Garden Walks



Garden Train with creeping sedum
in foreground

The Garden Conservancy raises money for charity through their "Open Days" program, private garden owners open their gardens to the public. You can go to their website and request to be on their e-mail list to get notices of gardens open in your area. 

Another view of trains with
sedum and veronica

Last weekend I went to two gardens in the Barrington area. The first garden has as it main feature garden trains. These "G" scale trains are built for outdoor use. The woman who owns the garden actually has a business designing and installing garden trains called Huff N Puff. In an area the size of my city lot, she had quite a layout with numerous tracks and trains all running at the same time. There was also an indoor display that basically depicted all of Illinois, from down state farms to the city of Chicago, complete with Wrigley Field, Millennium Park and Grant Park.

Non Stop Begonias, salvia
and argeratum

What I found fascinating was her use of annuals in her gardens. It’s rather inspiring to see plants most people can only afford to use in containers being used as bedding plants. She had a whole bed of tuberous (Non-Stop) begonias in full bloom that were gorgeous. It inspired me to stop at Countryside and get a few for my last container. It is mind boggling to think of the number of flats and 4" containers that are needed to fill a garden that size. It must be truckloads.

The second garden was equally as fabulous, though for different reasons. Again, lots of use of annuals for great color punch, but also, as my friend pointed out, several well-placed arbors to give some structure to an other wise flat landscape when you moved away from the house area. One in particular had clematis growing up the arbor and shrub roses along side.

Clematis arbor

Janice also pointed out that even in the shady areas, the turf grass was thick and green. It’s hard to grow grass in shade and in really dense shade we usually recommend putting in some type of ground cover. To do it successfully, you must start with the right type of grass seed mix. Most shady mixes will have very little bluegrass and lots of fine and tall fescues. It’s important not too push the grass by heavily fertilizing as that will just result in tall spindly blades of grass.

We over heard the owner of this property tell another visitor that she has gardeners in Monday through Friday. That’s a bit intimidating so I am perfectly happy with my little lot.

All of this brings me to the subject of our next garden walk, which is next Saturday, July 9^th. It is sponsored by the McHenry County Master Gardeners and is a major fund-raiser for them. This group of volunteers gets special training by the Cooperative Extension Service and must also complete additional training to keep their certificates current. They repay the extension service by volunteering in the extension office in Woodstock and answering homeowner horticultural questions. The garden walk starts at the demonstration garden at McHenry County College and then to 8 other gardens in southern McHenry County. The cost is $17.

Garden Walks

One of my most memorable overseas experiences was on a trip to England with my good friend, Mrs. Grindrod. Mr. Ross had given me two round trip tickets to England for Christmas and said I could take anyone I wanted as long as it wasn’t him. We planned our trip around the locales of two series of books we were reading at the time written by Miss Read, otherwise known as Dora Saint. We even got to go to lunch with her one day. Afterward, Debbie and I toured several private gardens that were open to the public in aid of a local charity. We ended the tour at the rectory garden where the ladies were serving a cream tea. It was absolutely delightful. If you are interested in touring private gardens in England you can plan your trip using the National Garden Scheme’s Yellow Book, where you can search to find gardens open in the area. Here in the states, The Garden Conservancy has a similar program. The gardens listed by this organization tend to be large, private gardens. The schedule lists open garden days in many states and we are fortunate to have a few here in Illinois. The nearest open garden for us in Crystal Lake will be June 28 in North Barrington. This garden features a unique garden railway. On July 27, four gardens will be open in Glencoe, Lake Forest and Mettawa and on August 3, the Gardens at Ball, in West Chicago will be open to the public. The greenhouse department at Countryside usually goes to see the gardens during their "trade only" field day, so this is a great opportunity for the general public to see new varieties of perennials and annuals being trialed as well as great container designs, and woodland and wetland restoration projects. There will be guides available to answer questions. You can check out the details and get directions by going to the The Garden Conservancy website.

Closer to home is the upcoming McHenry County Garden Walk sponsored by the McHenry County Master Gardeners. This walk takes place on July 12 and features five local gardens, including that of my neighbor and another of a woman from my garden club. These are both great gardens, cared for by two people who truly love gardening and plants. I am sure the others are fabulous as well. These are great places to get new ideas and also to reassure yourself that your own garden looks pretty darn good.