This is an example of a question that caught us completely off guard. Most of what we've done with the grounds has been piecemeal, one project at a time work that gets squeezed in during the few spring weeks when it's warm and dry enough to be outside but not yet hot enough to attract beach-goers to the inn.
Seely's mom, Gert, gets the credit for most of the front gardens and the line of blueberry bushes that helps screen the parking lot. When you drive by the front of the inn or come into the driveway, the first flora you see has mostly been selected and organized by her. Gert comes for visit every other spring and, after a day or so of brainstorming, takes the truck and heads out for a full day combing the garden stores for decorative shrubs. It helps that she is a life long gardener,a former volunteer at the Missouri Botanical Gardens in St. Louis, MO, and that St. Louis is actually in the same planting zone as Narragansett.
We have also planted a number of trees (walnuts, cherry, pear, birches and a few evergreens). The original idea was that someday the nut and fruit trees might provide actual breakfast fare for the inn, like the blueberry bushes. However, we forgot to factor in the effect of our year-round residents with the bushy tails. Since the squirrels are much more limber and skilled at scaling tree trunks than we are, they get the lion's share (99.6 percent) of the nuts.
Our most ambitious recent project is the nature preserve in the side yard. When we had to remove a buried oil tank from the premises, we discovered to our dismay that it had been leaking for years, thus contaminating the soil and forcing us to remove all the dirt down to a depth of eight feet from the inn's foundation all the way to the hedge. The company that did the excavation filled the massive crater with the cheapest, sandiest, rockiest fill dirt imaginable. Clearly, we needed to come up with something to make this barren looking quadrant at least respectable.
Seely's solution evolved into what we now call the nature preserve. Seely caught the back hoe guy in a good mood and asked him to dig the pond. Well, if you have a pond you need moving water. The next winter we rebuilt the front porch and salvaged the large rocks from under the porch to build the waterfall. Being totally clueless on how to line a waterfall a salvaged child's slide became the water chute. (The next phase is to cover the slide with rocks and shells to create more turbulence.)
So once you have a pond and a water fall and ten cent gold fish growing into 6 inch beauties you have to put in a patio. Dave was sent out to salvage paving slates from a guy that was tearing his patio out before the state put a highway ramp through his back yard. Presto! a paved apron for the pond plus path of paving stones leading from the front porch to the Hideaway Suite leading right past the goldfish.
We put some bird feeders in the area and now when the guest are at breakfast they can watch the birds feed and hear the soothing sound of running water from the pump.
By now you are are wondering why this post lacks photos. Quite frankly, we completely forgot to take any while the gardens were in full bloom. If anyone has any I would be happy to post them with photo credits. Until then (or next summer) you'll just have to visit to see the grounds.
