Do you live in a "gardening Town" ?

Not many people in my town garden, most homes have evergreens and a few potted plants or hanging baskets about.
I'm talking about the town where almost everyone has a flower garden and you almost get in a fender bender trying to see what is in bloom, or park your car and walk down the street just to peek in every-ones yard.
For those of you that live in the country, what about the town near you, do they garden?

I don't think I do. When I walk thru the neighbor hood, I am more often thinking-"why don't they" than "OOH I like.."
I am sending a picture of something not too far from me. This little chapel is in a kind of rundown neighborhood, on a busy road. The guardrail may be visible. There are woods next to it with a fair amount of windblown trash. But I almost always have to glance at this when I go by.
Take a better look. This chapel is on a little island in a duck and goose pond!

Years ago, a man built this for his wife., when the road probably was a country road with no houses or apartments nearby. Over the years, this man and his wife have passed away, but several years ago the son fixed this all back up. I just think it's a special little neat thing in a pretty unspecial place.

That is nice that the son came back to fix it up. A ray of hope where you least expect it!

I wouldn't say my town gardens, they landscape. We are lucky enough to be carved into a beautiful mix of forest and pasturelands...most people don't have sprinklers set up, yet the lawns are green.

My community is EXTREMELY conservative and I think most folks would be scared to plant something that someone might not like. They don't wear purple around here either!!

I am lucky enough to have a neighbor who gardens....I am slowly spreading the bug to some of my mom-friends by sharing seeds and teaching their kids about gardening.

My neighbor and I have very different philosophies and goals in the garden, but who doesn't, I guess. At least when my bulbs come in the mail I can run next door and sure enough she has just gotten hers...we swap and each time become closer to friends. That is what it is about, isn't it???

Peace,
Kyrina

My section of town not too much, more landscaping than anything. My neighbors have veggie gardens. The other side of town has this....
http://www.sayengardens.org/Sayen%20Gardens.htm
http://www.sayengardens.org/Koi%20Pond.jpg

We have only been here 3 years and haven't gotten there yet.
The little town next to us has a garden club and a garden tour in the spring it's not posted yet but I'd like to do that this year.

This is a hard one. It's not the kind of place where people landscape to keep up with the neighbors, not even in the local towns. A lot of people garden but you see a lot of older houses with old timey gardens filled with old timey plants.

Keep in mind too we don't have a lot of fancy nurseries here so you don't see many of the fancy, newer plants because people don't find them. There sure are a lot of people shopping for plants, though, in the warm months.

In a lot of areas, like here, the soil is pretty awful and unless you bring in thousands of dollars of topsoil, you're going to plant mostly tough things that can survive in the rocky soil.

Lots of people have vegetable gardens. The guy across the road plants nothing but potatoes in his. I get a huge kick out of that. He must really like potatoes.

hart says-The guy across the road plants nothing but potatoes in his. I get a huge kick out of that. He must really like potatoes.--Stck wit h what works, eh? My nextdoors grow a ton of onions. But then again, most people use onions almost daily in cooking, so...

Mental survey- 21 houses closest to me.
Maybe four, seriously into flowers or plants in quantity and variety, and you know they spend time at it.
Five or six- a well done or recently professsionally done, minimal maintenance landscape for the front yard.
Two- you're lucky the house doesn't fall down.
The rest (you do the math, I'm lazy this am!) never seen plant a flower, pruning if you're lucky to see it, is of the green meatball school.
So about half I consider substandard. There, I AM the garden snob of the street.

But if they saw inside my house I would get ripped

Speaking of green meatballs, this has to be the ultimate no maintenance garden. There was a guy in Manassas years ago, don't know if it's still there, who parked largish boulders in his front bed right in front of his house and painted them green. I was kind of astonished that he didn't finish it off with some plastic flowers stuck in the ground but maybe he's a minimalist.

minimalist. chuckle!!!
There's a really funny thread somewhere about green meatballs

I live in a gated community with a community garden. There are 750 residents here and 75 (or, 10%) of them are gardeners.

LarryD

I'm always disappointed when traveling that I don't see more "gardening towns". Seems like when I traveled through parts of Massachusetts every house had some sort of attempt at landscaping - not so here :( Although I do have to say that Lexington is the most beautiful little town in spring. Not so much for the landscaping efforts of local gardeners but when the Redbuds and Dogwoods that line the streets are in bloom, it's a sight to see!

What is it about some cultures that really value gardens and look at every space, no matter how small, as an opportunity to grow something. The Brits are really devoted to their gardens with perennials, boxwoods, bulbs, shrubs and trees. Almost every pub has some gorgeous display in window boxes. You see small cottage gardens in a village, daffodils in their hundreds along a country road, perfectly tended beds in churchyards, even in the center of their roundabouts. It's enough to make a gardening tourist weep to walk down the High street and see walls of flowers spilling out of second floor window boxes from one end to the other and plaques stating who has won which prize for their display. Whole towns vie for "most beautiful" awards each summer. Gardening shows on the BBC have a roster of loyal listeners dating back forty or fifty years. Of course they have a long gardening history with the many National Trust gardens and houses that are open to the public, but they seem to share a national consciousness about gardening.

