Sedges at the Shakespeare Garden
The perfect plant for woodland gardens, providing shelter, food, and protection for insects, birds, and small animals.
Sedges are perennials and have triangular shaped stems, giving them edges. They spread by rhizomes to form a dense ground and stabilization of soils, which provides an important habitat for small animals. The animals can also eat the seeds. Sedges can thrive in both wet and drought conditions, and they also suppress weed growth.
Often included in woodland gardens, which are designed to evoke comfort and cool feelings of being in a natural wooded area. Sitting in a woodland garden, listening to the sounds, and breathing in the smells can reduce stress, lower blood pressure, and improve moods.
Shakespeare used sedges in five plays:
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"And Cytherea all in Sedges hid, which seems to move and wanton with her breath, Even as the waving Sedges play with wind" - Second servant.
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" You nymphs, called Naiads, of the winding brooks, With your sedged crowns and ever harmless looks" - Iris
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"The gentle seven's sedgy bank" - Hotspur
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" He makes sweet music with the enamell'd stones, Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge. He overtaketh in his [pilgrimage..."
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“Alas, poor hurt fowl! now will he creep into sedge.”