Joy Leneaux-Gale has the best rose garden in Maldon* and has been enjoying the full flush of colour over the past few weeks. She’s very humble when talking about it but she created it from scratch.
“I got the house built by a local builder in 1995 and this block of land was simply a bit of waste marshland,” she explains, saying that the land didn’t have anything on it except some wild plums and a big old pear tree, with peppercorn trees leaning over from next door.
It seems as though Joy may have inherited a love of roses.
“We had a lovely rose garden at Mount Eliza and my mum was always into roses; I guess it was a natural progression. I brought quite a few cuttings from Mount Eliza and a lot of the cuttings have survived.”
Joy agreed with the proposition that growing from cuttings helps to keep memories alive, like souvenir plants.
“I look at some and I think oh, that was mum’s favourite.”
Joy has so many roses – each with a different growth habit, hue, scent and bloom – that she struggles to choose a favourite of her own. It might be a flourishing apricot-coloured variety with a lovely smell called Just Joey, or the pink Bonicas currently out in their full glory.
“But I do love them all, really.”
Is it hard work to care for all those roses? Joy says it’s not as difficult as it seems.
“Honestly, they really are hardy things, really they are,” she insists.
“If you don’t prune them one year you just say, ‘oh sorry, I’ll be back next year’. They do put up with a lot, roses.”
Joy says that it can sometimes be a struggle to stay on top of weeds (“Mum used to say ‘this year’s seeds are seven year’s weeds’”) but she generally enjoys the process of gardening and the outcome.
“Because I think of it as being a hobby, I refuse to go out and get cold and wet and miserable: that’s not my idea of fun.”
When asked if there are any secrets behind her glorious rose garden, Joy doesn’t hesitate to share. She says she would ideally prune in July and she fertilises with a product called Sudden Impact.
“After I’ve pruned them I go around with my little bucket and give them a handful of the pellets. It makes a huge difference and it does them for the year.”
During the blooming season, Joy dead-heads to encourage more flowers and she does enjoy cut flowers in vases.
“It’s nice to have some inside and they do give you a lot of pleasure really.”
Roses are red, orange and ‘blue’. Now that we’re done, there’s some gardening to do!
*Please send all rebuttals with photographic evidence to editor@tarrangowertimes.com.au because we’ d love to see! Also check out more Magnificent Gardens of Maldon in the issue.
This article appeared in the Tarrangower Times, 14 November 2025.
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