Gardening very often happens during the day. We’re out in the sun caring for our plants and soil or harvesting flowers and veggies. There’s a good reason for this—light makes it easier to do garden tasks safely and effectively. However most of us are busy people and we may find ourselves enjoying our gardens in the evening and even at night. There’s a lot to be said for this. The air is cooler, the surroundings more peaceful, and if we’re out at night the moon and stars add something special. As it turns out, there’s an entire style of garden called “night gardens” or “moon gardens” that aims to create garden spaces designed to be experienced after dark. We’re new to this idea ourselves so join us as we learn a bit more about night gardens and all they have to offer. Let’s dig in!
Gardzen Executive Summary:
· Night gardens, also called ‘moon gardens’ are garden spaces designed to be enjoyed after dark.
· Night gardens offer a new experience, with new fragrances, sights and sounds, and a new mood.
· While some gardens are designed as night gardens, we can add night garden features to nearly any garden space.
· While night gardens often require artificial light, we need to plan lighting carefully in order to enhance the mood while ensuring that our gardens are still friendly for insects and wildlife.
· Night gardens let us experience our spaces in a new way, and that can be pretty amazing!
What is a Night Garden, Exactly?
Well, as it turns out there is no “exactly”. A night garden is a broad category referring to any garden designed to be enjoyed in the evening or nighttime. There’s also sometimes referred to as “moon gardens”; while there may be a distinction between the two terms we’re unaware of what it is.
Night garden design taps into the magical features of nighttime. Things are quieter, the light is dimmer and more diffuse with artificial lighting taking on a new role. Some plants only bloom at night, and many wildlife species are more active. By designing ornamental gardens with nighttime in mind, we can create spaces that offer a different experience. Night gardens and moon gardens often feel more mysterious, more exploratory. They are both more intimate in that we can’t see everything we do in the daytime but also more expansive in that there’s a new sense of space and depth.
This is something special, indeed, and adding some night oriented features to any ornamental garden can help create the night garden experience in our garden spaces. So how do we go about doing that?
Features of a Night Garden or Moon Gardening
As with all gardens, your night garden is what you make it—there are no rules beyond healthy plants and ensuring the safety of the people and animals involved. That having been said there are some common features of night gardens that help enhance the nocturnal experience. Let’s take a look at some of those:
Night-Blooming Plants
The heart of any garden is the plants involved, and many plants bloom at night with brightly colored flowers that stand out in the dark. This makes them perfect for a night garden for obvious reasons, but there’s another bonus: many of these plants also release wonderful fragrances at night in order to attract nocturnal pollinators. This adds an additional layer of sensor experience to the garden as well as attracting some interesting and beautiful insects and animals.
There are many different night blooming plants and as always we need to select plants that are suited to our climate and location. Common and popular night-blooming options include:
· Night-Blooming Jasmine (Cestrum nocturnum)
· Moonflower (Ipomoea Alba)
· Evening Primrose (Oenothera spp)
· Four O’Clock Flower (Mirabilis Jalapa)
· Night-Blooming Cereus (Selenicereus grandiflorus)
There are many, many more, and we recommend contacting local nurseries or garden clubs in order to find the night-blooming plants that work best in a particular space or climate zone. Remember: just because plants bloom at night doesn’t mean they don’t need plenty of sun, so check the plant tag or seed back (or send us an email) to find out for sure what a particular plant needs in terms of light, soil, moisture, and more.
And another reminder: many “day blooming” plants leave their blossoms open at night. This means that they still add something beautiful in a night garden space, though they may benefit from a bit of lighting. Speaking of which.
Artificial Lighting in the Night Garden
Artificial nighttime lighting is one of those things that must be employed carefully and responsibly. While the right lighting can turn a garden space into a nighttime wonderland, excessive or all-night lighting can disrupt wildlife and insects and thus have a negative impact on the natural world of which our gardens are part. So, with that in mind, let’s look at some tips for lighting a night garden.
· Use the minimum level of lighting necessary: by keeping artificial lighting to a minimum, we can help preserve the ambiance and magic of the night garden while still allowing ourselves to enjoy it. Small solar garden lights are often the best choice, and they can be used to highlight pathways and key garden features in order to allow us to enjoy our gardens while avoiding additional light pollution or providing a hazard to the creatures and insects around us.
· Soft, warm lighting is best. This is part of using the minimal level of light necessary. By using a soft warm-colored light we can enhance the mood and give us enough light to navigate the garden space while also keeping things healthy for the environment. Warm yellow lighting is best—bright white lighting mimics the sun and can confuse birds or insects causing them additional stress or even leading to their deaths. If you see a moth circling a light, that’s because it’s mistaken it for the sun or moon. It will continue to fly in circles until another light appears or it dies of stress. We can avoid this with the right color lighting that minimizes the blue-white light that mimics the sun.
· Lights should face downward in order to both add to the mood (and our ability to see where we’re walking) while also avoiding creating light pollution and posing a hazard to birds and insects at night. It’s also a much nicer aesthetic choice; night gardens are all about intimacy and mystery.
· Create inviting spaces for people: Remember gardens are about people too, and it’s really nice to have places in our gardens where we can sit and just enjoy the plants around us. This is doubly true in a night garden, where a carefully lit space with seating offers us a chance to just exist and experience everything going on around us.
Night gardening will likely involve some lighting, but careful planning means that artificial lighting can add to the experience rather than destroying the magic and harming wildlife and insects. By following the tips and suggestions here we can do our part to support the natural world while still creating a wonderful garden space for ourselves.
Gardening in a New Light
Gardens are mean to be experienced. In addition to the flowers, fruit, or food they produce we are meant to connect with and enjoy our garden spaces. By creating a night garden or adding a few night garden features to our garden spaces, we can see our gardens in a new light—literally! And that can be a wonderful thing. New aromas, new sounds, and new sights await us as the sun goes down and night moves in.
We don’t have a lot of experience with night gardening—as a matter of fact we’re new to the entire thing. If you have a night garden or know more about them, please get in touch. We’d love to hear all about it and we may just feature your stories in a future article!
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