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The journal
Reading for the Irish garden
Twenty pieces on soil, structure and the plants that actually settle in an Irish garden — written from twelve acres in Celbridge.
Soil & Ground
Reading the ground before you spend anything on it.
- Feed the Soil, Not the Plant Healthy plants come from living soil, not from a bottle. Organic matter feeds the fungi, bacteria and worms that build...
- Mulching: The Most Valuable Hour in the Irish Garden Year A 5cm layer of compost spread over bare soil in late autumn feeds the ground, suppresses weeds and holds moisture...
- Know Your Soil Before You Spend a Penny Knowing whether you are gardening on sand, clay, loam, chalk or peat tells you which plants will settle in and...
Irish Conditions
Wind, salt and water — the three things that actually decide what lives here.
- Planting for Wind and Salt: A Guide for Irish Coastal Gardens In most exposed Irish gardens the limiting factor is not cold, it is wind. Understanding how wind and salt-laden air...
- Drainage, Not Frost: Why Plants Really Die in an Irish Winter In most of Ireland, hardiness is rarely the limiting factor. Plants far more often drown, slowly, in cold saturated soil...
Design Principles
Structure, depth and rhythm: the decisions that come before the plant list.
- Hedges and Boundaries: Choosing the Right Green Wall for an Irish Garden A boundary shelters, screens, encloses and feeds wildlife, and the material decides which of those it does well. Here is...
- How to Make a Small Irish Garden Feel Larger How large a garden feels has little to do with how large it measures. A handful of spatial decisions, most...
- Learning to See: Four Questions to Ask Before You Design Anything Before you draw a line or buy a plant, learn to read the space you already have. Four questions —...
- Repetition: The Quietest Trick in Garden Design Choosing three or four reliable plants and repeating them the length of a garden is the simplest way to make...
- The Four Layers: How to Plant a Border with Real Depth Most amateur borders read flat because almost everything in them is the same height. Thinking of a border as four...
- Bones Before Beauty: Giving a Garden Structure That Works in February The permanent framework of a garden — its paths, levels, enclosure and evergreen mass — carries it through the eight...
Choosing Plants
How to judge a plant on the bench, and what to ask before you buy it.
- Shade Is Not a Problem: Planting the North-Facing Corner Most shade problems are really dryness problems. Once you can tell dry shade from moist, two quite different plant lists...
- Choosing a Tree for a Small Garden Every garden needs an elder. One well-chosen tree, given the room it needs, does more for a small garden than...
- Foliage First: Why Leaves Run the Garden Flowers hold a border for a fortnight. Leaves hold it from March to December. Learning to shop for leaf size,...
- Twelve Months of Interest: Building a Garden You Never Tire Of A garden that peaks for six weeks in June is one you walk past for the other forty-six. Aim instead...
- Four Questions to Ask Before You Buy Any Plant Most disappointing plants were bought for the one thing they happened to be doing that day. Four questions, asked in...
Planting & Care
Getting them in the ground properly, and keeping them alive afterwards.
- Pruning Without Fear: The Principles That Cover Most Shrubs Pruning frightens people because it feels irreversible. It is not. A handful of principles covers most garden shrubs, and almost...
- Watering New Plantings: How Much, How Often, and When to Stop More new plants are lost to drought in Ireland than gardeners believe, and plenty are lost in a wet summer....
- Pot-Grown, Bare-Root or Root-Balled? How to Buy Plants Well The same plant can be sold three ways, at three very different prices, with three different chances of thriving. Knowing...
- How to Plant a Tree or Shrub Properly Most trees and shrubs lost in Irish gardens are not killed by cold or disease. They are killed slowly by...