Things to Do on a Rainy Day (III): Considering Summer and Autumn Flowers

So I know two things about summertime flowers. I know what I would like, and I know what I absolutely do not want to end up with.

I would like to fill the edges of the lawn with lots of bright, cheery things like poppies and cornflowers and big, happy ox-eye daisies and lupins - I love lupins! I remember them all around the sides of the field behind my grandparent's garden, they come out in high summer in lots of bright colours like so many roman candles... and they'd be tall enough to hide the fences.












Ideally, these would be followed in September and October by lots of fiery reds, yellows and oranges in the same spots - dahlias and rudbeckias would be perfect.

Unfortunately, most of these plants like lots and lots of sunlight. This is why they grow in cornfields and not in woods. Now, our back fence gets lots of sunlight, but first of all, this is where the trench around the lawn is deepest, so the small seedlings would probably get shaded out. I will also need most of this space for raspberry canes, as it is where the fruit has the best chance of ripening properly. The trench along the side of the lawn is the bit of the garden which gets the least sunlight, because of the shade from the fence - so it's no go there either. I know from the old place that dahlias and rudbekias do really, really badly in shade. Cornflowers might just about work, and ox-eye daisies seem happy enough in the shady gardens of the surrounding streets.

So began a process of research on plants for shady gardens. This was initially depressing, as it seemed to involve the very set of boring non-native pretentious-colonial-botanist's-collection stuff I associate with the dank, gloomy, formal gardens of dank, gloomy, formal mock-gothic mansions. What was it with the late Victorians? All death and respectability, no fun.




I cheered up a bit after flicking through a pocket paperback on shade plants in the library. It seems most of the summer plants I want to put in the bed under the roses will tolerate partial shade, so I'll fill it with columbines, London Pride and stocks (for scent). I also decided that I will only need about half of the trench along the back fence for raspberries - so the section up to the almond tree will be getting the cornfield treatment after all. Two metres of it will look a lot less dramatic than the whole garden edge, but hey, it's better than nothing. I still won't get dahlias, though.

So what can I do about that terminally shady right-hand trench?

I can use foxgloves instead of lupins, for a start. Bees and butterflies love foxgloves, so that's good. And they have the height to hide the fence. I'll experiment with some of the cornfield type flowers next year and see what happens. Perhaps if I put them in grow beds so that they are level with the lawn, they will get a bit more sunlight, I don't know (I can't just build up the soil to the right level, because it would get soggy, and probably rot the bottom of the fence).

"Bleeding heart" is also apparently reasonably shade tolerant. I'd never heard of it before, but now that I have, I have to have one. Or maybe two, as there is also a white version - appropriate for the garden of a Spurs fan! I think they would grow high enough to give some good cover and colour in the back right-hand corner.

It's all still going to look a bit bare in the autumn, though. The obvious thing would be to go for a climber up the fence which would go bright red. The trouble is, most of them will only do that if they get sunlight. And I hate Virginia Creepers anyway. There's something about the way they spread all the way over walls and along the ground which gives off a 1950s sci-fi comic book vibe - like they want to take over the world while you're sleeping...

Spouse, incidentally, has expressed limited opinions on flowers ("daffodils are evil", and "Bluebells, please!).