AFTER TWO YEARS in my garden, my
topiary cat looked like a mangy stray that needed a good
grooming. So I turned to Gail Arnold at Topiaries on 25th
Street in Virginia Beach for help. Over the years I have
purchased several. This year Arnold is at the top of her
form when it comes to making and planting topiaries. She
spent two weekends in So when my cat and I arrived at Arnold's
shop, she took us through the replanting process step-by
step, as if we had gone My cat is one of the newer topiary
sculptures. Made from a sturdy wire frame and stuffed tightly
with sphagnum moss, There are two ways to plant or replant
them, Arnold said. One, you can plant a pretty, small-leaf
ivy in the ground next "With ivy, there's no maintenance,"
she said. "It gets its nutrients from the ground."
The other method is to plant the animal itself, and that's
what I wanted to do with my cat. Arnold prefers succulents
like The sedum I brought to plant on my cat has little star-shaped
yellow flowers this time of year and green leaves that turn
"All kinds of sedums do great, though," she said,
"and are low maintenance."
In addition to a plant, Arnold said
to have wet sphagnum moss and wreath pins on hand. Before
you start to work, soak The wire animals generally come
in two pieces and are held together at the center with hooks.
Arnold undid my cat and "The most important thing is
that roots are planted in the center of the moss,"
Arnold said.She loosened the moss around the hole with a
screwdriver. "The roots must be able to maneuver in
the moss."
When she unpotted the sedum, she
left as much dirt around the roots as she could and still
fit the roots into the hole. "Cover the roots with
a nice little blanket of wet moss."
She hooked my cat back together and used wreath pins to
hold the plant's stems in place gracefully around the cat's
back."Don't feel like you have to cover the whole animal,"
she said. And she never covers an animal's face with plants,
"because it takes the character away," she explained.
My cat has In addition to sedums, there are many other plants
you can use to plant on topiaries. For example, Arnold likes
groundcovers But, she warned, most other plants will require
more water than sedums and other succulents. Keeping topiaries
in semi-"Mix plants for texture. Experiment with what
grows well in the yard and looks cute."
As for hens and chicks, think about
using them around the edge of a topiary turtle shell or
down the back of a topiary frog, "Have fun with it,"
Arnold said.
Mary Reid Barrow, barrow1@cox.net.
