A Garden Isn't Finished in July | Marcus Bergin's Garden Notebook
THE CRAFT OF GARDENING
Marcus Bergin
7/4/20263 min read
A Garden Isn't Finished in July
July has a way of making us think a garden has reached its destination. I've learnt that it's only halfway through the journey.
There's a particular feeling that seems to arrive every July. Borders are full, the roses are at their peak, the lavender is alive with bees and the lawn, assuming the weather has been kind, has settled into that rich green that only early summer seems able to produce. After months of planting, pruning and waiting, it's tempting to stand back, admire everything around you and think, "There we are. The garden is finished."
I've heard customers say exactly that.
The truth is, every time I do, I smile to myself because I know what's coming next.
Gardens have never been interested in finishing.
That's one of the first lessons they teach you if you spend enough years working with them. Just when one plant reaches its peak, another quietly begins to fade. The roses may be magnificent now, but before long they'll need deadheading if they're to give another display later in the summer. The sweet peas that looked so full of promise in June are already asking for regular picking, while the borders are beginning to hint at the colours they'll wear as August approaches.
The garden is always moving forward.
I think that's one of the reasons I enjoy gardening as much now as I did when I first started. No matter how many years pass, there is never a point where everything simply stops. Nature doesn't pause because we've reached a convenient moment. It continues to grow, change, and adapt, often without us noticing until we return a week later and wonder where the time has gone.
Perhaps we should take comfort from that.
So much of modern life encourages us to chase completion. We finish a project, tick another job off the list or reach a milestone we've been working towards for months. There's satisfaction in that, of course, but gardens offer a rather different way of looking at the world. They remind us that some of the most worthwhile things are never truly complete. They simply evolve.
I've often found that the happiest gardeners are the ones who embrace that idea. They don't become frustrated because another weed has appeared or because the lawn needs cutting yet again. They understand that's simply the conversation they've chosen to have with the garden. Every season asks different questions, and every visit provides a slightly different answer.
That doesn't mean the work becomes easier.
July can be demanding. Dry spells test both plants and gardeners. Hedges seem to grow just when you thought you'd finished cutting them, and the borders somehow produce another bucket of weeds almost overnight. Yet even on the busiest days, there's usually a moment when I find myself stopping to admire something that wasn't there the week before.
A new rose is opening.
The first ripe tomato.
A butterfly settling on a flower that's only just come into bloom.
Those moments remind me that the garden hasn't been waiting for me to finish working.
It's been getting on with life all by itself.
Perhaps that's why I've never thought of gardening as a task with a finishing line. It's more like a friendship that grows stronger with time. The more seasons you share together, the more you understand one another. You begin to anticipate the quiet changes, celebrate the unexpected successes and accept that every year will be a little different from the last.
So if you look at your garden this July and find yourself thinking it's finally finished, enjoy that feeling for a while.
Then make yourself another cup of tea.
Because the garden has already started planning for tomorrow.
Marcus
