared!

The forgotten front

Front gardens.  Where are they in gardening literature or on the web?  They are a rare beast, spotted only fleetingly, even in my own photo collection.  As front gardens are the bits of us that everyone sees all the time, why are they so neglected in terms of coverage?

I can recall perhaps three features on front gardens read in various gardening magazines over the last 10 years or so, and a quick Google of the term usually results in lots of marketing pics from paving manufacturers, which highlights the central issue that generally they're used for accommodating off-street parking and not a lot besides. But they can prettifying the street too.

My current house has very little front garden to speak of as it sits close to the road, having been a sweet shop in a former incarnation.  We have cast iron railings separating us from the pavement with a narrow border behind them and when we first moved in, this strip was (freshly?) planted with young cherry laurel shrubs.  But why would I want something that rapidly grows to form a dark, heavy leaved shrub when the railings themselves form an attractive enough barrier to the street?  I certainly didn't want the grief of trying to keep this vigorous species in check to stop it poking out over the pavement and blocking the light from my front windows.  It wasn't even that pretty to look at with its rather large, regular foliage and dark spreading branches.  It very definitely is NOT the shrub for a small, constrained space, as its tree-like form dominating many front gardens regularly testifies.

Along with the conifers, these cherry laurels were the first things to go. But typically their existence was never documented, unlike the minute recording of all stages of the back and side gardens' development.  This post started life as an idea to write simply about the lavender hedge which took its place, but it was only as I searched in vain for any photos of the lavender in all its glory, that I realised that I completely ignore this border in my recording, even though it is the only public bit of my planting.

The only photos I have of the front garden were taken to document other things - the house covered in snow, or to text a dodgy paint colour to my husband while I was in the middle of applying it with great misgivings.  But not a single picture of the wisteria in flower, not the minutest snap of the paving detail or of bees on the lavender flowers in summer.

I'm therefore going to make it my project to promote the front garden in the pecking order - it is a prime south-facing spot (hence the lavender loving its home), even if the soil is solid clay in places. The latter is clearly a further sign that it has not enjoyed the same additions of muck, grit and leaf mould as its favoured rear-facing sibling. "NOT FAIR!"  as my children would yell.  Things must change.

Steps have been taken as I have widened the border next to the house wall this year - more due to the fact that wisteria roots were appearing in the cellar, rather than  because I had a firm design plan.  I loved the perfumed, purple racemes which it produced in late spring, but I love the house more, so they had to go as they'd been planted just a couple of centimetres in front of the brickwork when young, and had developed trunks about 30cm in diameter over the last six or seven years.   Now, in the new widened border, I've planted  (a good foot away from the wall) an Aloha climbing rose which has a more moderate habit, and whose feet I hope will  feet benefit from the addition of manure and grit.  I've also put in a clematis - both of these plants chosen with a view to them contributing towards the cutting garden as well.


 I'm going to also make it a mission to take pictures of other people's front gardens in order to get together a little library of inspiration and ideas for this Cinderella of the horticultural world.  Better knock on their doors and ask first though or they might think I'm casing the joint!

Photos to follow - watch this space....