Valley Gardens: Cottage garden yields food, beauty and therapy

By Cheryl Wilson

Published on July 18, 2008

Area residents dropping off their pets at Shady Glen Kennel in Belchertown often stop to smell the roses.

A Cape Cod-style rose with clusters of double blossoms in deep pink covers a wrought iron arbor, framing the garden view from the house. Kennel owner Cindy Meaux said she got the rose as a cutting from her friend Pat Reynolds just two years ago. Now it is a rampant glory.

The front yard of Cindy and Tom Meaux's house next to the kennel is a cottage garden of raised beds filled with flowers and vegetables. Tom made the beds using one or two tiers of railroad ties bolted together. He also made several impressive 10-foot-tall wooden obelisk trellises for climbing plants, including beans and morning glories.

This year, for the first time, two trellises hold tomato plants growing "upside-down," a method using unusual containers purchased from Gardener's Supply Company in Vermont. Large flexible-sided green containers feature a special water reservoir above the soil container. The water slowly drips through the soil and fertilizer can be added to the water supply. So far, the plants look healthy but have yet to produce fruit. They are growing more tomato plants by conventional methods in one of the beds.

Raised beds

"I don't really remember why we started with raised beds," Cindy said last week.

"I know I like the neatness and how it's easy to mow around them." She said they also seem to deter the family dogs from marauding.

One longer bed is planted with tomatoes, basil, cucumbers, beans and sunflowers. They over-wintered some of the basil inside and these plants are already quite large.

Last year when they planted out their three- or four-inch-tall sunflower seedlings they were nibbled by bunnies. This year they waited until the seedlings were closer to a foot tall before risking damage. Evidently they were too tall for the rabbits and are now thriving. Cindy said they leave the sunflower seed heads on the stalks through the winter for the birds.

Each year is full of surprises. "I always forget what I plant," Cindy said. "A lot of times we won't weed early in the season because we aren't sure what's there." And, of course, there are always missing plants, especially bulbs eaten by voles over the winter.

Cindy learned to love gardening from her father-in-law when the younger couple lived above his old farmhouse up the street early in their marriage. Every day she would tour the gardens with the elder Meaux and help him dead-head the flowers and harvest the vegetables. Cindy and Tom moved to their present house in 1987.

"My addiction is going to Andrew's," she confessed, referring to Andrew's Greenhouse in South Amherst. "I could spend hundreds of dollars there. I love playing in the dirt."

She also frequents Class Grass in Granby and has bought plants from Wanczyk Evergreen Nursery in Hadley. A few years ago she bought a Japanese willow with unusual splotchy white variegations on its leaves from Crystal Gardens Unlimited, a garden boutique that started in Belchertown and is now on Mount Warner Road in Hadley. The plant appears to be dappled willow Salix integra 'Hakuro nishiki'.

Among the most dramatic plants are stately old-fashioned hollyhocks. Most of them are in shades of pink, a few of them evidently planted by the birds. Some are the double "powder puff" type in pale yellow. In a new bed along the garage, Tom planted some newly-purchased hollyhocks to add height beside boxwoods and daylilies.

Eclectic color scheme

As befits a cottage garden, the color scheme is eclectic. Last week there was purple phlox next to fuzzy silver leaved stachys, deep rose Echinacea or coneflower next to dark blue balloon flower alongside black-eyed Susans with white and blue allium globes as accents.

"I kind of like for them to grow in together," Cindy said. The flowers weave together creating a pleasing picture.

"I have always loved the yarrows," she said. She has them in several colors including brick red and yellow. She also loves spiky veronicas in blue, white and pink. Another favorite is daylilies.

Tom is especially fond of sedums and there is an entire bed of them from low ground-cover types in pink and yellow to the stately Autumn Joy' and several forms in between.

Tom is the canner in the family, every year making grape jelly from the vines beside the kennel as well as a zucchini relish.

"He and his sister make zucchini relish," Cindy said. "I've never liked relish but this is incredible."

Tom's sister, Alice Cole, who lives in Pelham added a greenhouse to her house this year and Cindy hopes to be able to grow some seeds there next year. They usually just start plants on a sunny windowsill with additional light.

Cindy and Tom save seeds from some of their plants every year. Their sunflowers, which the birds devour, come from saved seeds and they have cleome or spider flower and cosmos grown from saved seeds. This year, however, Cindy bought some of the unusual Seashells Mix' cosmos at Andrew's in shades of pink and magenta. When they buy new seeds, they rely on Burpee.

Not everything thrives for them, however. "I can't grow lupine and I can't keep delphinium," she lamented.

Cindy has a practical way of storing her tools. She simply leaves them in the beds on top of the railroad ties. It's easy to find a three-pronged weeder or a trowel or even an admittedly slightly rusty pair of hedge shears.

They may be lying next to one of Cindy's many small statues. She has a thinking toad (just like mine), a sleeping cat, a welcoming otter and several appealing dogs.

At the top of each trellis is a small metal sculpture such as a praying mantis, a grasshopper or a hummingbird, all of them purchased at a weathervane store in Wells, Maine. A complete weathervane on top of the kennel is a cat chasing mice in four directions.

Cindy has window boxes of annuals on the front of her house in full sun as well as several planters around the yard. One planter has a sunflower planted by the birds. The entrance to the kennel is shady so they planted hostas, daylilies and astilbes in pink, red, lavender and white to brighten that corner. Arriving dogs seem too eager to greet friends inside than to ravage the plantings.

Around the garden are landscape lights as well as lanterns for citronella candles so the family can enjoy the garden in the evening after caring for dozens of dogs and cats all day.

"It's my therapy," Cindy said. "It's Tom's therapy, too."