Hey friends! Today
on
Gardening with Creekside we have some fun developments with the construction of our
proven winter signature Garden here at Creekside Nursery if you have followed us for a length of
time you know that of course we work very closely with the folks at Proven Winners and last spring
so not this spring but spring of 2022 the folks at proven Winters approached us and asked us if
we would be interested in designing creating a proven winners signature Garden we were honored
and we were thrilled and absolutely jumped at the chance to do that so if you're not familiar with
what a proven winter signature Garden is it is basically a a garden that highlights and has the
overwhelmingly majority of the plants are proven Winters whether they are a lot of times we will
mix in with annuals your perennials and your shrubs and even trees there is not a set size
some of the proven winter signature Gardens are relatively small we visited the hotel Iroquois on
Mackinac Island last year when we were there for the grand Garden Show and it is a very beautiful
intimate Garden that Jack Barnwell created and it is a fantastic one other ones we'll have will be
larger right so it depends on what the creators of the signature Garden want it to be as far as the
size then they get to determine that the design is completely up to us so we get to figure out do we
want to have a super formal Garden do we want to have an informal Garden like whatever the design
is we get to decide we're going to kind of walk you through our ideas today and then of course
you're just going to have a vast majority of those plants are highlighting proven Winters so with us
being in North Carolina a Zone 7B obviously we're going to focus on plants that really grow bloom
and Thrive here in our lovely hot humid summer climate in North Carolina all right so I think
let's say oh the plants we provide the plants and so we get to choose which plants we want to use
the design of them and then that's the beautiful thing about us being a grower retailer of The
Proven winter plants is that we have a gorgeous selection of plants available for us that we get
to pull from and then of course we will work with our friends at Proven Winners if there's
maybe some plants that we can't secure they will help us find those plants as well I'm specifically
thinking about some of the proven winter trees because they have some great ones that I would
love to incorporate into these Gardens if you were interested about the proven winter
signature Gardens the they are really all across the country I know there are two other ones here
in North Carolina there is one in Pinehurst and then there is one in Cherokee North Carolina so
you can go to The Proven Winners website they will have different ones that you can go to they are
free they are open to the public so if you have a Garden Club that you want to take a tour of with
rather then you can you know go to those they're free open to the public just check to make sure
that their hours are uh work with your schedule so that you can visit them all right so I think
that's all the nuts and bolts of a proven winter signature Garden so let's talk about the one that
is going to be developed here at Creekside Nursery Now Jerry and I are standing here on our strug lot
and basically our this proven winter signature Garden is going to be in front of us
you can probably see some mounds of dirt we have already started the construction
in deconstruction of our display Gardens because we've had display Gardens here
right that showcase new introductions plants that are coming out onto the market
we've removed those we'll show you those in a minute but basically this is where the signature
Garden is going to go this whole area here is going to get revamped the main entrance to the
gardens will be in this area so ignore the plants ignore the small pergola that will all be gone
we'll have a nice beautiful walkway to come through here and then we come on over so
um the plans that I'm going to talk about with you today are the plans that Jerry and I have come up
with and dreamed about nothing is really hard set in stone because if you know us we just we like to
develop as we go along one thing about Creekside nothing's flat and we deal with water all the time
so we have learned that you don't stop water you just try to tell water where to go so here we have
you can see this lovely little swell that Jerry has dug out because here at Creekside
we have obviously the creek right so the creek is a lovely Sleepy Little Creek where you see
those massive trees it is right between those trees so that's where the creek is
but we have loads of Natural Springs so water coming up from the ground we're going to install a
French drain here we already have multiple French drains throughout the property but obviously with
the signature garden and folks coming and visiting we need it to be nice and dry so that it is not
gooey after it has been you know tons of rain so we're going to have a French drain in here you'll
never know that because what we're going to do is then create like a Dry Creek bit put beautiful
decorative River Rock here so it will kind of if you've been familiar with the Dry Creek bed on the
