Olfactory delights

We spent half of last weekend digging away a bank to make a carport. Well, he did the digging while I sat in a deck chair and applied my razor-sharp, symmetrically focused eye to making sure it was all level. He heaped the dirt up on the bank, constructed a good-looking timber retaining wall, back-filled it, and then we went to the village for coffee.
When we came back an hour later, our Asperger's syndrome-afflicted cat, Millicent, was adding her contribution. She cased the joint, checked out the quality of the soil, dug it over a small section at a time, added fertiliser, dug that in, and sat back to admire her work. She was so meticulous, you'd never have known she'd been there. That's typical of an Aspie. If only I could interest her in housework.
Cats are good gardeners. As soon as they know you're out there they come bounding out, whiskers forward, ears pricked, tails high, and leap on to the nearest comfortable thing from which they can criticise proceedings.
Dogs are also companionable in the garden. If it's a hot, sunny day, they may haul themselves outside, find a pile of preferably damp, freshly dug soil, roll in it, get filthy, and repair inside to the white wool rug to cool down.
I wouldn't be without them, but I have to say there's nothing like having two dogs and four cats going about their unspeakable business in the garden to make you long for fragrance. Quite apart from the smell of whatever has lodged itself in the tread of your shoe soles, you'll come across the unmistakable aroma of dead mouse, smashed lizard and rotting dog bone on any garden ramble chez ours.
But at the moment, praise be, the predominant scent on our two acres is the heavenly aroma of several port wine magnolias I bought on special a few years ago because I thought they were monkey apples, with which I was having a brief but intense affair at the time. I'm pleased they weren't, not just because of their fragrance, but because the monkey apples would have required almost weekly pruning to keep them to a manageable height and stop them from enveloping the house. They do have beautiful flowers, but whether they're scented or not I don't know, as they're well beyond the height of my nose.
I have a few other fragrant trees and shrubs, also acquired by accident - by which I mean I didn't know they'd have a scent. I bought my Michelia "Bubbles" not because it has an exquisite citrus/coconut fragrance, but because I like champagne and the idea of drinking bubbles under Bubbles was very appealing. (Yeah, I know, that's really sad.)
The "Little Gem" beside it has been anything but this year, sulking after a rather hasty and indiscriminate pruning, but as I recall its flowers are also beautifully scented. And we've since bought and planted three "Touch of Pink" scented magnolias, a trailer-load of gardenias to plant around the carport which may, hopefully, overcome the smell of petrol fumes, and several Mexican orange blossoms.
Interestingly, the shrub which provided the best scent in our garden was queen of the night, of which we had an embarrassingly large number of self-seeded plants, but a botanically correct member of the plant police (our friend Mike) made us yank it all out. (Had it actually been a visually attractive plant I might have defended it with a little more enthusiasm, but it's leggy and sparse and the port wine magnolia will easily grow into the space it's left. Not that that's acceptable to the plant police either: after all, it's Not A Native.)
It's interesting that once your olfactory senses have been piqued, just about everything has a scent. There's a mad thing growing over our defunct but soon-to-be-resurrected hen house which was 50cm high last time I looked and is now at least three metres, and it has a stunning, talcum powder scent. My casual internet research suggests it's some kind of viburnum. There are three or four similar ones growing down the driveway - no idea what they are, but they certainly overcome the fragrance of what the dogs leave beneath them on a daily basis.
And the best scent of all, I think, is the combined smell of our lime trees, which are currently multi-tasking in the flower and fruit department and inspiring me to do all sorts of clever, culinary tricks with limes. (Actually, I do have heaps of unusual recipes for using up limes, so feel free to email for a selection. If I say so myself, my Lime and Tangelo Curd is to die for - and easy to make.)
A gardener's scented selection
Ready to dash out and buy something smelly? Try these:
Lavender - grows well in light, well-drained soils with plenty of sun. Trim after flowering.
Honeysuckle - train one over your pergola. It's easy-care - just give it a quick prune after flowering. Lonicera periclymenum - mmmmmm.
Cytisus battandieri smells of sweet pineapples and is a quick-growing plant. It'll grow in dry, poor soil.
Daphnes have a beautiful scent. They come in evergreen and deciduous, low-growing and medium-sized varieties - your choice. They like a well-drained soil with plenty of manure - tell the dogs and cats.
Did anyone ever walk past a rose - whatever the colour - without bending to sniff? Old climbers like Rosa "Climbing Lady Hillingdon" or "Madame Alfred Carriere" smell just stunning.
Some plants have subtle scents. Many of the flowering cherries have a subtle perfume. Prunus "Shirotae" has big, white flowers and a very delicate, sweet almond fragrance. And the glorious Katsura tree smells of burned toffee. If you're old-fashioned, go for night-scented stocks, sweet peas and mignonette.
If you'd like to make suggestions, ask questions, agree, disagree, elaborate, comment or berate, please email info@gardenpress.net