Mary Claire Rowe

The second in our series on gardens featured in the May 10 Smith County Master Gardeners Garden Tour belongs to Josephine and Herb Coursey.

The Courseys have spent the past 10 years developing their wonderful home garden, which they call "Greenleaf Garden." The Master Gardeners like to have their tour on the same weekend as Mother's Day, because touring lovely gardens is a nice activity for families on a May day. This is a garden that is certainly worth a long visit.

The Courseys have given whimsical names to the various sections of the grounds in order to clarify to each other the areas in which they are doing their gardening. This makes wonderful sense.

For example, they can say they are working today in the "Friendship Garden." This is an appropriate name, because it surrounds the front of the house, and is the area where they welcome friends to their home and gardens.

In this area are planted many varieties of plants such as a "Sioux" Crape Myrtle, several different clematises, each on its own trellis, and five of their favorite plants - camellias. Two of these are particularly interesting to camellia lovers, as well as casual observers.

These are examples of a very large-growing and huge-blooming variety, R. L. Wheeler Variegated, grafted onto dwarf-growing rootstock, Shishi Gashira.

So these plants will always produce normal-sized leaves and 6-7 inch blooms on dwarfed plants. By the front door, they set three different varieties and colors of camellias in a bunch-planting, which makes a lovely welcoming bouquet when the camellias are in bloom.

With more than 100 camellias growing in Greenleaf Garden, the visitor quickly realizes the depth of interest and care these two gardeners give their favorite plant. Everywhere one looks at this time of year there are beautiful camellias in bloom. The range of colors from white to pink to rose to deep red is amazing.

The different shapes, mottling, and designs of the flowers are just beautiful and quite intriguing. The Courseys have several of the camellia plant that is considered the "holy grail" of camellias - "Ville de Nantes."

One look at it and the casual viewer can understand why it is valued by every camellia grower. It is exquisite. It was originally a sport of "Donckelarii" and is dark red with white blotches over a large, semi-double with upright, fimbriating petals. In other words, some of the petals look like little ears sticking up towards the middle. It is really interesting.

Since the camellias will not be blooming when the Garden Tour happens in May, the Coursey's will give a "rain check" to those who participated in the tour and wish to come back in 2009 to see just the camellias.

While camellias are the cherished plant of the Coursey's garden, there are many other plants of interest that will be blooming and growing in May. It is not just a one-season garden.

There is a "kitchen garden" of asparagus, tomatoes, onions, peppers, and herbs. They have a lovely area with palms for shade. They constructed several structures of bamboo to help direct growth and prevent overexposure of sensitive plants. Their pathways are made of Oklahoma sandstone.

Recycled railroad ties raise the beds to improve drainage, and control the design. Just a few of the wonderful names of sections and beds are: Paris, Guernsey, Wales, Florida, The Autobahn, China, East Lily, and Japan.

A list of plants they have is quite extensive: agapanthus, ajugas, azaleas, bulbs, begonias, caladiums, cordyline, daylilies, dianellas, dogwoods, ferns, ficus, hollies, heucheras, grasses, and hostas.

There are Old William Mohr iris, ipheons, Japanese maples, juniper, Knockout roses, lilies, Lariope, and Labradorean violets. In addition there are hydrangeas, nandinas, Ophiopogon, oxalis, phlox, Phormium, rosemary, salvias, sedges, and sedums. Whew! What a lot of work and care this list represents. It is an amazing garden.

Josephine and Herb explain that they "do all their own designing, choosing, planting, maintaining, and re-doing of their garden."

"Like all intensive gardening, it is stimulating, exhausting, and sometimes expensive, but deeply satisfying," they say.

At the end of the day, when all the work is done, they like to sit together under their blue umbrella, survey the landscape, and with their feet propped up, enjoy a cool drink, and appreciate the fruit of their labors. What a nice gardening adventure!

"What's Blooming In Our Garden'' is a regular feature of the Tyler Morning Telegraph Garden Page. It is written by Mary Claire Rowe, a Master Gardener with the Texas Cooperative Extension, and focuses on flowers and plant life around East Texas. To share your comments on gardening, write her in care of the Morning Telegraph.

Mary Claire Rowe
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