Gardening in Newfoundland

Published in The Packet

Gardening in Newfoundland has me completely stumped.

I’ve admitted in past columns to making decisions for our yard based on whatever our next-door neighbours are doing to theirs. If they rake their lawn, we know we probably should go buy a rake. It’s not the most scientific method of lawn care, but it seems to work.

I’m most confused by when to plant things. Everyone I talk to tells me not to plant anything until after Father’s Day, because that’s when you know we’re safe from sudden frosts.

Last year, I heeded this advice and waited until the Monday after Father’s Day to do my gardening, only to discover that all the plants in Clarenville had been picked over. I brought some scraggly looking Petunias home with me from Walmart, and hoped they’d perk up with time and water. They didn’t.

I had this ridiculous paranoia that everyone told me to wait to buy my flowers, so they could get to the good flowers first, and that gardening was a more cutthroat affair than I had realized. 

Then I realized I was being melodramatic and egotistical (as usual) and surely the entire town hadn’t banded together with the shared goal of making my garden looked terrible. That would be crazy! Right? Right??

I am new to gardening. My parents like to garden, but they live in warm, wet Florida. Almost any plant down there can grow almost anywhere. I’m serious. My husband once had mushrooms grow through his bathroom tiles. I attribute my parents’ success with plants to a lucky climate, and can’t rely on them for Newfoundland gardening advice.

I have to rely on books, the Internet, and chats with locals in the Sobey’s checkout line to answer my questions.

When do I plant perennials? What about vegetables? What’s the deal with all this grass liming?

The thing is, there really isn’t that much information out there. Maybe I’m just looking in the wrong places. I find that I frequently miss out on troves of valuable information, because I’m not sure where to find it. People in Clarenville know what is going on based on word of mouth, but not much else.

This makes it very hard for anyone who isn’t a local to feel included. For example, I am “friends” with the Town of Clarenville on Facebook. Clearly we’re not besties, because despite searching their page from top to bottom, last year, I couldn’t figure out where to go to celebrate Clarenville Day and what time the event started.

I wanted to celebrate you, Clarenville, but I couldn’t figure out how to do that!

Let me get back to gardening. I recently asked my neighbour to give a gardening seminar to me and other newcomers to the island, who are trying to figure out when to put on out gardening gloves. I think she thought I was kidding.

I wish I could rely on the gardening inventory at local stores. It’s like Kent, Walmart and Canadian Tire are giving me permission to fill my window boxes and back yard with the colorful blooms I’ve been craving for months. Every time I go out, I feel the urge to fill my trunk with the beautiful plants in stores right now.

Maybe I’ll buy all the best trays of flowers, and keep them indoors until it’s safe for them outside at night. I picture myself laughing maniacally, surrounded by my bounty of peonies, and screeching, “NOW WHOSE GARDEN IS THE FAIREST OF THEM ALL?” as lightning flashes and thunder roars.

Or maybe I’ll just wait until Father’s Day.