One of the greatest joys as a Landscape Designer is delivering appropriate gardens to clients. That is matching a garden’s form, intensity and maintenance requirements to the lifestyle of the people who use and look after the garden. The most striking side effect is turning apparent ‘non gardeners’ into avid gardeners simply by delivering something they visually like but more importantly understand how to manage. This can be done at all levels from those who do all their own gardening to those who employ professionals to do the work for them.

The Boyds have lived on the 11 acre site since 1990, when they built the original cottage (now guest accommodation). The family home was built a year and a half later as the family grew in size.

Initially the garden extended around the cottage, but it now covers an area of some 3 acres, surrounding the house, which is located on a level area towards the centre of the site. Forest covers the remaining land and provides the dramatic backdrop to the garden.

Soil is the backbone for all gardens. Understanding your soil type will guarantee better gardening and water conserving techniques.

If you have sandy soil it will drain more quickly but will also require additional water to sustain plant growth.

If you have clay soil it will retain much more water but it may take longer for the soil to become moist after rainfall when it is really dry.

The soil in-between, referred to as loam, exhibits characteristics of both these soils.

The water penetration into the soil is crucial to reap the benefit of rainfall and irrigation. When you water does it roll off the surface and down the driveway, or does it seep into the soil?

In the tropical, subtropical and warm temperate climatic regions of the world, there is no flowering tree nobler than the frangipani. Of the world’s four most revered flowers, rose, gardenia, frangipani and jasmine the frangipani stands alone, in terms of size, diversity of
colours, climatic adaptability, hardiness, ease
of culture and drought tolerance.

Befitting a flower with this mystique is conjecture over its early cultivated history.

The botanical name for frangipani is Plumeria, named in honour of French botanist and explorer Charles Plumier (1646–1706) who studied the frangipani and introduced it into cultivation in Europe.

Last issue, we covered a selection of fruiting plants that had multiple uses as hedges, screens and of course, producing fruit. We open this time with a few spiky friends.

A sad indictment on our modern suburban way of life is the need for security around our homes. People looking for a security plant to grow outside a sunny, exposed bedroom window need look no further than these two spiky fruiting shrubs: The Natal plum and the finger lime.

Linda also covers:

In the last Issue we looked at how to grow allamandas in Australia.

In this issue Arno King takes us on a personal discovery of the various allamanda cultivars currently being grown.

The genus Allamanda is named after Frederick J.S.N. Allamanda, an eighteenth century Dutch naturalist at the University of Leyden who specialised in Brazilian flora. He sent seeds of this plant to Linnaeus the great taxonomist, who went on to name it after his friend. There are approximately 8 species of Allamanda, most of which have been growing in this country for many decades.