The East and Ruin Gardens at Teixeira Park in Late July

These gardens are planted with primarily American natives and pollinators. The aim is to compliment the wild landscape near the Nubanusit River to attract birds and butterflies in particular.

 

Teixeira Park Yesterday Morning

Peterborough Parks: Different Styles and Influences for Different Parks

The recent rains have breathed life and color back into the parks in Peterborugh. This is the Pavilion Garden at Depot Park. It has a very high proportion of annuals. I think of the waved yew hedges bordering this planting like a gargantuan pot for a huge container planting. It changes dramatically each year.

Susannah, Mollie and Laura stop working long enough to pose for a quick photo.

The planter at Peter's Gate at Depot Park

This garden at Putnam Park is three years old and beginning to fill in nicely.

There is a "block" style of planting used here like Piet Oudolf's earlier work which has influenced this planting. This garden is weighted toward grasses and perennials. One of the few annuals, Verbena bonariensis self seeds throughout the garden.

 The planter at Putnam Park

The Boccelli Garden was influenced by the "succession" planting philosophy of Christopher Lloyd and Fergus Garrett at Great Dixter. There is a mixture of cut-back shrubs, perennials, grasses, annuals, biennials and bulbs in this planting.

Teixeira Park's Ruin Garden has mostly native plants that attract birds, butterflies and pollinators. I think of Teixeira Park as the "wild" park in Peterborough. We tend to let the plants "duke it out" in this garden. Calamagrostis brachytricha, was one of the few exotic plants I used in this garden. Early on, I thought it might take over the garden, but as the other plants have filled in, it has not been able to handle the competition of the natives and is slowly being crowded out.

 The sunny East Garden at Teixeira Park is just a year old. It has a high proportion of native American prairie plants-- again attractive to birds and pollinators. It is looking a bit sparse its first season but thankfully almost all the plants survived the winter.

The new West Garden at Teixeira Park is quite shady. Mostly natives, like the rest of Teixeira Park, it has a very wild feel to it. Both the East and West Gardens incorporate a "blended" style of planting much like Piet Oudolf's most recent work.

The Ruin Garden at Teixeira Park in Mid-July

New "Layered" Plantings at Teixeira Park

The Ruin Garden at Teixeira Park has had five years to settle down and fill in. The dozen Malus 'Prariefire' trees along the sidewalk have gotten larger and fruited well. The theme has always been to be a wild garden, attracting birds and butterflies. A common complaint was that the garden felt isolated in the park and the suggestion was to add plantings on the outside of the granite walls of the Ruin Garden to soften them. My thought has always been that as the granite ages and the plants spill out, the garden will mature and its hidden nature will beckon visitors to enter and explore the garden; that being partially concealed was part of the allure. 

But after careful consideration, we decided to plant the two triangular areas formed by the pathways at each end of the park. The East end is full sun and the West end is partial shade. I wanted to continue the wild theme and the paths, like the granite walls in the Ruin garden, made the boundaries very clear, which from a maintenance perspective is a good thing. We would now have three related gardens with overlapping plant lists that would talk to each other and create a repetition of gardens over the entire park as seen from the road. Hopefully the Ruin Garden wouldn't feel isolated, but rather, integrated into the landscape.

The Ruin Garden at Teixeira Park

Waking toward the West Garden from the Ruin Garden

The Part-Shade West Garden at Teixeira Park

The Sidewalk Looking toward the East Garden--Malus 'Prariefire' to the right

The East Garden at Teixeira Park

I have spent many hours studying Piet Oudolf's work in books and have seen three of his designs in person: the Glasshouse Borders at Wisley in England, The High Line and the Gardens of Remembrance in Manhattan. I was particularly  interested in his "layered" approach to planting that Noel Kingsbury describes in the book Landscapes in Landscapes. The first layer is the "martix planting of ground-covering, relatively low growing plants. The next layer is the "island plants where irregularly shaped beds are planted with a mixture of grasses (and in my case, also perennials) for a late-summer-to-winter period of interest." The final layer is "the scatter plants, taller species, often colorful or with distinct structure." We also added trees and shrubs with colorful fruit and bulbs for interest in the early spring. Below is the plant list. Time will tell if our planting will be successful.

The East Garden Plant List

Trees/Shrubs
Viburnum dentatum 'Blue Muffin'

Matrix Planting
Sesleria autumnalis
Heuchera villosa 'Autumn Bride'
Aster macrophyllus

Island Plants
Helianthus occidentalis
Liatris ligulistylis
Monarda fistulosa
Solidago speciosa
Sporobolus heterolepsis
Solidago rigida

Scatter Plants
Eupatorium purpureum
Helianthus salicifolius
Sorghastrum nutans
Silphium perfoliatum

Bulbs
Camassia leichtlinii 'Blue Danube'
Chionodoxa sardensis
Tulipa sylvestris

The West Garden Plant List

Trees/Shrubs
Cornus mas

Matrix Planting

Sesleria autumnalis

Heuchera villosa 'Autumn Bride'

Aster macrophyllus

Island Plants

Helianthus stromusus

Aster divaricatus

Sporobolus heterolepsis

Scatter plants

Eupatorium purpureum

Aruncus aethusifolia

Aralia racemosa

Bulbs
Camassia leichtlinii 'Blue Danube'
Chionodoxa sardensis
Hyacinthoides non-scripta
Tulipa sylvestris

The Ruin Garden Evolves: Letting Nature Take its Course

The Ruin Garden at Teixeira Park

Textures in the Garden: Calamagrostis brachytricha in the foreground

Volunteer Goldenrod allowed to enter the garden

Echinacea, Butterflyweed and the fine foliage of Vernonia lettermannii 'Iron Butterfly' in foreground

Close up of the original Asclepias tuberosa 'Gay Butterflies'  and Heliopsis helianthoides 'Summer Nights'

Asclepias tuberosa 'Gay Butterflies' and Heliopsis helianthoides 'Summer Nights' are the stars of the Ruin Garden in early July. They are good companions. Asclepias tuberosa 'Gay Butterflies'  is a short and squat plant of about 24" with bright orange flowers.  Heliopsis helianthoides 'Summer Nights' is slim, airy and stands about 3-4 feet tall on elegant red-tinged stems.  The golden flowers tower above the low granite walls at the Ruin Garden and can be seen from the sidewalk on Union Street inviting the passerby to explore the garden.

Both plants are cultivars of Native American plants that attract butterflies. The seeds of Heliopsis helianthoides 'Summer Nights' also provide food for goldfinches. Interestingly, both of these plants are self-seeding in the garden. I want the Ruin Garden to have a wild feeling and I am letting some of the volunteers grow where they please but I am editing out other plants that may overwhelm neighboring plants. 

This garden is a bit of an experiment for me. I usually like to control what happens in the garden. I am working on removing any unhappy species and letting the happy plants be fruitful and multiply. I want the Ruin Garden to attract birds and butterflies and be full of a diverse combination of plants that look good throughout the year. It is more difficult task to do well than one might think.