Style: January 05, 2018

STYLE | landscaping 25
SOME LIKE IT
HOT
Planting at this time of year
induces heat stroke on both the
garden and the gardener.
Craig Wilson highlights plants
that will forgive you for planting
them in the heat, and ways to
ensure they survive.
If I reminisce on growing up in Christchurch, a
key memory was playing outside on summer
days that seemed to go on forever. Backyard
cricket, swing-ball and running under the garden
sprinkler on hot days…. This year the summer
would be up there with the best of them,
with great weather to get about and enjoy the
outdoors.
The flipside of a classic summer in
Canterbury is the typically low rainfall – and
again this summer is no exception. During
November we had the lowest rainfall recorded
for more than 150 years.
Our environment’s low rainfall can have a
big influence on the gardens we choose to
plant. An establishing trend in garden design
is to utilise drought-tolerant planting species.
This simply means planting species that, when
established, will require less water than others
to survive. Often New Zealand natives and
Australian natives will fall into this category. It
makes sense to consider this in your garden as
drought-tolerant plantings will end up using less
Brachyglottis greyi. Image Gillian Vine
water, which can only be a good thing for our
precious and pressured water resource.
Drought-tolerant plants are often
characterised by a silver/green foliage colour.
For example the New Zealand natives
Brachyglottis, Pachystegia, and Olearia, all well
suited to sunny, dry Canterbury conditions.
Many of our native grasses are accustomed to
surviving prolonged dry spells once they are
established, too.
Even with drought-tolerant species, if you are
undertaking a planting project over the summer,
it will be critical to put a good irrigation
programme in place to ensure the survival of
your plants. As we move through summer the
soil water content can ‘bottom out’ and soil
temperatures can get comparatively high.
Here’s a good planting tip: make sure you
hydrate the rootball of any plant well prior
to digging it into the ground. The best way
to ensure you’ve done this thoroughly is to
dunk the rootball into a full bucket of water
for a minute or two or until the bubbling has
stopped – i.e. when the larger soil air pockets
are saturated. Also, wet the planting hole for
a few seconds to prepare the soil to receive
the new plant. The freshly exposed plant roots
won’t be burned by hot dry soil.
If it’s at all possible, some landscapers would
even suggest holding off on planting until March
or April when there’s a higher chance of rain
and the ground temperature has started to
drop. Unless, of course, you enjoy the calm and
relaxation of a whip around your property with
the garden hose at the end of a summer’s day.
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