New gardener advice please

Posts

• zugenie Posts: 831

  May 2022 edited May 2022

  Hi Fiona! I love the design of your raised beds, they’re really pretty! I’m a big advocate for just waiting to see what happens, some plants will thrive, others won’t, some just won’t look right, take note of what is doing poorly or what you don’t like the look of so you can remove it and add more of what is doing well! Gardening is definitely not an exact science

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• fiona-cooper Posts: 15

  May 2022

  Hi, thank you for taking the time to respond 😁, thank you for your kind comments, good to hear there isn’t anything screaming at you as a bad choice for my first attempt which is good lol, my garden isn’t fit for growing as heavy clay, so bought the beds to give me more opportunity, so I’m hoping it turns out well as I went adventurous on some plants I haven’t seen before and some old faithfuls, fingers crossed 😊

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• zugenie Posts: 831

  May 2022

  Your garden is personal to you, remember that! Other people may not love what you’ve done but if you do that’s all that matters.
  
  Ahh heavy clay! It’s actually a very good growing medium (assuming it isn’t entirely waterlogged) if you dig in some compost or composted manure it will very quickly become lovely soil, full of nutrients and doesn’t often need watering, the most important thing I think is choosing the right plants! Roses love clay soil

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• Lizzie27 Posts: 12,494

  May 2022

  I think you've done very well and I do like your raised beds. As Zugenie says, just wait and see how your plants do and also you may find that the beds need a bit more watering than if the plants are in the ground. 
  I'm presuming there are no bases so that your black lace tree (elderflower) can get it's roots down in the ground? They can grow quite big so you might need to keep an eye on yours. The good news is that they are easy to prune to the height/spread you want in the spring.
  Good luck with your gardening.

  North East Somerset - Clay soil over limestone

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• fiona-cooper Posts: 15

  May 2022

  I was thinking about roses but do you know better ones to have with dogs?🐶 as I have 2 very curious ones which will roll around in a good fertiliser or manure as I had to stop them jumping on the beds 🤣, I was worried they may get hurt on the thorns or anything on ground level that may be poisonous.

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• fiona-cooper Posts: 15

  May 2022

  thanks Lizzie, yes the raised beds are bottomless to allow my black lace tree to finally grow to her full potential, I have had her for years and she was in a large pot until now, the whole raised bed idea was to plant her up as my new garden is the heavy clay but I really wanted to let her grow to her full potential.  I have since the picture,  fitted an irrigation system (well my husband did lol) so they get watered thoroughly everyday on a timer in case I forget 😉, thanks for your advice 😊

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