Why the summer solstice is the right time to take stock in the garden
Have you slept in much lately? If you were up before 5am today, and will be out in the garden till nearly 10pm tonight, then you will witness either end of the longest day of 2020. Welcome to this year’s Summer Solstice, a moment I always find the most thought-provoking time of the year in the garden.
There’s something delightfully pagan about the solstices and equinoxes that puncture our calendar. I’m firmly of the astronomical camp when it comes to the start of the seasons; while others will merrily usher in spring, summer, autumn and winter on the first of March, June, September and December accordingly, as is meteorologically correct, it never feels like the weather has caught up yet. I enjoy the slight slipperiness of the dates, the notion that we can pinpoint the moment when the Earth has tilted on its axis once again.
What does this mean from a gardening perspective? Well, I always use the solstices (both in summer, and the winter one a few days before Christmas) as an opportunity to take stock. From here on in, the days that have been gradually lengthening over the past six months will begin to shrink. I can’t help but think of the autumn and winter ahead, and what I would like and expect from the garden over that time.
When the beds are as abundant, billowing and demanding as they are now, it can be difficult to imagine them bare and in need of mulching. So, rather than making any grand design decisions, ask yourself instead if your garden is offering you what you want and need.
The past few weeks, in particular, will have shown up those things that have worked especially well: would you like more space to grow edibles? Are there steps in annoying places, uneven paths to flatten or certain shrubs that are getting too big for their boots? What might you want your garden to do better this time next year, that you might be able to work towards over winter? More time spent at home may have encouraged you to think more mindfully about ecological matters such as a proper composting system; the strangely hot late spring may skew the mind towards a more sustainable planting scheme, so you can sit back and enjoy, rather than water twice a day.
Of course, this might all sound terribly hard work but the sweetening of the shorter-day pill is that we’ve at least three months of warmer evenings ahead of us, even if they are getting darker. So I’d urge you to create yourself a space to spend them in: scrub down the garden table, or install one. Don’t feel wedded to traditional garden furniture, it can cost a fortune and more stylish alternatives – anything that is metal, plastic or marble-topped – can be borrowed from the interiors section (I use a vintage melamine-topped kitchen table on the balcony, which is both foldable and wipe-down). Bring out the candles (a citronella one is good) and a tablecloth, stick a bunch of seasonal flowers in the middle, and relish the awakening of summer: a proper opportunity to work out how to garden better over the coming year.
Alice is the author of ‘Rootbound, Rewilding a Life’ (Canongate, £14.99) and you can follow her on Instagram here.
