Landscaping And Perennials

Create A Harmonious Garden

By Nancy K. Crevier

“A Glimpse Of The Garden” is a miniseries focusing on the heart of a gardener’s work — a special spot, an extraordinary plant, a place of respite, or a place that evokes a heartfelt memory. What is down the garden path of your friends and neighbors? What is down your garden path?

Parklike landscaping and gardens rambling from the front to the back of the Sandy Hook property are a 30-plus year joint effort of husband and wife team, David and Marion Thompson.

“I mostly do the perennials and flowers,” said Ms Thompson, “and David is in charge of the landscaping and pruning.”

Over the years, they have turned the 1¼ acres of wild brush and lawn into neatly landscaped plots that flow gracefully one to the next. Towering cedars and white pines, tidily trimmed blueberry bushes — planted for the autumn foliage color and to feed the wild birds — and sprawling rhododendrons create a shady and restful scene, with border gardens bursting with color to attract the eye.

The driveway provides the first peek at the work the Thompsons have done in making an oasis of peace and beauty. It winds gently past a display of pruned bushes, planted for the red fall leaf color and the bright red berries that cover it in summer, and low-growing juniper.

The gardens are also a place where recycled items find a home, said Ms Thompson, beginning with the stone pathway that divides the rose bed from the front border garden. “Two of the biggest stones in the path actually came from a barn that was being torn down in Sandy Hook. My husband thought they would look nice here. They were the front steps into the barn,” she explained.

An antique barn air vent spins on a stand along one path, and a huge, balloon-shaped green glass bottle, recovered from a junk shop, blends into the greenery about it. Statuary is not necessarily from antique shops, said Ms Thompson, but collected in their travels when it catches her eye. Unusual stones unearthed while landscaping are utilized in the gardens, she said, including one that Mr Thompson enhanced with nut and gasket eyes and a painted nose, because it resembled a bear’s head. Everywhere, the tinkling of wind chimes adds soft background music.

Ms Thompson has been gardening for more than 40 years, influenced by her uncle, a nurseryman. “He told me that perennial beds should be reset every four to five years, and that’s what I’ve always tried to do to keep them looking nice. I split up plants and move them, and the extras I stick into a dirt pile at the back of the property until I decide where to put them, or I give them away to friends,” she said.

The lesson has paid off, with her gardens spilling over, even in a heat wave, with daisies, black-eyed Susans, echinacea, and the tall purple spikes of liatris. Magenta phlox tower over Canterbury bells and pink yarrow. Sedum, Veronica, coreopsis, and dianthus fill in the gaps. A white buddleia bush tempts butterflies and bees, and blue hydrangea valiantly fights the hot sun.

“One of my favorite plants is the French bleeding heart. It blooms all summer, and the deer don’t eat it. That’s one of the things I try to do — plant what the deer don’t like,” Ms Thompson said.

A weeping birch and a white pine pruned into a giant ball give structure to the rose bed, where the unusually tall David Austin Rose blooms among the other roses.

With much of the landscaping highlighting evergreens, pots of annuals placed strategically about the grounds add flashes of color — red petunias pop from a basket of dusty miller vines, and a large antique caldron overflows with red begonia and spiky greens. A very special potted plant is the blush-colored Gerbera daisy that was given to her two Mother’s Days ago by her grandson, said Ms Thompson.

The path behind the house leads to an azalea bed, where red, white, and pink plants bloom in succession. A stone bench, one of several made from flat stones found on the property, provides a cool resting place among the azaleas. “I come down here and sit with my 3-year-old grandson,” Ms Thompson said. “He loves to sit with me or play on the rocks.”

Nearby, another shade garden is filled with astilbe and lilies that bloom in spring. Tall oaks and maples that mark the start of the woods and a classic stone wall provide a backdrop for a row of precisely pruned white pines and azaleas. Underfoot, a cushiony mulch of pine needles and leaves covers every path, leading from one tended plot to the next and another opportunity for rest and relaxation.

“It’s something we really enjoy,” said Ms Thompson.

That is what is down the garden path at Marion and David Thompson’s.