Accessories for the garden

Spring is supposed to arrive in March, but for most gardeners in cold climates it's like another bad romance. There is the flirtation of those 10C days and then the dreaded cold shoulder, when a snowstorm smacks down all romantic notions of an early gardening season.

So what do rejected gardeners do? They browse, they shop, they kick tires at garden shows, garden centres and bookstores. They meet with other addicts at horticultural societies and Master Gardener groups. They go to orchid shows and have wild flings with dendrobiums.

How else can you explain why I walked away from the Stratford Garden Festival with a purse made from a gourd? I am in the same sort of gardening deprivation that I witnessed at the show. Normally-sane people were walking around like a scene from Night of the Living Dead, clutching trinkets, and whirligigs, obelisks and elephant ears.

Yes elephant ears. Those big leafy tropical plants that make any garden look more interesting. Allan Watts co-owner of the very stylish store Anything Grows in Stratford (www.anythinggrows.com) was selling them at a torrid pace, "I don't know, there seems to be a lot of curiosity about them, maybe because the bulbs are so big."

Elephant ears (colocasia), also known as taro is a benign inhabitant in Zone 5-6 gardens, but turn up the heat to Zone 9-10 and it often gets black listed as an invasive pest. With its gigantic heart shaped leaves it has jungle written all over it. Use one of the big ones in a pot as a specimen plant, or sink a container of elephant ears in a pond and watch the fish lollygag in the shade cast from the enormous leaves. 'Black Magic' elephant ears has stunning deep purple to black leaves, 'Nancy's Revenge' has a dramatic blotch of yellow in the centre of the leaf.

This bold plant is described in more detail in the Plant Delights online catalog at www.plantdelights.com and is often discussed on the tropical plants forum at www.gardenweb.com.

In these parts, elephant ears are exotics, but gourds can grow. Just ask Pam Grossi of the Northern Dipper-Your Canadian Gourd Suppliers (www.northerndipper.com). It was in her booth at the Stratford Garden Festival that I bought the gourd purse, mostly because I'm sure Jeanne Bekker doesn't have one. "From start to finish it takes about a day and a half to make one," says Grossi. The purse is made from a canteen gourd, a hard shell gourd that grows like gangbusters on the Northern Dipper farm in Wilsonville (south of Brantford).

Seeds, gourds, gourd books and tools can be ordered from the Northern Dipper website, but I like the sound of their Gourdfest July 17-18 on the farm. There will be demonstrations, workshops and competitions, best of all a barn dance with drummers and gourd musicians. The musicians will play drums, pianos, kazoos and rattles-all made from gourds. You can soak up the goodness of gourds at two more shows where the Northern Dipper has a booth, April 9-10 in Peterborough at the Evinrude Centre and April 22-25 at the Ontario Garden Show at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Burlington.

Proudly packing my gourd purse, I moved on to the elegance of finely crafted pots. Paul Kaye of Night & Day Studio (night_day_studio@hotmail.com) makes the most luscious things out of clay. A new creation this year was a tile panel covered with intricate flowers and vines. It sold in a snap at $1,500, destined for a kitchen. The studio's real hot seller was little clay feet to prop under pots at $2.00.

It's fitting that in March while we are still dreaming about gardening, the Stratford show featured a fantasy called a digital garden. Created by Terry Marklevitz (www.marklevitz.com), it was a group of panels lit up by a changing series of photographs. Oh, but there was water involved, fog, and mysterious curtains. There was something retro and futuristic about it that blended perfectly. It's an idea worth stealing. Imagine, a garden party in March, outside it's snowing, but step inside to your own Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.

So next March, when you are withering on the vine from a lack of gardening, trot off to the Stratford Garden Festival where they know a thing or two about magic.