Spring 2009: A Season in the Garden
· Escape Garden Design, Aspen, Colorado
The valley spends weeks deciding whether to let go of winter, and mud season is the price of admission to spring.
Patience is the rule. The last hard frost can land in early to mid June up here, so the tender things wait while the cold-tolerant ones go in the ground.
Cleanup is the work of the season, though it is less about tidying and more about reading what the winter did: what came through, what did not. We cut back last year's growth and freshen the compost.
The waterfalls come back online first. There is a morning every spring when we open the valves, clear the basins, and listen for the sound to even out, and it is one of the better days of the year.
We also spent time this season on the everyday craft of the garden. Two gardens a mile apart in this valley can be a full hardiness zone different, and even one yard has warm and cold pockets. South and west walls collect heat and let you push a tender plant that would die in the open. Low spots gather cold air and frost first, while a slope drains that cold away and stays a few degrees warmer on a clear night.
Go easy on the beds while they are wet with snowmelt, since working saturated soil compacts it for the season, and firm any plants the freeze and thaw has heaved.
The land around us is the best teacher there is, and the gardens we like best borrow from the hillsides more than from any catalog.
Everything in this valley runs on the same short calendar, and the gardens that thrive are the ones designed around it rather than against it.
Our soil is mostly alkaline clay, the air is thin and dry, and the sun is strong, so the plants that last are the ones that have made peace with all three.
We take on only a handful of gardens each year, which is the only way to give a place like this the attention it asks for.
More than anything, a garden up here rewards patience: it takes a season or two longer to settle than people expect, then looks like it was always there.
We design, build, and maintain our own gardens, so we live with the results for years and learn from them.
We will see you next season.