Words Janice Henshaw
Photos Tanya Murchie
“The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature. To nurture a garden is to feed not just on the body, but the soul.” Alfred Austin, English poet (1835-1913)
Brynn and Barry’s delightful garden in North Saanich was a treat to visit. I marvelled at its pristine beauty and impressive size. The curves of the flowing garden beds are soft and inviting, filled with an incredible variety of gorgeous flowers – tulips, zinnias, dahlias, peonies and beloved sweet peas, to name just a few. There are also shrubs, fruit trees and raised beds that flourish with favourites like garlic, lettuce, spinach and herbs.
They purchased the property in 2010 when there was only some foundation planting – a fragrant mock orange shrub, cedar trees and a hedge. There were also a lot of recalcitrant blackberries to battle and a large, abandoned boat, which they have since cleared out. Given that this property was once part of the Bazan Bay Brickyard, the soil presents a challenge to work with as it’s predominantly clay. Various neighbours told them that everyone who lived here around that time used broken bricks for their drain rock, and they often find brick remnants when digging up new areas. Bazan Bay Road used to extend down to the ocean, across where the Pat Bay highway is now, and that’s where they shipped out the bricks.
Brynn and Barry have brought in tons of topsoil for their extensive landscaping projects. Starting in the front yard, they built a notable rock river feature and planted hostas (considered the queen of shade plants). Brynn started with four yellow primroses, and now they number around 300. “I put them all through everywhere so that they look like a river in spring. The river we built in the front has been my inspiration.” Brynn creates repetitive patterns throughout the garden and does succession planting so that when one thing dies down, she has something else to replace it. Flower bulbs and tubers are dug up and stored. When the fall flowers are finished, Brynn tucks the spring-flowering bulbs back
into the ground.
Everything in the garden tells a story, said Brynn. She pointed out a rhododendron that she received on her 50th birthday. “So once the rhododendron appeared, where do we put it? I want to see it from the kitchen, so that’s an example of how I plant things. It’s not like I sit down and make up a plan for the garden; the garden creates its own plan.” Holly is growing exuberantly, and Brynn said her daughter, a wildland firefighter, will be trimming it significantly with a chainsaw when she returns from this summer’s deployment. A bloom-filled pink rose bush came from a local roadside stand several years ago. There are several fragrant spring lilacs, and they have a story too. Brynn explained that some of her Grandma’s cousins worked at the local Experimental Farm, and an order of lilacs was brought in from Paris. Somehow, the order for five or so resulted in something like 50 lilac bushes; the excess were given to the neighbours, and many of them are still growing strong.
Barry is a master at maintaining their trimmed, weed-free borders using his weed wacker upside down. But he said that Brynn has a habit of getting rid of the grass. She said: “Let’s move the garden out here by six inches … followed by: ‘Let’s go another six inches,’ and so the grass gradually disappears!” Brynn described it this way: “You know how boaters have ‘two-foot itis,’ which refers to always wanting a boat just two feet larger. I think in gardening, two feet makes all the difference. I like to take out two feet of grass every year and move everything forward. But I am running out of space, so we’ll have to be careful.” It looks like in the future, Barry might be able to sell their lawnmower!
When asked who does the weeding, Barry grinned and said he calls it “bum scooching.” He sits on the ground and digs out the weeds in the first three feet, and then Brynn goes in to weed the interior. “My goal is to try to pack plants in,” said Brynn, “so I don’t see dirt, while Barry likes to see the dirt. I don’t want to offer space for weeds to be invited in.” Brynn doesn’t mind weeding; together, they work their way around the property, and by the time they are finished, it’s time to start over again. “There’s never time off,” said Brynn, “but it’s getting better because in the beginning, we had so many projects every year, expanding and making new beds, and now we are almost running out of space.”
On Saturdays, they load up their old truck with all the green waste and drop it off at the North Saanich green waste site on Mills Road. On their way home, they swing by Peninsula Landscape Supplies and pick up more soil. They maintain their garden with a focus on soil enrichment and sustainable practices.
Brynn has deep roots on the Peninsula, being a fifth-generation resident, and considers herself profoundly grounded in her community. In 2010, she and Barry purchased the 1925 home in North Saanich that they named “Sundrop Cottage.” The property is approximately 1/3 of an acre, shaped like a slice of pie, with a wide frontage at the street and narrowing as it extends back. Ironically, they later discovered that Brynn’s great-great grandparents once owned the land and home. Brynn adores her heritage home and spends every chance she can designing, creating and tending Sundrop’s garden. She believes her love of gardening is “genetic,” as both of her grandmothers were also deeply involved in gardening. When Brynn was a child, she would often help her paternal grandmother care for plants at Marigold Nursery, where she worked. Chief labourer Barry said with a smile: “It’s not genetic for me as far as I know, but it’s a learning process. I do what I am told, a good husband, right?” It’s easy to see that he is proud of the garden and loves it as well.
Unique flower bouquets made by Brynn are sold at their roadside stand. “When we were coming up with a name for our flower company, we called it ‘Wild and Witty Florals’ so that I can keep the designs free; I don’t have any background in floral arranging, so it’s just meant to be fun. Brynn provides the bouquets with a poem and a scroll featuring words that express love or gratitude to the world.
“I like gardening – it’s a place where I find myself when I need to lose myself.” Alice Sebold, author of “The Lovely Bones.”
