Milton & District Horticultural Society Garden Tour

At our very last hort meeting I sat next to a lovely woman who was the organizer of the Milton tour.  As quickly as I asked, when? and how much?  - she had the tickets out of her purse to complete the transaction.  And at $15 for 2 - how could you go wrong?

The Milton society was established in 1910 - the land then was primarily agricultural.  Today, the crop is houses, lots of them.  If you haven't driven up there in a while, you will be shocked to see how many have been built.

Kevin and I realized that we'd be able to do five of the six gardens if we started at the dot of 10:00 and still make it back to Oakville in time for his appointment.  Our first stop was at Anne and Walter Elliot's garden - Walter was a former high school teacher at Oakville Trafalgar and has been retired for a while.  Their property is about an acre and a half - they garden about 2/3s of it - and let the rest do what it wants.  It is filled with hard-working perennials and lovely bits of whimsy.

I can see they've worked hard to provide colour throughout the garden season - this patch is just starting to colour and will look wonderful when the mums are in bloom.

Now, this isn't a combination I'd thought of but think it works very well.

My first big butterfly of the year - sadly, it appears to have been clobbered by the rain the night before.

The next four gardens were much smaller, but packed with good ideas, and like the first, were done by the owner.  Not that I don't appreciate the over-the-top quarter million extravaganzas that I could never have, but I really prefer seeing what gardeners are putting in their gardens and how they've solved garden problems without taking out a loan.

Susan Platt has a very wet section in her backyard, she pointed out the offending area - you'd never know it existed without being shown.  Her perennial bed is 150 feet long.

What's a garden without a wee gnome?

I think you can get more fun and photos with one sunflower seed than you can with almost any other flower.

Our third stop was to Len Lee's garden - a man with 250 rose bushes.

And, one wonderful Opuntia.

I can really understand how a rose-lover would fall in for beautiful plant.

Lost in the bushes....

Len had removed the lawn and raised the beds.  He sends all his roses into the winter well covered.  (And I whinge about having to hill up the few that I have.)

Not only do the front and back gardens look lovely - all the owners took care to make the transition areas just as tour-worthy.  This is Judy and Bob Wallace's garden on Wilson Street.

Bob said he likes to sit and listen to the water flow on a Sunday night - pop on the radio and listen to the folks battling the traffic coming back from the cottage.  No need to go anywhere - he's got his own little paradise in his own backyard.

They even managed to fit in a vegetable garden.  Note the grand children's toys for the pool (not pictured).

And then to garden number five - Diane Vandenbosh's garden on Kingsleigh Court.  Grass be gone.

When the curbs were being redone, Diane decided to just give over the whole front to flowers.  I'd never seen white Knautia only the dark red.  It's equally pretty and a good weaver.

A giant insect in watching over the smaller faster moving ones.

I really miss my old Coreopsis.  One of the first perennials I grew from seed.  A good reason to go the nursery don't you think?

Although, maybe next week when it's a little cooler - talking about 43C (109.4F which is the current temperature in Riyahd) with the heat index today - or a shivery 33C (91.4) without.  Better get out and water - at the moment, it really doesn't look like we're going to be able to count on rain.