Creative Winter Gardening: Cultivate Joy and Color
Winter is the season when we normally think of pale, featureless landscapes and dull greenery, but your creative side can also ensure that your garden comes alive during these colder months. In this article, we will look at winter gardening and what you can do at this time of the year to inject some colour and cheer into your garden tables or outdoor furniture.
Why Winter Gardening?
Gardening doesn’t just apply to the spring and summer months. While it’s sunny and you have more planting options, there’s an ingenuity to winter gardening, a therapeutic aspect to being outdoors in nature. Aside from getting out of your house and staying fit, tending to your outdoor landscape has been shown to reduce stress and ease anxiety. Come early winter, the thermometer declines and it becomes too cold for some plants to survive, while others might be more prone to pest interference. So winter gardening helps you stay in tune with nature, keeps your garden green all year long, and exposes you to planting options that might not be suitable in the warmer parts of the year.
Choosing the Right Plants
Cold-Hardy Plants
Do consider planting plants that thrive in low temperatures such as pansies, violas and ornamental cabbages. Aside from being sturdy in the winter season, they can be an extra vibrance in your grey landscape.
Evergreens
Evergreens (plants whose leaves remain green year-round) are a backbone of winter gardens: flowers or not, you will always have the way they look and the shape they provide. Holly, boxwood and juniper are just a few of the options you can use to add greenery and form to your garden. Use them in a combination of heights and textures.
Winter Bloomers
Yes, that’s surprising; but in truth several plants flower in winter. Hellebores, winter jasmine and witch hazel, to name but a few, burst into bloom in the coldest months. Tough plants, they would die if they didn’t flower in late winter, because there is simply not enough sun to nurture their leaves. But they do flower and, thanks to these plants, your garden never sleeps.
Designing Your Winter Garden
Creating Focal Points
This is when the garden’s structure shows itself most clearly; use this to your advantage, by giving visual focal points with garden sculptures, bird baths or garden benches – things that will look interesting even in a time of year when the plants may not look much.
Layering and Texture
Use plants of several different textures and heights to bring dimension. For example, combine a tall ornamental grass with a low-growing ground cover. The height layers will add interest to your garden and help maintain visual interest.
Using Containers
Containers are great for winter gardening – you can move them to catch the best light and protect tender plants from harsh weather or temperature extremes. For a portable pick-me-up, pack your containers with a mix of evergreens, winter bloomers, and cold-hardy annuals.
Maintenance Tips for Winter Gardening
Protecting Your Plants
It’s cold at this time of year, so keep your plants protected. Do you know what your best friend is at this time of year? Mulch is, as it protects the soil and insulates the roots; it’s essential in the garden. Lay a good layer of mulch around the bottom of your plants to keep them warm.
Watering Wisely
Plants need less water in the winter but they still need some moisture, especially during dry spells. Water your plants when it’s dry outside but take weather temperature into consideration. Water as early as you can in the morning so it does not freeze.
Pruning and Cleaning
Winter is an excellent time to prune trees and shrubs. You can see what’s going on inside without leaves. And while you’re at it, remove accumulated leaves, pine needles and grass clippings to prevent overwinter pests and diseases.
Incorporating Wildlife
Feeding the Birds
Image by Mark WheelerBirds not only bring your winter garden to life, they also provide much-needed movement – a rarity in a time when nature is snoozing under a thick blanket of snow. And as an added bonus, their presence also helps to scare away destructive pests. If you provide high-energy foods such as suet and sunflower seeds at bird feeders, then you can enjoy regular and predictable encounters.
Creating Shelters
Don’t send aigration messages to birds. Instead, create shelters that will invite them to your garden. Birdhouses and bat boxes create secure spaces for animals to rest. A brush pile can provide protection from the cold. Shelters can be functional and decorative.
Bringing Indoor Gardening Outdoors
Using Indoor Plants
Some indoor plants do well outside in winter, such as Christmas cactus and cyclamen. Bring these in at the first sign of bad weather.
Greenhouses and Cold Frames
Getting a greenhouse or a cold frame is the next step for those who want to extend their growing season, and can offer a sheltered environment for many more species ranging into the coldest months.
Final Thoughts
Winter gardening means finding joy and beauty in the act of growing, of battling the cold, and of nurturing a space that needs a little extra TLC but that rewards you with incredible colour and an immense sense of achievement. Invariably, every year, people stop me and tell me of the joy that my garden brings them. And this year, in what I hope will be the case every year, I can smile back at them and say: ‘Yes, I know exactly what you mean.’ Winter Specific Bulbs Winter biennials and perennials Clematis Delving Deeper Late colour Erica Winter maintenance Garden Magnolia House
Happy gardening!
Every garden and gardener is different. You must experiment till you find what works for you. Winter gardening is a process. It is not a formula. You must learn by doing to master the technique. The rewards are tremendous.
