Trust’s annual tour features gardens that fit the landscape.
NORWAY – Donna Primozich’s gardening philosophy is “if it doesn’t work in one place, move it.”
Strolling through her Norway Center Road garden, it’s obvious that this guiding principle has worked well for her. Shady wooded areas overflow with hostas, accented by bright patches of astilbe where the sun comes through. Behind the house, where there is full sun, day lilies bloom in almost every shade imaginable. Every plant seems to be in the right spot; none have been forced to grow where they can’t.
“It took me a long time to learn that,” Primozich noted. She had originally put the astilbes, for instance, in full sun, and wondered why they didn’t thrive. Once she learned that they prefer wet areas with some shade, she moved them to another area of the garden, where they have been happily growing, blooming and spreading ever since.
“If you garden with the lay of the land, you enjoy it more,” Primozich said.
Primozich’s garden is a perfect example of the gardens featured in this year’s Mahoosuc Land Trust garden tour on Sunday. The tour, titled “Gardens Designed to Fit the Landscape,” will include four private gardens, with a landscape professional at each site, said Ginger Kelly, volunteer coordinator for the Land Trust.
Participants will visit sculptor Gil Whitman’s garden in Bryant Pond, where sculptures are displayed among the flowers. Another garden in the tour has been terraced into the hillside overlooking Indian Pond in Greenwood. The fourth, near Mt. Abram, was designed to feature a view of the mountains across a valley.
The tour will benefit the Mahoosuc Land Trust, which works to preserve wild land and areas of historical significance in the Bethel area. Founded in 1989, the trust recently purchased the 385-acre “Frenchman’s Hole” property in Riley. The trust’s current projects are Whitecap Mountain, a historic spot known for its wild blueberries, and Buck’s Ledge in Greenwood.
Anyone interested in attending the tour may register at the Whitman Library in Bryant Pond the day of the tour, July 31, at 11 a.m. Tickets are $12 per person. Kelly said that people should bring a bag lunch. Drinks and dessert will be provided. For more information, people may call the Mahoosuc Land Trust at 824-3806 or Ginger Kelly at 824-2686.
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