Tropical paradise

by Elizabeth Shaheen
It is such an exciting, heady experience planting out. Especially, when one has just put down the trowel having planted the final plant in a newly created border.

This is made even more poignant when the plants are those that one has nurtured from a seedling or from a cutting.

In the garden, trees are the soul and shrubs the structure and together they form the framework. They are never static, as time works its transformations upon them, yet they give a garden its mood in perpetuity.

In their youth, I carry out a task referred to as formative pruning. This ensures that they develop a strong, well-balanced framework of evenly spaced branches.

It involves the removal of any dead, damaged or diseased wood, as well as any weak or crossing branches.

Another reason I carry out formative pruning is to determine the tree or shrub’s shape as it grows.

The bones of the border are fleshed out with drifts and duvets of colour caused by the effects of the annuals, bulbs and perennials.

It is because their performance is so transient against the perpetual evergreens that they are more enthusiastically anticipated.

When I plant up a border, I prefer to select a variety of plants that offer different attributes. Some plants are chosen for their leaf-power, whereas others for their flowers alone.

I exploit the plants I use for under-planting not only for variation in height to add interest and very roughly emulate settings in a wild woodland, but also to serve needs as is the case with the ground hugging plants.

These I use very often with the desire to keep the roots of their bedfellows cool in summer and warm in winter.

In the same way as with people, gardens evolve with time. They pass through different stages as the plants age from babyhood to maturity and fade into senescence. Each transient stage has its own sense and experience, character and virtues.

The steady changes towards maturity as the plants establish themselves and fill-out the border will cause them to compete for water, nutrients, light and space. This will mean that you will have to make some adjustments.

Naturally, this rests on the form of plants you have used and your initial spacing of them. Most of our garden borders are very mature and a couple could do with rejuvenating. This will be an autumn task.

Some plants grow very quickly, such as Datura repens and “some” forms of Hibiscus rosa-sinensis, and reach their finest days at around four to six years old, while other plants take their time in reaching their full potential.

The tree Jacaranda takes several years before it fully opens its canopied form, whereas the tree Sesbania grandiflora blooms in its first year, attaining at the same time a height of around 10ft.

However, with all that energy consumed so rapidly, it is extremely short-lived. Just a couple of years.

With routine maintenance, a mixed border will burgeon and thrive for conceivably seven to 10 years. Nevertheless, without remedial endeavours, they lapse and look exhausted.

With the passage of time, sunny borders soon become dappled then shaded as shrubs and trees increase in both height and breadth. Shrubs become naked at their base and outperform those growing beneath.

The thick roots of trees and shrubs will cause the formerly, moist, friable soil to become choked with roots, draining the soil of moisture.

Plants that once basked in the sun gradually find themselves disadvantaged and weakened by the canopies of the trees and shrubs blocking out the sun and spoiling the appearance of the plants.

If you are experiencing such conditions with your garden, don’t be in a hurry to up-root it all - many a gardener might be tempted. Hold your horses and step back to contemplate alternative measures of how you can now use this setting to your benefit.

The mature trees and shrubs will have formed a shelterbelt from prevailing winds and will advantage other plants that should require the more constant microclimate that this setting has now created.

If a plant is clearly not worth saving, then rejuvenate the area by removing it. This action, in itself, may permit its neighbours to breathe more easily and thrive better.

It is for this reason that I always take cuttings from a beloved plant, to make sure that it lives if not in the same spot then elsewhere in the garden.

Light can be released into the arena by removing the lower branches of trees and shrubs.

They will themselves profit from this. A multi-stemmed shrub, such as Barleria lupulina (which is such a thorny personality and becomes overburdened with sparse lateral branches that interlace) should be thinned out considerably.

This action promotes new shoots from the shrub’s base and in turn, permits air and light to get to its heart and moisture to its feet.

Then it must be the turn of the herbaceous plants and bulbous perennials. Some may need a new site while others may need splitting or dividing. If you have not been one to practice putting humus on your garden, then it is imperative that you replenish the area with some well-rotted manure or garden compost.

First, loosen the soil and at the same time remove some root growth. This will not harm the plants if you don’t cut too close to their main stems. Then add the manure.

Now you are in a position to advance the garden to it sequential stage of evolution by planting species that are more suited to your more mature, prime-of-life garden.

Our garden soil is rich in organic matter because it is regularly mulched and the shrubs create a humid environment (given the shade and protection provided by the framework of the trees and shrubs) which is ideal for tropical forest dwelling plants.

These are the plants with which I shall rejuvenate the down-at-heel areas of our garden.

Comprehensive “How To” chapters on: Planting Out, Pruning, Propagation, Soil Preparation, Compost Making and Insect Control the Organic Way, feature in my book Tropical Trees and Shrubs of Bahrain.