Celebrated nature strip alive in Buninyong

DEBORAH and Ron Gilchrist are runners up in the 2020 Open Gardens Victoria Nature Strip Garden Competition.

Their three-year-old front garden was judged virtually, through supplied photographs and a plant list, during the remote contest, which was run to encourage green thumbs to embrace nature strips’ potential.

With lots of colour all year round, the Gilchrists’ garden has a mix of native and exotic bee-attracting plants, sourced from friends and markets, and rooted in rich, volcanic soil.

“When we bought this house, we had so much grass to mow and thought, environmentally, that wasn’t a good idea because most of what we were mowing were weeds,” Mrs Gilchrist said.

“We always wanted a garden on our nature strip, so that’s how we ended up with one.”

The garden includes purple and white westringia, acacia, a wide variety of correas, pumpkins, liquidambar and ginkgo trees.

“We’re on a corner, so we can’t block sight for cars. We have quite a lot of low-growing plants, like grevilleas, brachyscomes, scaevola,” she said.

“Because Buninyong has the National Road Cycling Championships, we put a couple of bikes out there. One got completely covered with hardenbergia, which is really pretty.

“We have things like saltbush, dianella with lovely, blue flowers, eremophilas… Quite a lot.”

One of six runners up, Mrs Gilchrist was proud to be recognised alongside a strong field of competitors.

“I’m just a gardener, but three of the other people were landscape gardeners. I felt as though I’d learnt a few things over the years,” she said.

“By having this garden, we’ve met so many people, and a lot have come by and said congratulations. The runners up received a packet of special tomato plant seeds, so I’ll have to share them around.

“Gardening is a great way to get to know the community and share knowledge. I would encourage other people to enter the competition next time because it was a fun experience.”