Last evening, I was down the street admiring “my” pink poppies. These are the poppies I killed by trying to transplant at the wrong time a few hot summers ago.

Luckily, like most of the things in the Microgarden, I had given a few away. So there are some growing in the front garden of neighbour T. For a few minutes, we gazed at the buds together, like proud parents.

Then, as I had my camera in hand, I asked if I could take a few shots of his back garden. Here is a peep inside.

T. is a wizard. His pond is full of goldfish, and occasionally of incubating toads (which he is happy to share, for slug control, with his pond-free neighbours).

To keep marauding raccoons out of the pond, he has created a collapsible fence out of two pieces of cast-off trellis and some dowel. In two shakes of a lamb’s tail, it was off so I could take my shots.

He is also a genius at the Great Find. A handsome wooden barrel and a curlicue brass music stand are two recent catches now acting as garden sculpture. Old mirrors are here and there to extend the space, looking just like doors into a neighbour’s space.

When it comes to composting leaves, T. simply digs a big hole at the back of the garden and piles them all in. Subsequently, the soil is rich and luscious and his garden grows, as our father would have said, “like a bomb.”

An avid birder, he makes plenty of room in his garden for avian visitors, and knows exactly what they need to be happy. This platform is for the jays.

And like the well-bred Northern English bloke he is, T. knows that gardens are home to more than flowers (or toads). Gooseberries grow up one side of a fence, and a little trough of lettuce looks decorative as well as delectable.

I suppose it would have been better to go back and photograph this in a week or two, when his many peonies and climbing roses are in bloom. But I decided to use these shots anyway, a testament to the power of good bone structure, created on a dime.