WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE?
Horticulturalist Paul Zammit on the Future of Gardening and the Best Spot for Flowers in Niagara
The horticulture professor and CAA Member shares his favourites.
By Nicole Keen
(Above) The Wiley at Wildside garden in the U.K., one of the stops on Zammit’s garden tour. (Below) Paul Zammit. | PHOTOS: COURTESY OF KEITH WILEY; COURTESY OF PAUL ZAMMIT
Paul Zammit showed an early interest in cultivating plants. As a young boy, his mother taught him how to propagate African violets, and he never really strayed from the (garden) path after that. Zammit spent 10 years as the director of horticulture at the Toronto Botanical Garden before joining Niagara College as a professor of horticulture. He also shares his gardening expertise on two CBC radio shows, Here and Now and Ontario Today. When he has a moment of spare time (which isn’t often), Zammit can likely be found in the garden with his camera in hand.
Where would you like to see gardening practices heading? When I went to South Africa in 2018, I did a presentation about challenging the aesthetic. Are we gardening for beauty or for function? And when you start to see the function — the role plants can play in terms of supporting biodiversity — it just elevates the purpose but also provides a new sense of beauty as well.
What are some of your favourite native plants? It depends on the time of the year, but plants like bloodroot or Virginia bluebells. I’d also say redbuds and serviceberries.
Are there any photographers who you admire? I’ve always loved Janet Davis’s pictures and her blog. I would also say Rob Cardillo out of the United States.
You’ve co-hosted garden tours to the United Kingdom in the past. Where would you like to go next? I do [the tours] with Marjorie and Jeff Mason. We’ve done England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. We’ve talked about possibly doing Italy or South Africa, but if you were to ask me where I would want to go again, I would say the U.K. There’s still so much to discover.
Is there a particular garden that stands out in your mind? I really love Sissinghurst [one of England’s most famous gardens]. It has such an amazing history. I had the opportunity to visit in the summer, but I also saw it in January, when you get to see the bones.
What are some of your favourite spots in the Niagara region? Downtown Niagara-on-the-Lake. They do a bang-up job [with] the annuals and the display beds. Plus, there’s good ice cream! The Niagara-on-the-Lake campus [of Niagara College] has two lagoons with all sorts of waterfowl and turtles. CAA
(Clockwise from top left) Virginia bluebells; Niagara College’s campus lagoons at Niagara-on-the-Lake; The Paintbox Garden by Janet Davis; England’s famous Sissinghurst. | PHOTOS: NATURESCHARM/ENVATO; COURTESY OF NIAGARA COLLEGE; COURTESY OF JANET DAVIS; COURTESY OF THE NATIONAL TRUST
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