Community Garden before   Community Garden after

Two years ago, on 11th November 2022, I went round the garden photographing everything that was still in flower. I don’t really mean ‘everything’: I did not include weeds, some of which must surely have been in flower then, nor, it appears, did I include plants in pots. So what I photographed was ‘garden plants’: plants growing in the ground and either deliberately put there or encouraged to grow having once seeded themselves. Altogether, my photographs included thirty-eight different species. Of these, some, such as the rudbeckia and the aster, were in full flower, this being their season, or at least the tail end of it. Others, such as a bellflower and a scabious, were stragglers, their heyday long past; but still a few flowers held on.

Yet others, such as the Christmas rose and the witch-hazel, are midwinter flowers, now just at the beginning of their season, their moments of glory still ahead of them. I was quite surprised to find as many flowers as I did, which is why I decided to photograph them; I suspect that most of these flowers wouldn’t have been out on that date thirty or forty years ago, perhaps even more recently.
I didn’t repeat the photographic experiment last year, but I think it would be a good idea to make a habit of doing so every year from now on, as a way to track the ups and downs of our local microclimate. I have therefore resolved to photograph all the flowers in the garden this November 11th, or as near to that date as weather permits. Looking at what is and what is not flowering in the garden right now, in mid-October, I suspect that I may be hard-pressed to find thirty-eight different kinds this year. We shall see!

One flower that was absent from my list of thirty-eight, even though it grows plentifully in our garden, was marjoram. In the late summer it was glorious, with masses of flowers in various shades of pink or purple, and much loved by bees, butterflies, and other insects. Looking at it now, in October, it’s not hard to see why it didn't feature in my November list: there are still, it is true, a few flowers open here and there, but most of it is long finished and going to seed. I doubt if even those few hardy late flowers will persist till November.

In last week’s episode of Gardeners’ World, Monty Don specifically included as one of his ‘tasks for the weekend’ to cut down the spent flowering stems of marjoram in order to encourage the new growth, already very much in evidence, by giving it better access to air and light. Normally I don’t do this: in keeping with a general inclination towards minimal intervention, I usually leave the marjoram stalks till the end of winter before cutting them down. My reasoning is that these densely packed clusters of spent flowers, as well as the protective environment below them, provide a safe haven for all manner of creepy-crawlies, whose presence in the garden is so important for biodiversity and the health of the ecosystem. This year, though, I have decided to compromise: I have selected some patches of marjoram to cut down as Monty recommends, while leaving others alone. Perhaps some of these will still have the odd flower open for me to photograph come November 11th, but in any case it will be interesting to see whether there is any discernible difference between how the two groups of plants perform next year as a result of my treating them differently.

Cutting back perennial plants in general tends to promote new growth. With tough plants like marjoram it's fine to do that now, because the new growth will happily withstand the winter frosts. Whether you cut them back now or leave them till later is a matter of taste: tidy-minded gardeners will want to cut back as much as possible so that the garden does not look too much of a mess over the winter; I myself incline the other way, for reasons I have explained; and there is plenty of room for compromise positions in between. But with more tender plants, such as penstemons, if you cut them back now then the new growth they put on will very likely succumb to frost later in the winter. For this reason you should wait till spring before cutting them back; they will still put on copious new growth, which will no longer be in danger from frost.

As so often in these notes – and if you’ve been following them at all attentively you will probably be bored with this by now – the marjoram story is essentially a negotiation (a one-sided one!) between nature and the gardener, who has to decide just where in the spectrum of possible interventions to strike a comfortable compromise. For my part, I feel fortunate that we have enough space to allow us to strike this balance in different ways in different parts of the garden, but even in a small garden there is no reason why some parts shouldn’t be left more in nature’s hands than others. At least it will make for an interesting variety.

Meanwhile, I look forward to November 11th and the next step in my photographic experiment. In the past, gardeners have often thought of themselves as being at war with nature, employing heavy artillery in the form of pesticides, weedkillers, flame-throwers, rotovators, and who knows what else in an effort to keep the enemy at bay. Although increasingly frowned upon, many of these practices continue. November 11th is surely an apt day for us to declare an armistice and embrace more nature-friendly practices in our gardens.
Antony Galton