A garrigue garden

A GARRIGUE GARDEN

Marie-Claude Baro

Sometimes during conversations about flowering plants people say to me “You must have a beautiful garden”. This takes me by surprise, so that I answer “It’s a garrigue garden… a naturalist’s garden.” Over time it has indeed become a beautiful place, a place that I enjoy, although it is by no means finished yet.
It was originally nothing more than the plot of land – a subdivision of a larger plot – surrounding one of those little weekend houses in the garrigue outside Nîmes where families used to get together on Sundays. In it were grown food plants, especially olives and other fruit trees (almond, vine, fig, pomegranate) as well as a few ornamental plants for pleasure (lilac etc). This weekend-home culture has been marvellously described by Véronique Mure-Bombal in her book Jardins de garrigue, first published in 1995.
This land, surrounded by drystone walls, had once been cultivated and the stones removed from it. Here and there the stumps remained of olive trees destroyed by frost in the terrible winter of 1956; some had grown again from the stock. The dominant vegetation consisted of Viburnum tinus and large Aleppo pines, while an area was covered with Spanish broom. I was of course familiar with the garrigue, yet did not know its plants in any detail.
When I first visited this piece of land it was February and I was surprised to find the Algerian iris, Iris unguicularis, in full bloom. Subsequently I learnt to identify some other plants, such as Rhamnus alaternus and the wild honeysuckle, Lonicera implexa. There was no thyme or rosemary here, nor were there any cistuses, arbutus, sages or butcher’s broom (Ruscus). My plan was thus to introduce these plants, as well as others which would suit the soil and climate conditions and the environment. When I started, in the middle of the 1980s, not many such plants were offered for sale.
Right from the beginning one could enjoy this bit of garrigue for picnics, for siestas in the shade of the pine trees, for games of hide and seek with children. Friends could be invited to spend some pleasant time together. Or one could simply wander around, gathering wild asparagus in the springtime and fruit later on, or picking bunches of flowers. And it was from all this that the idea came of making this land evolve towards being a garden while always staying within the bounds of realism and prudence so that gardening continued to be a pleasure rather than becoming a constraint.
Another important stage in my perception of the place was the discovery of its wildlife. I subscribed to “La Hulotte”, a nature journal, and was thus already oriented towards observation. I rapidly became aware of the squirrels from their very particular manner of gnawing pine cones. Installing a basin for birds to drink from made it easier first to observe and then to identify them (thanks too to binoculars). During the course of the seasons I have seen about forty different species of bird in and around the garden. In summer 2008, at five o’clock in the morning, I heard the very characteristic song of the European nightjar, a bird so rare that it is the object of special expeditions by birdwatchers. I quickly went outside to try to see it – in vain, but its presence alone was a source of great happiness. Wandering around the garden, I easily get a good close-up view of other birds, such as wrens, tits and warblers.
Identification of insects is a lot more complex since there are so many of them. But they are fascinating. All this insect life is important, yet it is a lot less perceptible to anyone visiting the garden.
What all this means is that I practise a kind of “dilettante” gardening. I may start with the intention of pruning a tree, but then I see a butterfly and set off to find a book in order to identify it, then from butterfly to butterfly somehow the time allocated to the pruning task has sped by in observation…
I use no chemicals in the garden, with the result that a natural balance has been reached, pests being controlled by insects, birds, bats etc. In order not to disturb birds during their nesting season, no hedge clipping is carried out between March and June. Although I do combat the spread of sarsaparilla (Smilax aspera) and brambles, I leave some since they offer protection to birds against predators like cats.
As the years have passed, I’ve learnt to garden in harmony with the soil and the climate. It is necessary to prepare the soil well, digging to a good depth so that the roots of new plants can make their way down deep and thus resist drought. Existing plants such as the wild clematis and Viburnum tinus must be carefully removed, for otherwise they grow back lustily… The best method is to prepare a particular area thoroughly and then plant it in autumn. This system makes it easier to deal with the watering and weeding required the following year, and in the end is much more satisfying than putting isolated plants in here and there all over the garden. I’ve stopped buying plants in spring, after quite a few losses; it is much better simply to note the names of the plants that attract one’s attention in spring. Gardening in the garrigue requires a certain amount of forward planning and organisation…
Over the course of the years, too, this plot of land has changed a lot. The grass has become “pretty”, including under the pines (it is cut three or four times a year and the mowings are left on the spot). Orchids have appeared (Ophrys, Barlia). The Viburnum tinus bushes that have been cut back to lighten them or to get rid of old wood now form handsome masses from which the pines stand out. The death of some old pines has led me to realise the necessity of managing the trees in such a way as to show off the existing deciduous ones (Pistacia terebinthus, elm). Making choices hasn’t been easy. Introducing a new plant is so difficult that a priori precedence is given to those that grow spontaneously. This is in any case often very interesting: thrushes “sowed” cotoneasters and a mulberry tree appeared by itself in a spot where it provides welcome shade in summer. Spontaneous plants that seed themselves, such as Euphorbia rigida, E. characias and cistuses, form a solid base. Some viburnums have been removed in order to open up vistas or to give space to the Rhamnus that were growing beneath their cover. The basic structure of the garden consists of the plants that were here originally; only the Spanish broom has been drastically reduced. There is a lot of green (Viburnum tinus, Rhamnus, pines) which I like as a compensation for the yellowing of the grass in summer.
It seems to me that to appreciate this garden one needs to understand the particularity of the garrigue and the difficulties it presents. This is a garden which “sulks” in summer – and I’ve no idea if I shall ever be able to alter this…
At the beginning, the paths that lead round the garden were made simply by removing stones and levelling the ground. However, stones seem to sprout from nowhere and the ground moves. Thus the need for hard paths became apparent, although it took a lot of thought before I could find a material that blended into the site – I was afraid of having something that looked like a building site in the midst of my pines.
Once this was done, I turned my attention to selecting plants, for this was the next phase: achieving my planting objectives. Luckily – and thanks in large part to Olivier Filippi – one can now find plants suitable for poor, stony soils. What happiness!
For what I am aiming at is to make this more of a garden while at the same time always keeping it a garrigue garden: a garden space in which to enjoy life and nature.

Translated from the French by Caroline Harbouri.