Visit New Town Karen 2020

After a week of showers and a Saturday of solid rain, Sunday greeted us with just a few clouds, plenty of blue sky and the promise of a bit of spring warmth. Karen’s garden in New Town was at its glistening best when we showed up for our visit.

Welcoming garden paths

Max & Karen discussing the garden

THE PLAN: Karen & Roger purchased their property twenty years ago with a back garden that she describes as full of concrete, blackberries, concrete and … some concrete 😊. You’d never know it had such a rough start to look at it today. Not only has Karen wrested a very productive food garden from that inauspicious patch, she’s created something beautiful as well. This was by design so the sloping garden could be enjoyed from the first storey veranda as well as from within the garden itself. And, the whole thing needed to be attractive and inviting for their B&B guests. On all counts, the garden succeeds.

Garden from above

One of the many flowers sharing the beds

The cherry plum tree is just setting fruit

STRUCTURE: The garden beds have been built over time, most raised so soil can be piled on top of the sandstone which runs just under the surface. The beds were formed by a combination of purchased stone and materials found on the site where plenty of sandstone pieces remained from when the house was being built in the mid 1800s. 

Raised beds

Karen explained that when choosing which plant goes where, soil depth has been a limiting factor but the productivity of the garden is proof that she’s got it figured out. Eleven fruit trees produce enough to keep the couple in bottled fruit all year and there’s space for some ornamentals and natives as well. 

Apple Tree in mixed bed

FOOD AND ORNAMENTALS: Much of the food is grown in amongst the trees and between the flowers. The plants all coexist happily and continue to produce regardless of their neighbour. 

Peas growing up a black currant plant

The primary vegetable bed is well laid out with each row marked so the crops can be tracked. Metal cages are placed over seedlings to deter the local blackbird family who, though kept off the seedlings, repeatedly manage to sneak into the netting over the berries and fruit trees. Still, there appears to be enough to go around and the birds are very used to their gardeners. 

Veggie row 15

Plenty of chard

Keeping the blackbirds out

BENDING BRANCHES: Karen explained that one of the aims of espaliering fruit trees is to encourage growth along branches. Auxim, a plant hormone produced in the stem tip, promotes stem elongation and inhibits growth of lateral buds. This is why buds tend to form on the highest points of branches. Bending the branches for espaliering results in buds forming all along a main branch rather than just the end. A similar result can be achieved by bending branches of non-espaliered fruit trees. Karen does this by tying the branch to bricks sitting under the tree. It was generally agreed that this type of fruit tree management doesn’t work well on plums, peaches and nectarines but works very well on cherries, apples and pears. 

Tying down the apple branch

IRRIGATION: The garden is divided into four zones for irrigation. Karen has solenoids (electronic valves) attached to mains power which she uses to control which zone is watered. The water is released at ground level via small holes in the irrigation piping. The only shortcoming of her system is that, due to the spacing of the drip holes, the brown irrigation pipes she uses work best when the beds are already moist so she is forced to hand water to supplement in the driest periods.

Solenoids controlling the irrigation

Brown irrigation pipes running through garden

FERTILISING & MULCHING: Karen uses sheep manure on all her beds and places a deep layer of pea straw wherever she mulches. She purchases these from local small suppliers (for example, Scouts have supplied her manure and she picks up pea straw from a farm in Richmond). 

Well-manured strawberry bed

Pea straw mulch under the kumquat

BEES: The garden was well-attended by honeybees and a few bumble bees during our visit. Karen explained that she’d specifically planted more colourful flowers to lure the bees to her garden to hopefully pollinate her fruit and berries. Whatever she’s doing, it’s working. 

Purple for the bees

Nectar for 2 💕

Busy pollinating the apples

HERITAGE IRISES: This garden, like all successful gardens, takes its fair share of TLC. Karen hires someone help to keep it at its best but she still finds time to raise a huge collections of heritage irises. They are a bit late in blooming this year but in a couple of weeks the garden will be bursting with colour while the fruit and veggies keep doing their bit to put food on the table. Karen’s garden is a perfect example of how a backyard garden can be many things at once, in a complimentary fashion.

Showy Iris

I'd like to extend a special thanks to Karen and Roger for opening up their garden to us as well as to those who brought something to share for the produce table or the seed box and to everyone who attended and helped make the day a great one.