Garden Notes

Beautiful shady hosta garden with limestone path

Two members of the Southeast Wisconsin Hosta Society extended an invitation to SEWHS members and friends to tour their private gardens on June 30, 2012. Since one of my friends is a new member of this group, I was able to attend their event. Both gardens were mostly shaded and both had a wide variety of hostas and ferns, but they were quite different in focus and general ambience. The resident gardeners were available for questions at both gardens during the tour which was very helpful, since I did not recognize some of the plants.

In the first garden, we had a great time strolling along the limestone paths laid out among large maple trees. Those trees created structure as well as a dense shade situation that would have been daunting to less talented gardeners. However, the trees had been limbed up and the homeowners had planted their large backyard with 178 different varieties of hosta all nicely labeled for the convenience of the attendees. The hostas were then surrounded by ferns, brunnera, lungwort, astilbes and other shade perennials. The focus here was on creating a calm and serene space that had a meditative feel. I just wanted to sit quietly and enjoy the color, texture and Asiatic ambience in this beautiful shady yard.

Second shade garden on tour with sunny patch

The second garden was larger and had sections of sun as well as deep shade. There was a lot of texture, thanks to many dwarf conifers and the garden included over 300 cultivars of hosta and daylilies. It was also a wildlife garden complete with native trees and shrubs to provide shelter and food for wildlife and included a beautiful pond teeming with fish and frogs. I can only imagine how much time and effort went into the planning and execution of this ambitious layout.

Small pond in shady garden

The tours were well organized and our host gardeners could not have been nicer. We had a great time viewing two beautiful gardens and learning about some unfamiliar plants. In fact by the time we finished, we were so inspired by our tour that we ended up at local garden center buying even more plants for our own gardens!