A Pine Hill couple's love of gardening has them in the running for the national Housing New Zealand Garden Awards, Janice Murphy reports.
Joe and Joan Ratana's garden has been a labour of love for 29 years.
Now their efforts have been recognised with a win in the Dunedin section of the general garden category in the Housing New Zealand Garden Awards.
When the couple moved into their Pine Hill rental house, the section "was like a paddock", Mr Ratana (68) says.
But the green-fingered couple have designed and planted a colourful haven filled with native trees, cheerful flower beds and a productive vegetable patch.
Most of the trees and shrubs and many of the flowers are grown from cuttings, which Mrs Ratana (64) says she "just sticks in the ground".
A row of small hydrangeas grown in this way is set to brighten up the shady side of the house.
Petunias - the couple's favourite flower - and pansies tumble over each other in a riot of colour in the Ratanas' many flower beds, and pongas thrive in the sheltered front garden.
Sweetly-scented honeysuckle trained over an archway built by Mr Ratana frames the view from the front past a bottle-brush bush to the Northern Motorway and the high hills beyond.
Along the back fence, a row of young trees Mrs Ratana has propagated will soon fill in the space left where a hedge was taken out.
There are few pests in the Ratanas' garden.
Compost, both home-made and bought, and blood and bone keep the soil healthy and vegetables are grown organically.
Most of their plants come from cuttings, although each year they buy three trays of 40 petunias along with vegetable seedlings.
The keen, self-taught gardeners had never considered entering HNZ's national competition, which aims to recognise and celebrate the pride and effort put in by tenants in taking care of their homes and gardens.
But, encouraged by their tenancy manager, they took three photographs of their garden and submitted them for judging in the annual contest.
The win came as a pleasant surprise to the couple, who were unsure what their prize would be.
"We didn't enter for that," Mrs Ratana said.
All category-winning gardens have been entered in the national finals to be held in Wellington next week.
National judging takes place at the Wellington Botanic Gardens Treehouse on Wednesday, with official results announced on April 2.
National entries are judged by a panel including broadcaster and gardening enthusiast Maggie Barry; Housing New Zealand chief executive Lesley McTurk; Housing New Zealand board member Sandra Lee; and Wellington Botanic Gardens manager David Sole.
