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Re: Regional Gardening

Hi Moira -- thanks for the fascinating posting (though by now I know that
your postings are always wonderful)!  I wonder if there is a listing of the
farm gardens you describe that are open to the public.  I'm not planning  a
trip your way at the moment, but who knows about the future and maybe such
as list would prompt me (or other list subscribers) to put N.Z. higher on
their priority list...

Nan

>
>Away from suburbia one thing which is very much a feature of the
>countryside is the large farm garden, based on the English country house
>pattern, with everything from intimate rose gardens, lakes and and
>rhododendron dells to extensive areas of parkland full of rare and
>beautiful trees, and the majority of these are open to the public for
>some or all of the year.  Indeed garden visiting has become something of
>a mania here, with all sorts of gardens including some quite tiny ones
>opening their gates to the public, sometimes for charity and sometimes
>just to make a little on the side. I myself show my garden occasionally,
>but only to invited parties - mainly groups interested in organic
>growing. I would hate to open regularly as it involves a lot of hard
>work to do it properly.
>
>Some of the great farm gardens have been developed solely by the women
>folk, but there have also been a number of men who have eventually
>become totally rapt and worked on these places through retirement right
>into old age. One old gent I knew of giftd his garden to the National
>Trust to ensure its survival, but was still pottering round and talking
>to visitors until his death at about 95. I had the privilege of a guided
>tour a few years earlier. I remember among many delights he had a most
>extensive and magnificent bog garden.
>
>Regards
>Moira Ryan
>
>Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
>Wainuiomata, Lower Hutt, New Zealand
>(SW Corner of the Pacific Ocean)


Nan Sterman, Master Composter in residency
San Diego County, California
Sunset zone 24, USDA zone 10b or 11
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