It's supposed to be relaxing, right?

In a perfect (gardening) world, we would all have huge, lush, sprawling gardens, a joyful and perfect quilt of flowers and foliage, fruit and vegetables. These gardens would all be perfectly healthy, abundant, blooming or fruiting constantly. And, of course, all these joyful gardens would be free of weeds, pests, and diseases.

Reality isn't quite like that-unless we've won the lottery and can afford to hire professional caretakers, or are positioned to have nothing else to do in our days (blissfully retired) except garden. Gardening does take time and energy in order to have good results. And sometimes, weather, health, and time commitments conspire against us.

It took a bout of serious illness to really bring this home to me last year. Meeting my work commitments was enough of a challenge; dealing with my gardens, as much as I love them, was quite something else, and I fell very much behind in tending them. Happily, my long-suffering spouse is generous of spirit and energy and helped with some tasks, and did so again this spring. But my situation brought home what others deal with when they're limited by space, time, ability or other factors.

Gardening is meant to be a joy, a pleasure and relaxing pastime. It is work, but the work of dividing and pruning, weeding and planting, harvesting and other tasks shouldn't be something we face with dread. If you are finding your garden is too unwieldy, perhaps it's time to rethink the plan. If you're in a new space and don't know how to go about beginning, then just the thought of starting can be daunting. Just say to yourself: "one bed/container/plot at a time"-and remember that you're gardening for the pleasure of it, not the stress of it.

Whether you're downsizing or starting fresh with gardening in a new home location, here are some options to consider.

Container gardening

You can grow just about anything in containers, and people do. "Just about anything" can include perennials, annuals, vegetables, even small fruit trees and flowering shrubs.

But there is a caveat-what you grow in planters depends both on your container size and your physical ability to move large planters. I know people who grow all kinds of shrubs and small trees in large planters, but have to move them by means of forklift or sturdy neighbours and relatives.

The secret to good container gardening is to start with a top-quality potting mixture, which doesn't mean taking soil from your garden to put in a container. Such soil can contain disease pathogens, weed seedlings and also tends to be heavy, adding more weight to containers. Purchase pre-mixed potting media, or make your own using a mixture of compost, peat, sand, and perlite or vermiculite. There are many different 'recipes' for container potting available online.

One very important fact about container gardening: in order for plants to survive and thrive, they need to be watered and fertilized regularly. Unlike their counterparts planted in the ground, containerized plantings have a limited amount of soil in which to spread their roots, and thus limited amounts of water and nutrients to be accessed. In the absence of a truly soggy summer, containers probably need to be watered every day, or at least every other day. Grouping them together can help reduce a little evaporation from plants and pots. (Avoid using the chemical-based products that are supposed to reduce watering frequency: these products are not necessarily effective, can be messy, and may even be harmful to plant growth.)

Groundcovers

Groundcovers can be a mixed blessing. They usually grow quickly and many can be used in difficult spots, such as in the shaded area under trees or on sloped areas that are hard to mow or otherwise plant. Once established, they often act as living mulches, helping to shelter out weed seedlings and also to conserve moisture in the ground.

A drawback to groundcovers is that they do cover ground, and in some cases quite a bit of it, moving into areas where you really hadn't planned to have them growing. You have to avoid those with invasive tendencies such as the evil goutweed, (Aegopodium) which should not be sold by nurseries but still sadly available at some gardening centres around the region. Other over-achievers can include gooseneck-loosestrife (Lysimachia clethroides), creeping speedwell (Veronica umbrosa) stonecrop sedum (Sedum acre) and bugleweeds (Ajuga). While waiting for your groundcover to establish, you'll want to weed carefully around your plants, and perhaps mulch; once the groundcover is established, it's a real pain to try to separate weeds from groundcover.

