Open for Viewing… Vancouver Island Garden Gem

The Milner home viewed from the glade, bluebells (Hyacinthoides non-scripta) in the foreground. Authors’ photographs, except as noted

The Milner Gardens and Woodland is a seventy-acre garden gem in Qualicum Beach, on the eastern coast of Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The property lies within an area of mild, semi-mediterranean climate centered in the southern Strait of Georgia. The weather in this area is strongly influenced by its proximity to the Pacific Ocean and its position in a rain shadow on the leeward side of the island’s mountain ranges. The average annual rainfall at Milner Gardens is fifty inches, whereas on the western side of the island, rainfall may reach 120 inches. Summers are cool with occasional periods of high temperatures and drought. Winters are typically mild and soft with rain. Grey days are punctuated with brilliant sun—or occasional snow. Frosts are generally light and brief, but an arctic outflow, bearing snow and freezing winds, may wreak havoc on coastal gardens in this area.

Milner Gardens and Woodland includes sixty acres of towering Douglas-fir, western red-cedar, and...