I think a lot more people take up gardening when they have the resources, ie good nurseries nearby that carry plants that will thrive in your region vs whatever are the plants du jour, and when they have time. You're probably not going to see a lot of passionate gardeners in commuting communities - probably 60% of the people in the towns here commute into the DC area to work.

I think builders' habit of scraping away all the topsoil in subdivisions has probably discouraged a lot of would be gardeners. They try planting whatever is available at the local nursery or box store and it dies because the soil is bad and the plants aren't really adapted to that region. Their new gardener neighbors are in the same boat so they aren't able to get good advice on what they should do.

That's why a community like this one is so great

Hart, I think you hit the nail on the head! When I drive to Bluestone or Sunnybrook Farms I see lots of gardens. It is hard to keep my eyes on the road and my tongue in my mouth, drool... drool... There are many nurseries in these areas.

And the top soil is also a big problem even with older homes where top soil was not valued, my home was built on the soil they dug out of the basement lots of rocks, and we are in an area with loads of clay. I have been working a long time on this soil, and have brought bags os soil home in the trunk of my car. I did buy a truck load of soil which the guy said was very good, raved about it, it was so full of weeds and wild raspberry roots that I am gun shy to buy it that way again.

I also think if you grow up in a gardening family it is much easier to carry on the love of gardening to the next generation.

My house is really old and I'm sure no one ever considered bringing in topsoil when it was built. LOL Some areas have nothing but rocks and sand and while there are some areas with fairly decent soil, there are numerous black walnuts nearby. The other problem is all the grassy weeds growing everywhere.

I've heard some real horror stories about buying topsoil by the truckload. I guess you almost have to go and look at what they're going to bring and even then you may not see sprouts to tell you if it has weed seeds.

I was thinking and didn't write the same thing about growing up in a gardening family. My parents gardened, my paternal grandmother loved her flower garden and my grandparents on my mom's side were tobacco farmers. Although they sold the farm when I was a baby, my grandfather still had a tobacco plant growing in a pot in his apartment when he died at 95. I think that's cute.

So I don't know if it's in the blood or if it's just that you learn by watching. Probably a bit of both.

One of my professors in comparative lit used to talk about the urge to plant in the spring as an archetype. He believed everyone had that urge but then maybe he was just a gardener and couldn't believe everyone didn't share it. LOL

I'm sure glad I didn't order that truckload of topsoil I was thinking about.

Pam- Doesn't Charlottesville have a lot of gardeners?

Yes, I believe it does have quite a few. I am about 45 minutes from there now that I've moved. I just haven't changed my information page. I can't find how to change it-LOL.

My town is a tree-huggers town. People love their trees, and we probably have some of the biggest, oldest, and shadiest tree-lined streets in my voting presinct. The housing lots are some of the biggest-1/2 to almost 2 acres. Lawns are nice, if not perfect, and landscaping is variable, but not too interesting. There is a trend to put something out near the sidewalk for interest, but it is not done with skill and creativity, or kept up year after year. I imagine there are flower gardens in the backyards that you just can't see. My next door neighbors have a small flower garden and I think veggies in the summer, but the landscape is traditional--rhododendrons, azaleas, dogwoods, holly, hostas, laurels, etc. You see those common orange daylilies that I think are native to Virginia or the Mid-Atlantic, they are everywhere.

I know there is at least a daylily club in Falls Church, and there are some community gardens in other areas, but not mine yet. I think all this will change soon because an old lady who has (gasp!) 15 acres on the next street from mine is willing her property to the county to turn into a public park. This old lady was a big azaleas and rhododendron collector, and she has paths of these shrubs all around her place. It will open in the near future. I believe this will change some things in our area.

I live in a rural area. Many of my neighbors raise horses, cows, and burros (think Babba Louie if you're over 40!) My place is nestled in the woods at the end of an unpaved cul-de-sac. There are about 10 other homes here and I am the only serious gardener. My left-hand neighbor's idea of gardening is to order the Arbor Day Foundation's little twigs that will be of reasonable size in about 30 years! I'm not that patient. My right-hand neighbor doesn't garden but leaf-blows his driveway every day during the summer and fall which, with all the mature trees losing their leaves all at once in the fall, keeps him plenty busy in his yard!

LOL!! Sallyg--don't get us on housekeeping here!!

LOL, again (at metopa)!! "Leaf-blowing" is for yardiacs, not gardeners. I think that term applies to people who are compulsive yard-tenders, or at least they enjoy the activity outside. Good for them!! It always helps the neighborhood, believe it or not. Our size of lots makes maintenance a chore in itself, and when you work 5 days a week all day, weekends are yard days.......

And what is one's own idea of gardening, anyway? It can be many things to different people, be it just a potted tobacco plant or a veggie garden, an azalea hedge, a tulip colony , whatever. It's the joy of working with a single plant or many.

Nope. We don't have yards that stop traffic--in fact, we have a trend toward speed bumps to keep people from speeding through!!