A gem of a garden in wine country

Virginia Heywood - the daughter of AFL great Doug Heywood - spent 16 years creating this wondrous garden in the Yarra Valley.

Labour of love: the garden at Seville, Victoria. Picture: Open Gardens Victoria

Horticulturist Virginia Heywood “swapped politics for plants” when she moved back to Australia from London nearly 25 years ago. The daughter of AFL great and sports presenter Doug Heywood left Melbourne at 21 to carve a career as a political adviser but returned at 49, with her young daughter, to care for her dad.

Heywood’s interest in gardening developed while overseas, but she really hit her straps after buying a 6.5ha property in the Yarra Valley 16 years ago. “It was the ugliest house in Seville,” she laughs. “It didn’t have a good garden and we were in the middle of a drought, but I fell in love with the fabulous views over the Warburton Ranges. On a clear day you can see 100 miles.”

Heywood put in cottage-style beds along the back of the house but soon discovered that the white and pastel colour schemes of England disappear in our intense light, which demands a stronger colour palette. “I never liked hot colours in the garden but now I love them,” she says. “I have lots of orange, and mix it with pink, taking cues from native Chorizema.”

Cantua

Grevilleas and salvias have brought in the small birds, while honeyeaters flock to “some of the more exotic exotics” such as Isoplexis, Cantua and Veltheimia. There are dozens of camellias and uncounted roses.

Melianthus major

Over 20 years at Seville Heywood has learnt that heat, not cold, is her main problem; successive 40-degree days are common. She has embraced the beauty of natives and increasingly is adding summer-dormant bulbs. She adds: “I use southern Australian, Mediterranean and South African plants as they are more adapted to summer heat, and I like to mix them all together.” A few years ago Heywood repaired the dam in the bottom paddock and planted around it, and despite promising there would be no more garden beds, she is still making them larger. That’s how the latest project developed – a woodland garden where trilliums, cyclamen, crocuses and snowdrops are flourishing under deciduous trees.

Mollis azalea

The garden now covers almost 2ha. “I have a lot of rare plants,” she says, adding that friends like Stephen Ryan of Dicksonia Rare Plants aid and abet her collecting bug. As well as opening her garden for Open Gardens Victoria, Heywood is a guide at Melbourne’s Royal Botanic Gardens; secretary of Plant Trust, a voluntary organisation that conserves garden plant collections; and part of 3CR radio’s Garden Show team. Turns out her second career is all voluntary.

The garden is open November 27-28, with bulb and plant sales. Details and bookings at opengardensvictoria.org.au

Q&A

Could we bury the frozen placenta from my daughter’s firstborn beneath a special tree such as a snow gum? I believe it’s nutritious. We have a windy spot on the edge of the escarpment. Barbara McAlpine, Katoomba, NSW

Detailed nutrient analysis is hard to find but placentas are known to contain iron, potassium, sodium and phosphorus. Eucalypts can be sensitive to phosphorus but the risk is slight; burying the placenta deeply, away from the roots, will lessen the risk and also prevent animals digging it up. A snow gum should be suited to that site.

My foxtail palm has sprouted a flower spike. Is it true that this means it’s near the end of its life cycle? And can I plant the seeds? Richard Morcom, Coolum, Qld

This northern Queensland native palm, Wodyetia bifurcata, was unknown to botanists until 1978. They can flower annually from maturity at about 12 years old and live for perhaps 70-80 years. They grow easily from fresh seeds extracted from the heavy crops of ripe, red fruit (which are poisonous). Scarify seeds by rubbing gently with sandpaper before planting.

Hills Planter Retracting Clothesline

Send your questions to: [e-mail] or Helen Young, PO Box 3098, Willoughby North, NSW 2068; helenyoung.com.au. The best question in November wins the new Hills Planter Retracting Clothesline worth $129. hillshome.com.au.