Beautiful backyard garden
Not every couple is as compatible horticulture together as 2022’sReader Garden Award Winners , Jim and Carole Poole . Their charming Georgia backyard garden is the arrant compounding of horticulture and artwork . With carefully put Tree and shrubs , well - thought - out beds and hardscaping and meticulous maintenance , it ’s a beautiful reflection of the couple ’s talent . look out ourTalk & Tourvideo audience above and read more about this couple ’s creative effort and see the great - look outcome below .
A true team effort
The couple met as teenagers at a conference for Alabama United States Department of State 4 - H winners . Jim was a horticultural champion , and Carole ’s vocalizing trio won the endowment competition . He ’s the horticulturist , determining the layout of the backyard , designing the hardscaping undertaking and choosing the social structure plant . Watercolor artist Carole helps take care of the plants , weighs in on color and grain combinations and cast together the containers every twelvemonth .
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Every inch of this roughly 70×80 - human foot backyard is composed and garden , and there are beautiful views from almost anywhere you stand or posture . Get a sense for how it all ferment together in the overhead survey that Carole paint below . Carole is a watercolor artist who specialise in home and gardens . To see her work , on Instagram , follow @carolepoolegalleryor look for hershop on Etsy .
How the garden started
When they retired to this theatre nearly 11 years ago , Jim drew up a plan for the garden powerful away . The live Burford holly ( Ilex cornuta‘Burfordii ’ ) hedge was only about 4 feet magniloquent , and he knew he wanted to keep the four flower dogwood ( Cornus florida ) trees growing in the backyard , so he designed the island beds and borders around them . He study out a few other “ trash tree ” and their root — a liberal task — and then got to work building and planting . First up : the white fence that make a background for the veer borders flow around the property ’s circumference . Then he put in a ‘ Little Gem ’ Southern magnolia ( Magnolia grandiflora ) , crape myrtles ( Lagerstroemia indica ) , several azaleas ( Rhododendronhybrids ) and Indian hawthorn ( Rhapiolepis indica ) to create a anchor for more plants that would come later .
Regular backyard garden maintenance
Although there was a fortune of work in the first few eld , now that the garden is established , they ’ve settle into a manageable act . A couple of fourth dimension a year , they tackle major pruning , but then it ’s just the annual planting and what Jim calls “ tinkering:”deadheading , lawn careand clipping . These are thing they can do as little or as much as they need to .
When the atmospheric condition allows , Carole has her good morning coffee on the terrace . She sometimes notices one piddling stray ramification that she ’d like to prune , “ and next affair you make out I have a bucket full . I start keeping my garden shoes on the patio because I stay fresh ruining my others ! ”
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All-year beauty in this backyard garden
It ’s obvious that Jim and Carole revel spend clip in their backyard : The meticulously cared - for lawn andboxwoodhedges and respectable edging skeleton a garden that ’s been planned so there ’s something colorful almost any week you call in year round .
Seasonal garden show-offs
In spring , several miscellanea of azaleas ( including their favourite , ‘ George L. Tabor ’ ) slop colouration across the garden , thetulipsare blooming and it seems something new is popping up every Clarence Shepard Day Jr. . Toward the death of bound , thearborabove is treat with the first flush of pink ‘ New Dawn ’ climbing rise flush . Jim climbs a run in former wintertime and cuts each stem back by a twosome of metrical foot to rejuvenate it for the year . If they deadhead after each flush of blooms , it ’ll often bloom three or four time . Big slam of red and white Drift ® roses and about 60 crimson , pink and ashen Knock Out ® blush wine add color to the bed in late spring as well .
Backyard garden in bloom
former summer land blooms on their 20 hydrangea of various types . This year , they put in near 40dahlias , and Jim is a big sports fan : “ They are very proud of themselves . The wonderful thing about them is they do n’t flower for only three or four 24-hour interval . They just do n’t stop ! ”
Carole say she loves July : “ It ’s when Jim does his legerdemain . The garden is so lush and green , the Sunpatiens ® impatiens are up to my knees and the roses are blooming a 2d time . It ’s all so healthy before August gets dry . ”
gloaming finds the annuals still putting on their show alongside the deepen leaves of the many trees and shrubs . And wintertime is when you’re able to enjoy the woody plants that Jim planned from the starting time : the French pancake myrtles ’ beautiful bark , many plants ’ evergreen foliage or needles , and the camelia flowers . In later years , the couple has added low hedges of Baby Gem ™ Nipponese boxwood ( Buxus microphyllavar.japonica ) that frame several of the beds , and mounding ‘ Green Velvet ’ and ‘ Green Mountain ’ boxwoods ( Buxushybrids ) add physical body throughout the garden as well .
Pruning is key
horticulture in Georgia is not without its challenges . Although they do get hot stretches in summer and an occasional ice storm or temperature drop that threaten plant , Jim says that their mood is relatively mild . In fact , “ Things want to rise . For me , the biggest challenge is pruning because thing get too big ! ”
So to keep shrubs in scale with their surround and help oneself them develop attractive use and bloom well , he rationalise many of the bush every year , and sometimes a couple of times a year . In late winter or other leaping , he tackle the holly hedgerow , roses and any other evergreens . Earlyspring bloomers , such as camellia and azalea , get their one-year haircut after they bloom .
While the overall penning and pattern in this backyard might get your centre first , the longer you expend there , the more inside information you notice .
Adding charm with garden containers
Containers are the icing on the cake of this beautiful garden . Carole composes several containers to tot up long - last colour to the seating country and other spots in the garden . Jim say , “ Carole is the artist and the florist shop . ” Some of her front-runner arecoleusbecause of their long - endure foliage colouring and Sunpatiens impatiens . “ you may put one of those in a tummy , and you ’re done ! ” She also likes to mix them in with whatever strikes her fondness when she ’s shopping for container . you’re able to see one of these compositions above .
Carole does n’t get to have all the playfulness with containers , though . Last fall Jim in secret tucked severaltulip bulbs into the plantersthat Carole had put together with poof for wintertime colour . She was bewildered for a moment in February when they started stab through thepansies : “ I was sitting on the patio with my morning coffee and thought , ‘ What is in that pot ? ’ Then I realized that Jim must have put the tulip bulbs in there . What a surprise ! ”
The long wire plantation owner above is one of their latestcontainerprojects . They hung the decorative wrought - iron wall hanging a few year ago to back up what they originally planned as a camellia garden . But when they changed course and planted perennial there , she decided to repurpose a simple conducting wire field goal from the house as a plantation owner under it . Then she top the arrangement with another cosmetic wrought - iron piece .
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Hidden potting bench
Every garden needs a work surface area . This one is enshroud in bare plenty . The two customtrellisesabove make the perfect backdrop for more of Carole ’s pretty containers . The container plantings in front of these architectural screens switch every yr , but the fragrant yellow recent - wintertime flowers of the Carolina yellow jessamine vine ( Gelsemium sempervirens ) grow on it are a invariant every wintertime . But slip behind them and you ’ll recover a potting bench andtool storagecleverly enshroud !
