Gardens throughout the year

Hi Coral, Indeed he is! Not only a really good gardener, but he has a creative streak about a mile wide:-) I must ask him if he's left handed, lefties are really good at spatial stuff quite often, Himself is a leftie and a lot of tennis players are. Himself can look at a space and see exactly what should go in it and where. Me, I have to shift things about until it 'looks right'. Higgy has a gardening blog which you can access via the link at the bottom of any of his posts:-) Well worth a look.

We came to this garden last August, so we're starting from scratch as well, but we have some natural advantages:- To the back is an old bit of scrubby woodland that belongs to our neighbour, neglected and great for wildlife:-) To the left as you face the garden is a bit of stately home parkland that rises to a ridge with a rookery and some great old oaks dotted about. Deer and hare wander about here (and cattle and sometimes sheep). Blocking off part of the parkland view is a huge barn, wood clad and covered in feeders, this belongs to another neighbour, no gardener, just keeps the acres of grass 'tidy' but a big bird lover:-) She also loves her ride on mower. To the right is next door's mature, overgrown mixed hedge that the birds love, it includes honeysuckle, beech, an apple tree, something I don't recognize with pink blossom and a large salix, the local willow that grows everywhere, not a weeper, more the sort you'd use for basket weaving etc. there's also an ornamental quince - all jumbled together with no breaks, forms a really good wildlife hedge. Then in the short stroke of the L (it's L shaped) outside the back door is The Glade, with the lovely Devon banks, drystone wall (ancient I should think) another hedge which includes dogwood and other stuff I'm not too sure about, this hedge has cow parsley, bluebells, the inevitable dandelions (we don't have grass, we have dandelions, moss and white clover in the Glade) and mushrooms in the autumn and winter. There are a couple of rather seedy looking buddleia (sp?) here that we've cut back, some shrubs that really suffered in the frosts, two we've had to cut to the ground because they looked, dead, they may come back. Another salix, the bees and birds love this. And some boring looking things, one a kind of laurel that have been pruned year after year but probably not at the right time - they've simply been kept 'tidy' There are a couple of conifers on the slope going up to the brick built and very old outhouse that is a bit rickety but has a wonderful, mature tree ivy growing over part of the roof that a robin and a blackbird are nesting in. The shrubs, the conifers, another shrubby thing I don't recognize, the cow parsley, dandelions, an ornamental cherry, the mushrooms, moss, bluebells and clover were the only things here when we arrived. We've put in a pond near the outhouse at the top of the hill and about 11 beds, some with wildflowers, some with herbs, others with perennials in. I also have a small strawberry bed and a raised bed made of ghastly painted wood which was once a bookcase. We need to paint that something other than the ghastly white it is now:-) I bet that's more than you ever wanted to know about our garden Coral. But I do so love a gardening 'chat'. I'll get Himself to take pics and post them and I look forward to seeing yours:-) Happy gardening, Kezsmum.

 

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"The Garden Man"!!??....

Sounds like a title I could make a lot of money out of!.....May be I should change my dream of writing a novel to writing a gardening book instead!..LOL

Very kind comments which are appreciated, but I have to say that much of my garden design is based upon whatever materials I have managed to 'blag' and then recycle into my garden!

I was out this weekend 'recycling' the rockery rocks which someone at work wanted to get rid of.....they have been used to finally finish my dry river bed.....

Oh I also recycled another old builders wheelbarrow which is now a feature in my shade garden and is home to some ferns and heuchera.....pictures to follow.

Hope you enjoyed the blog Coral and you don't now think that I am completely mad?

Kezsmum, You are wrong I'm afraid, I'm right handed but most of my family are in fact lefties so maybe some of it rubbed off.....

Many thanks