Serialplantfetishist's Pond Amphitheatre garden

This area of the garden is the most natural looking. It isn’t really a native garden though I use some native plants but rather a “naturalistic” garden. It takes up most of the 40 by 40 feet directly behing the warehouse. Near its center is a small, circular pond. There is an island bed North of the pond and another island bed to its South. The purpose of this area is to provide a path for a modest stroll through the garden as well as to provide habitat and forage for birds and insects. A large red dragonfly has shown an interest in the new pond and I’m hoping that there will be frogs soon too but no fish. I’m primarily interested in the pond’s reflective surface and have no plans to use any water plants.

A decomposed granite path, approximately four feet in width, begins just outside the back door which is located near the corner of the building closest to the center of the property. From there it heads South along a fairly wide border which runs along the backside of the warehouse, keeping the pond and island beds to ones left. The path turns left and East staying pretty close to the fence on the Southern boundry of the property. Just before a group of birches in the Southeast corner, the path turns left again and North along the back path. The back path winds some 70 feet beside a border along the fence demarking the Eastern edge of the property, to a deck in the Northeast corner overlooking Strawberry Creek. About halfway down the back path there is a wider area I call the “Y”, at which point a side path leads directly back under an arch to the back door.

Each of the beds and borders in this area receives very little additional water with some receiving none at all. The dry island bed to the North of the pond is raised for drainage as are the other beds to a lesser degree.

It is a fair criticism to point out that each of the beds and borders has a somewhat different association. The Northern island bed has many succulents and cacti suggesting a desert habitat while the Southern island bed contains a well established Gunnera m., black bamboo and other plants which suggest an almost tropical feel. The area near the birches in the Southeast corner is primarily underplanted with Hellebore foetides, native ferns and scillia bulbs suggesting a temperate forrest. The border directly behind the warehouse contains the tree fern Cyathia cooperii and Abutelon tridens along with African Linden, Azara m. and tree dahlia in its ‘upper story’ which might suggest a cloud forrest; but its understory is largely Salvia ‘Waverly’ and Lions Tail for the sake of the hummingbirds. In the border along the Eastern fence, in addition to the european birches in the corner the upper story includes Australian Tea tree, a well established flowering Quince, butterfly bushes and a Persimmon tree. This is underplanted with a lot Lantana and Butterfly weed along with New Zealand Windgrass. While I like for my gardens to feel like plausible natural landscape, I’ve compromised that a good deal in this garden in order to exploit the potential of each area to grow plants of interest to myself as well as to the bird and insects in the area.