Long story short: I want to build an ornamental garden to show to my potential clients, showing that it is possible to have beauty and maybe something to eat without irrigation.
There are two methods that seem to work in my mediterranean climate, but not knowing which one will work best, I've decided to try them both and compare. (Thanks to Rosie Peddle from Olhao for helping to make up my mind).
First method is promoted by Olivier Filippi, called simply 'Mediterranean gardening'. In this method, adapted plants have to be planted in a very drained soil, soils must be kept poor, mimicking our natural forests which barely get 2% of organic matter. Pathways serve as drainage.
Second method you may already know about, the 'rainwater gardens' explained by Brad Lancaster. In this method, a sunken bed is capturing runaway rainwater, allowing more plants to be grown than usual.
Both methods agree that plants need to be planted in fall, in a decompacted soil and be irrigated just the first summer with long deep waterings, up to 30 litres per plant every 3 to 4 weeks. This is for promoting deep roots. Filippi does not use mulch or fertilizer until the second year, making plants grow very slowly and preventing shallow roots, Rainwater gardens on the other hand, call for compost and mulch from the beginning.
What is great about Filippi is that he selected plants for the months that they can withstand draugh. Grade of draugh tolerance for each ornamental plant he studied. So I know that here in Malaga we have in average 5 months of draugh per year, and now I have a selection of suitable plants, and a nursery than can provide a few of them!
So the idea is to build both garden next to each other. In the higher zone I will follow drainage methods and plant draugh grade 5 plants. In the lower zone I will follow the rainwater garden method, plant draugh grade 4 plants and plant them more densely.
My only concern is that some of these plants are very sensitive to flood, so they may not prosper in the rainwater garden.
I've been allowed to use a zone of Dignity Gardens for this project. I've started to fork the soil, since we've had strong rains last week and the soil is ready to be worked.(So strong rains that they caused the worst disaster in ages in the Eastern coast of Spain).
Work continues. I am progressing very slowly since I am doing this in my spare time with an old broadfork that bends at stones and needs frequent repairings.
Meanwhile, I've sketched the paths for the garden, and planning a general idea. Since the space is too long, I've divided it into two sections trying to match the golden ratio. One side has a tall fence with many plants already in the East side so I don't want to touch it. I am projecting a hedge at the other side, bordering the main pathway. Inside the no irrigation garden I've placed a winding pathway and a few service pathways that creates several planting islands.
There is a slight tilting towards the north and towards the fence. I want to use the pathways as drainage for the dry mediterranean style, and for water catchment for the rainwater style. My idea is to rise the planting islands that are touching the fence and lower the planting islands that are touching the bordering hedge. I hope this would be optimal for water catchment without flooding.
I project pathways to be covered with mulch. I'd love also to build an arch separating garden areas.
Right now we are in 'red alert' for strong rains again, but this time we must stay at home for fear that something alike what happened in Valencia may repeat here.
Here I've finished broadforking and on the way of forming the pathways and beds.
Since the soil is quite heavy, I am adding some fine arlite (expanded clay), hopefully it will loosen the soil a little.
Investment 40€ in 5 bags of 70 litres each one.
This is the planting of phase 1.
They don't need to be irrigated until Summer. Then, only for the first year, they will need 25 litres each plant every three or four weeks. Since I don't know how much water I will have in Summer, I cannot guarantee the establishment of so many plants, so if I want to add more plants (and really the garden will benefit of having more plants) they'll have to wait until next Autumn.
In the pictures I show how I placed the pots, then dug a big wide hole for watering each plant, and planted them without touching the root ball.
The senecio plants were damaged in the process, I hope they recover fast.
Things are going well in the garden. I lost a couple of plants in the rainwater section. I am unsure if it was for excessive moisture or that they just didn't root.
Then, the Senecio macroglosus (this one that looks like a crassula disguised as ivy) is not faring well in either system, it's still alive but is looking sad.
I've planted a few cuttings of Boldo brasileiro (Plectranthus barbatus) since it's a plant that thrive in our orchard without any care, and another from one Pelargoniom hortorum that is happy in a dry and sunny corner.
Then I added by chance: Cineraria maritima, Salvia licyoides, Westringia fruticosa, Ceratostigma plumbaginoides, Hypericum patulum 'Hidcote', Erigeron karvinskianus, Hemerocallis 'Merry Monarch' and Miscanthus sinensis 'Jakujima'.
I couldn't find Atriplex halimus for the hedge as I designed, so I bought some seeds and seeded them directly a month ago. Not showing any sprout yet.
In the picture (just a corner of the garden) it is hard to distinguish anything because we're enjoying a wet spring and Oxalis pes-caprae is running wild everywhere.
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