Further to the Persimmon Post

Remember I mentioned that my Fuyu persimmon tree had arrived? He is now in the ground with his own little patch of ground covers.
For this gardening escapade I needed all sorts of paraphernalia. The 'soil' out the front is that dreadful brought in 'garden loam,' which is basically sand tinted brown. Therefore no plant goes in the ground without a generous sprinkling of cow manure, compost, blood and bone, Dynamic Lifter, and a healthy scoop of coir peat for bulk.  

Unfortunately, the first pictures of our persimmon don't look like much. That's because he's just a twig right now. Quite a tall twig, about 3 feet, but still just a twig nevertheless. You can barely even see it against the roses. Originally this section of the garden was white gravel (yuk, hate gravel in a garden! I presume it was put in by previous owners labouring under the misunderstanding that gravel is low maintenance). I've removed the gravel, ripped up the suffocating weed-mat, and pinched some of the bark mulch from under the roses. I'm not big on bark mulch, but since it's there already I'm aiming for continuity.

Around the tree I have planted thyme, oregano, sweetheart strawberries and pansies. There's also Tete-a-tete miniature daffodil bulbs, but we won't see them for a while. It doesn't look like much right now, but give it a few months and we'll see some ground cover action. 

Now, for some time the Iceberg roses have been bugging me. They should be lovely, and indeed the actual flowers are, but they're somehow a bit boring. And I think I've finally figured out why. For starters, I would never have planted roses in a neat grid, but I knew that already. No, it's something else. I've been reading a book called 'Garden Design Details' by Arne Maynard, and there's a whole section in there on vertical elements and I realised that's what's missing from the front garden: there's no variation in height, everything is at the same level.

So, it's not the greatest photo in the world, but you may get a hint of what I'm trying to achieve here. The persimmon will become a small tree, arching up and over the roses to the right and framing the house and garden. Over time I will fill in the garden bed in front of the tree (I have plans!). I might have to bring in more bark mulch even though I don't like it much. I don't think there's going to be quite enough available for continued plundering as I did today.

This is only part one of today's gardening efforts. There will be a sequel later in the week; stay tuned!