other side of the nursery going into the Pines that same concept right so you're not going to
physically see water coming through here but it will be draining we will have a lovely Bridge we
will have architectural elements in here coming across into the signature Garden here now you see
that Jerry has begun building up we're going to call this a raised bed we're not going to call
this a berm we're going to call this a raised bed it is not finished this is the rough construction
of it because we do have the retail shrub lot here and we want to make it very clear very evident
that this is something special and so we want to create a little bit of a mystery of what is beyond
this entrance so on this raised bed we're going to have obviously plantings we are going to have
more on this side through a shrub lot side of the raised bed we will have a sprinter boxwoods so a
nice thick hedge of Sprinter box was coming down on the front side this is where we will do annuals
so right now I'm envisioning a mass planting of the same plant so whether it's supertunia snow
drift or if it's many of us to Indigo right so you're going to have this massive color of annuals
cascading down going all the way down you've got your Sprinter box woods and then really kind of
the showpiece will be a hedge of incredible hydrangeas so I am a huge fan of incredible
hydrangeas they are beautiful sun loving part sun hydrangeas that bloom on New Growth that will come
through here massive hedge so when you're looking at from the shrub lot you'll see annual color
you'll see the Evergreens of the boxwoods and then the hydrangeas all on the top and then again
on this side then we will do another planting of annuals maybe this one is a mixed bed of annuals
and then that's the beautiful thing about annuals is because year to year you can change it this bed
will be planted the same they're not going to be the exact same size or the exact same shape but
they will be planted the exact same so while they are sisters they are not identical twins in their
shape and their size so that is what's going to be happening here and then we will have paths that
are easily accessible for folks of all Mobility coming through here we will have garden beds
throughout this area I do know that right smack in the center of the garden we have a beautiful
Fountain from our friends at unique stone I was planning on using that fountain for quite a while
so we the last order we ordered our Fountain so the fountain is here she is just uh waiting for
all the construction to happen before it will be taken and placed here and then the idea is that
we will have beds throughout here showcasing those trees shrubs perennials and annuals
you can see that all the display beds are gone they have been completely eliminated will need to
obviously we're going to move the wind sculpture so that will find its way back into the gardens
but it will not be in this exact location so what did we do with all of those fantastic plants that
were here well Jerry had some fun because if you know Jerry he does enjoy some good machinery and
it has been quite warm here in North Carolina so he has been in the Bobcat which has air
conditioning so he happily hopped in the Bobcat a couple of days ago and moved the plants so
what we have done what he did is use the bucket on the bobcat and came in and literally dug up
the plants and he has placed them here in this little Nook because for the vast
majority of the day this is in the shade so he took massive clumps of the plants and then
laid them down here this was probably what a week ago not quite a week ago it was last week
yeah so about a week ago he came in through here and dug these plants up so you can see that yes
it is a little bit of a hodgepodge but this is what we call like they're healed in so they have
tons of soil around them their Roots really were not disturbed because he had the big bucket and he
just scooped up all the soil and placed them here so you can see like for example coffee cups coffee
cups still quite happy right so that way we can that one had water in it so we can use these but
we're not having to try to pot them up at first we were thinking about do we dig them up and put
them in containers and like save them somewhere it would be really hard to put this coffee cups
in a container obviously you would have to divide it out but we've got the coffee cups we've got
monardas and the echinacea tons of monardas we've got look this hibiscus now you know if a hibiscus
was had any kind of drought it would be very limpy so it is quite happy so everything has been healed
in right here that way we can take care of them and then reuse them now they're going to stay here
indefinitely no but we'll that's a it's a great way to use them now the beautiful thing about this
space is one it is a gorgeous piece of property we are incredibly blessed that we get to call this
home that we get to be wonderful stewards of this piece of land and we get to invite people to come
and see these Gardens at Creekside and essentially this is our home right this is my family land I
grew up here so this this property is very near and dear to our heart so not only is it physically
