Fixing up a garden
tubaboya
Posts: 8
My mum is on holiday and I've decided to fix her garden for her for a surprise while she is away. Her garden used to be lovely but over the last 10 years it has gotten worse and in the last 4 years nothing has really been done except cut the grass and a few weeds pulled here and there. I'm fairly inexperienced with gardening and I'm looking for some advice on what do to with some things (a lot of things sorry for the long post). I don't have a lot of time or money to spend on it right now as I'm also trying to clear out my own garden (moved last year to an overgrown mess, will be posting another thread about that soon too) so I'm looking for quick fixes to make it look nice for her coming home and then some weekly maintenance to improve things/keep it nice
Before:
What I have done so far:
I don't know the names of most of these plants or what to do with them, they are all overgrown but don't know how to cut them back, i don't want to kill them off by cutting them too much
One of her acer trees seems to be dead on one side and the other side seems fine, is there anything I can do to fix this
Her lavender look lovely from one side the the ot
Posts
my post got cut of halfway
Her lavender look lovely from one side the the other side is horrible, is there anything I can do to fix this?
There is a little plant growing under a bush (what i think is a poppy) can i dig this up and move it to somewhere less hidden?
The back of the garden used to be a thin layer of bark but it was put down about 12 years ago and there is very little of the bark left, I was thinking about pulling up whats left of the lining and digging out the worst weeds and then mowing and putting down grass seed, do you think this will work ok? ( i know the grass wont grow in time for her coming home)
I'm stuck with what to do in this corner, all the plants have just kind of spread into one big bunch and not sure how to separate them, I'm tempted to rip out the plant with the dark green leaves with yellow veins as it has vines that are wrapped around everything (or if possible take a piece of it and replant it somewhere , not sure if i can do this though or how to do it)
Also are these plants or weeds? the one with the big leaves with white spots gives me a horrible rash when I go near it
You've made quite an impact already just getting the grass tidy and weeding. I think the shrubs look ok now the lawn is done - they look as if they might be azaleas and a choisya and a hebe and won't grow incredibly fast so shouldn't get out of control and they do provide a bit of a barrier between the gardens.
The spotted leaf is a pulmonaria that flowers in the spring. The dark leaved one I think may be an elder, could be bird sown. The next is an astilbe and the last one a strawberry, probably a wild one. The vine with yellow veins is I think a variegated honeysuckle. You could cut it back quite hard and give it a post to climb up and it will regrow and be less trouble to its neighbours.
I think you are right about that plant being a poppy. It won't thrive where it is so you might as well move it, but I doubt its roots will escape damage. I would suggest you pot it up and cut its leaves back so that with a little care it has a chance to recover.
The acer is more tricky - I'm no expert but I know they don't like hard pruning and can 'bleed' if pruned at the wrong time and some of those branches look only half-dead. I would carefully trim back any that are obviously dead, dry and brittle, then give it a good watering, a feed and mulch it, then hope. It may have suffered from the hot weather or wind burn. It will look awful anyway with only half its branches.
The lavender is a lost cause long term - they get old and woody and won't regrow from the old wood. Best just try to hide the back a bit and enjoy the front and buy your mum a new one sometime.
Your idea about the grass at the back seems sensible, but now is not the best time to do it. The grass seed will stand a much better chance of success if you can wait until the autumn comes and it is damper and cooler so it doesn't get frazzled. If you want to make a start now, you could clear the area and level it and cover it with cardboard to stop any more weeds appearing and then sow the seed in September.
I always think a few pots of flowering plants really brighten things up, looks like there are some nice pots you could use & this time of year you can pick up some bargains in bedding plants. What a lovely thing to do for your mum, I hope you achieve what your hoping for & have some fun along the way, it will also help to gain some knowledge for your own garden.
thanks for the advice, helps a lot to have names for some of the plants so i know what to expect with them.
I think i might make some sort of teepee thing for the honeysuckle with some canes i have. Could i cut a large chunk of it back and twist the left over vines onto the canes?
I'll move the poppy to a pot for now and maybe the strawberry as well. Are wild strawberries like normal strawberries where they will only fruit for a few years? If so do they produce runners I can take new plants from? I don't see any sign of flowers or berries on it so not sure if it's just too old or in a bad position smothered by everything
I was googling about the lavender last night and I've decided to take some cuttings from it to plant in a pot, they will replace the woody one once ready and one of the bare patches in the garden.
