Jill’s New Zealand Garden

Today we’re visiting with Jill Hammond.

I very much enjoy getting your daily photos of gardens from around the world, most of which seem to be in the Northern Hemisphere. I thought I would share some photos of my garden in New Zealand.

My husband and I have lived on 7.5 hectares (18.5 acres) in rural Hawkes Bay, New Zealand, for 28 years. We moved our 100-year-old villa onto our bare piece of land, and I set about developing our garden from scratch. There was not one single tree or plant present, and at first I was a wee bit overwhelmed with how to start. Just getting stuck in was the answer, and now we have a garden which is gradually maturing. I love being able to underplant some of the areas where I now have some shade, allowing me to grow hostas, hydrangeas, rhododendrons, and other shade-loving plants, which for so long I have only been able to see in other people’s gardens.

Many of my plants have come from my mother’s garden as cuttings and divisions. Like so many gardeners, I love this sharing of plants and knowledge, and then passing them on to other lovely recipients.

We have mild winters with occasional frosts, mild springs and autumns, and hot, dry summers with frequent droughts. I water plants in the first season to get them going, but then let them fend for themselves following that, so I do plant to the conditions and don’t mollycoddle. Having said that, I do water my vegetable potager garden.

The last two years we have had unseasonally wet summers, and this has led to the partial demise of some of my Buxus (boxwood) hedging (which has been a large feature of my garden) due to boxwood blight. I have had to remove some areas of this, as I simply do not want to have to spray regularly to manage it. This