just gorgeous but it also gives us just about any kind of garden you can imagine it is here whether
we have the full full hot sun where this bed this is the 15 perennials for the South bed this bed
is going to stay we might tweak and add some more plants to it but this bed is going to stay so we
have full intense hot all day sun then we have a beautiful Pond over here now the pond has been you
know I won't say neglected but it certainly has not been a high priority to put gardens around
that is going to change so we will have gardens around this Pond the pond has been here for
gosh uh 15 years Jackson is 13. it was here before he was born somewhere around there but what's a
fun little story about this Pond is that it is a spring fed pond so underneath the holly tree there
is a spring that feeds this Pond Jerry installed had this Pond kind of dug out and installed 15-ish
years ago because this spring obviously is very prolific and without capturing that water this
whole area was like a bog and it was just unusable so we had the pond obviously there is an overflow
pipe that goes out into the creek so we're going to develop this beautiful we have Sun part sun
here and then we go into the deep deep shade up here in the woods so we have all of that available
to us we have lots of fun plans that I will keep you updated on those plans as they develop
and then we come over here to this lovely kind of Grove of trees where this is a lot of dappled Sun
we're blessed with some cloud cover this morning wish we were going to be very grateful for but
essentially the sun comes up over here and then it sets back over here so this area has like I said
is a part sun part shade area dappled Sun gives us lots of great options that we can put plants in
here what we're going to use this to our advantage because like I told you we have lots of Springs
and wet areas here at Creekside somewhere in this general area is a spring under the ground and so
it comes up we have had just a little bit of rain this morning but we can tell because obviously mow
the grass we know this area right in here it is somewhere in here it is damp we'll get different
kinds of like native sedges popping up different grasses popping up so we're going to use this to
our advantage we're going to plant and use this as a bog Garden so we're going to put plants in
here that love to have those wet feet so this is going to be a really fun different take on Plants
so if you have a wet area and you're looking for some inspiration some ideas on how to handle that
here we go because what we could do is of course try to like excavate this dig this
up try to figure out where the water's coming from and then direct it into an area why go through all
that trouble let's put plants in here that love those conditions and let them Thrive it'll be
really fun so here within the signature Gardens we will have full sun we will have full shade
we will have dry areas we will have wet areas and all of these are highlighting those proven winter
plants that do really well in those conditions and just to give people inspiration some ideas come
see what is growing and blooming and thriving in here in North Carolina in the gardens so
as far as a timeline because I know that you're probably going to be wondering about the timeline
we will initially debut the gardens in the fall of this year so Jerry's behind the camera and
we're like yes fall it will go into the fall and then of course next spring so right spring
of 2024 will be the big huge showcase because of the annuals right so the annuals will be
coming in having those gorgeous annuals loads of color and then as you know right as Gardens
mature and as they get some age on them they just get better and so these Gardens like every
other kind of garden is going to be a growing Garden right meaning that it's not static it's
not like we're going to plant it and then leave it alone no we're going to be continually adding
tweaking putting more interesting things in there every season bits of pieces of interest
for folks to come and visit so if you're in the area we would love to have you come by you can
you can stand by the shrub lot and you can take a peek and see how the construction process is
going we do have pamphlets here at the nursery that kind of highlight the signature Garden
um the direction that we are going in kind of our story so feel free that when you come to
the nursery grab one of those pamphlets they're completely free that you can look at that and
learn some more about the signature Garden here at Creekside Nursery so it is a lot of fun it
has been a lot of fun dreaming and planning this obviously it is a ton of work but we are at the
point in the season where we have got the plans together and we have got it is the perfect time
of the year for us to begin this construction process so that it will be ready to go this fall
and have you sweet folks come visit us so we will keep you updated on this for absolutely for sure
but as always thanks so much for gardening with Creekside we hope you have found this
fun informative and inspirational y'all have a great day we'll see the next video bye friends