I'll weed the back and sow the grass later then, we're getting weird weather the now so probably not a good idea to do it now
Yeah she has lots of pots, she has another 15 or so at the side of the shed and this area as well that was originally a vegetable bed for my youngest sister
I'll keep an eye out for cheap plants to brighten them up, I also want to plant some pots for her front garden, she graveled over it 10 years ago and it looks really bare (or knee high thick blanket of mare's tail depending on how my war is going lol)
Also really need to think about replacing the fence, i think it's seen better days, my dad build it about 20 years ago and one side has completely fallen down and the other is barely standing. Might see if i can round up some pallets for now to build one
I've wanted to do up her garden for a while now as I know how much the garden bothers my mum but I've just had 3 kids one after the other so not been able to do much until this year and I moved to just round the corner to her last year so close enough I can go maintain it for her easily.
I'm actually really enjoying it , it's very satisfying to see how much of a difference i can make each time. I used to live in a flat so could never really do much gardening there. I am pretty envious of her soil though it's lovely compared to mine (half my garden is really sandy and the other half is heavy clay)
The teepee will work well, honeysuckle is a tough plant as long as it has enough water and some shade for its roots.
Wild strawberries do runner and can take over a large area. The flowers and berries are very small (but delicious), but it has probably finished for this year as it flowers in early summer and the birds will have eaten any fruit. Though there is one called the barren strawberry which looks almost identical but never fruits. They both have smaller leaves than garden strawberries. I'm trying to get a sense of scale from the pic,and decide, because there is another plant with strawberry -like leaves called potentilla that makes a clump and it might be one of those, but they don't runner but do have brightly coloured flowers. It depends what is going on under that tangle of leaves!
The lavender cuttings are a good idea. I nearly suggested it but thought you might have enough on your hands - I'm glad you're enjoying it! That veggie bed and some pots planted up will make a huge difference and if you have the time, a lick of paint on the shed would help too. Good luck with your good work, it will be a lovely surprise for your mum when she gets back!
I cleared out more of the tangled up patch today, took ages unwinding all the honeysuckle from everything. I think it is a wild strawberry the leaves look very similar to my strawberry plants but they are a lot smaller and more blueish green. there was a few long runners from it in the middle of the tangle and a few very weak looking strawberry plants spread out under the other plants. I've potted them up and hopefully they pick up.
I split up the big clump of astilbe into 3 smaller chunks and spaced them out under the acer trees which has filled up some of the bare space nicely
Took about 30 cuttings of the lavender and they are sitting in little sandwich bag green houses so will hopefully get a few good plants out of them. Also done some honeysuckle cuttings I wanted to try (would like to make my kids a giant growing teepee they can play in next year, was going to use beans but might add a pot of honeysuckle to it as well as I like the leaves)
I'm going out tomorrow so will look for some plants then, could really use some colour in there.
I am hoping to paint the shed but I'm in Scotland and i cant seem to get more than 2 hours without it pouring down, one minute I'm getting sun burnt and the next I'm soaked.
It makes a nice change from my own garden, there was nothing to save in my garden and I'm clearing everything out to make a large vegetable patch next year. I don't get the same feeling of satisfaction from it yet (although I'm sure i will when I have loads of lovely veggies growing)
maybe im going out against popular opinion here, but would it not be a good idea to ask your mum what she wants out of it first?
gardens are so personal, maybe at the moment she would appreciate the fences and lawn being fixed, but if its not to personal, how old is she? can she still do a lot herself? pots need watering, vegetables need looking after, im only asking as im doing my dads garden, and im treading carefully.
I hope im not offending by mentioning this,its just another thought.
I'm not removing anything but the weeds and tidying it up. She hasn't done anything in her garden for years except plant up some pots with plants I've bought her. From the conversations we've had already i don't think she overly cares what is in the garden just as long as it looks nice. She loves her acer tree's and a big poppy she has but the rest are just plant's either I've bought her in the past or she has been gifted over the years. I've helped her with her garden since i was a child so I have a good grasp on what she likes and doesn't like
I'm not doing any drastic work at the moment except fixing what she already has and planting up some empty pots. She will be back next week and I'll obviously discuss any big changes with her if we decide to do any (none planned yet). I only want to get it looking like it used to as a surprise for her coming home. We've spoken many time about how much her garden upsets her and she wishes it looked nice again
She's only in her 50's but has bad arthritis in her hands and struggles to do the gardening as it hurts her hands to badly. I've helped out when I've been able but I've had 3 pregnancies in a row and not been able to do much due to my health during my pregnancies. I'm now in a position to really help out in her garden ( I live a couple of minute walk away now and I'm not pregnant). I plan on maintaining the garden for her so she doesn't get sore doing it.
good luck hope it all goes well and keep us updated! maybe as the children get older they could help a little.