Shrubs
To my mind, shrubs are a fabulous answer when you're trying to fill up a garden space or reduce the amount of work you have to do. Once planted, most shrubs require little ongoing care. We don't have to divide or replant them unless they happen to be a type that puts up suckers, such as some roses and lilacs. Many don't even need pruning to keep them looking great. There are many compact or dwarf varieties of both flowering and evergreen shrubs on the market today, which can either be tucked into a small garden bed or grown in containers.

With a little planning, you can have shrubs that flower from spring until autumn. Start with the late-winter/early spring blooms of witch hazel (Hamamelis), move into quince (Chaenomeles), rhododendrons and azaleas, then weigela and roses, and finally later blooming shrubs such as hydrangeas and butterfly bush (Buddleia).

Don't forget, also, that many newer cultivars of shrubs have handsome foliage that looks great whether the plant is in bloom or not. I'm especially partial to ninebarks (Physocarpus) such as Diabolo or Coppertina.

The same can be said for evergreen/coniferous shrubs: they aren't just available in shades of green anymore. Look for evergreens with gold, blue, bronze or variegated (differently coloured) foliage, and be aware that some of them change their foliage colour in winter months, giving them a handsome effect.

Vertical gardening

Instead of plants that spread out across the ground, try a few that grow vertically, using walls, trellises or other means of support. Perennial vines such as clematis are a wonderful choice as are climbing roses or other shrubs or trees that can be trained to grow along a vertical support. Annual vines such as morning glories and thunbergia need to be replanted each year unless you put them in containers and overwinter them indoors, but you can change up your colour scheme yearly by trying different varieties.

Do be careful in your perennial vine selection: some are extremely prolific and can quickly overwhelm a small space or a small supporting structure unless you prune them regularly. Overachievers include porcelain vine (Ampelopsis), silver lace vine (Polygonum aubertii), and even the common Virginia creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia). Several fruiting vines need both a male and a female plant in order to produce fruit, including Arctic kiwi and American bittersweet.

My personal favourite perennial climbers are climbing honeysuckles (Lonicera) such as Graham Thomas or Mandarin, but I'm also extremely fond of clematis of all kinds. With careful selection, a gardener can have clematis that bloom in spring, all through the summer, and into autumn. There are literally hundreds of cultivars to choose from, and the main secret to growing them well is to site them in a sunny, somewhat sheltered location and mulch their roots well.

Easy Care Perennials

For anyone who has been busy in the spring with dividing and replanting perennials, that might seem like an oxymoron. Many perennials do require dividing every few years, or else their central crowns lose vigour and they don't flower as well as they otherwise would. Others can grow for years with minimal care, provided they are given the proper growing conditions that they prefer.

Two of my favourites these days are hostas and daylilies (Hemerocallis). Both will grow in almost any gardening condition (sun, shade, wet, dry) with minimal care; you can divide them or not, as you wish. Most people divide hostas too often, never letting them get to the full, majestic sizes they can achieve. Being an overworked gardener, I let my hostas grow and grow, and they shade out a lot of weeds with their massive leaves.

Peonies are another long-lived, easy-care perennial; they don't flower for as long as other perennials but given that they have a lifespan of decades or even longer, I think the two or three weeks of fabulous flowers are well worth enjoying. Most peonies also have very handsome foliage that makes a good backdrop for other plants, and in autumn some peonies even have foliage that changes colour.

If I could only grow one perennial it would be coneflowers (Echinacea). These are durable, attractive, long-blooming plants beloved by bees and other pollinators. They start blooming in midsummer, and many of the newer varieties will continue until frost. For those with small gardens, there are shorter varieties such as Kim's Knee High. Best of all, at least in my mind, is that plant breeders have come up with some remarkable new coneflower colours in recent years. Along with the standard rose, purple and white varieties, you can now find coneflowers in shades of yellow, orange, gold, bicolour and my personal favourite, green. I've never divided any of our coneflowers and they continue to grow marvelously, while I sit back in the Adirondack chair with a cold iced tea and admire them.