Forum home Problem solving
This Forum will close on Wednesday 27 March, 2024. Please refer to the announcement on the Discussions page for further detail.

Gardening 101

Hello!

I'm new to this forum and quite a novice when it comes to gardening (my experience consists pretty much on growing vegetables and herbs in small pots at home), and thought I'd join up here to get some guidance and help image

Some friends and I moved into a new house in London which has a tiny garden at the end. During winter (when we moved in) it was covered with some plastic sheet by our landlord to stop it from growing uncontrollably since no one really took care of it before but now that the weather is improving my housemates and I would like to make something nice out of it but we don't really know where to start...

So I removed the plastic and this is what was left behind:

image

 There was a pretty diverse selection of bugs (mostly ants) hidden under the plastic. I tried checking the quality of the ground and it's pretty hard. When digging a tiny hole I wouldn't stop finding stones (the stones easily go 1 feet below... Well, that's as far as I dug). There's weeds and funny plants growing around.

Here's a closeup of the ground:

image

 I have done some research but I'm still a little lost and confused as I don't really get what's the first steps needed... We would like to make it a little prettier with a selection of flowers and plants. Not too fussed about grass, just a little more visually pleasing. and maybe use some of it to grow vegetables/herbs too.

What would you recommend us to do first? Weed-Killer maybe? Would that potentially kill the tree in the corner (we'd like to keep that alive... haha). New compost necessary?

Thanks for your time image

«13

Posts

  • Hi Ant5,

    I think if it were me ( and I had the landlords permission!) I'd turn it in to a pub garden.

    I'd keep the steps and the rocks and the cable reel table as my seating area and make the 'seats' a bit more comfy if required.

    I'd put planters on the walls or fences depending on what the height is all with the same colours of bedding plant, nice red pelargoniums or something.

    I'd chop back some of the little trees and any over grown stuff you've got coming up in the corner near the 'keep'  tree, and make sure it was happy.

    I'd get a bigger fork than the one you've got in the photo and I turn the soil over by one fork deep. If I found worms I'd assume the soil was okay, and I'd chuck as many stones as poss onto the steps.

    Then I'd just plant anything I liked wherever I liked and then move it around again ten times.

    There are technicalities with regards the type of soil, drainage, amount of sun and shade etc but half the fun is in experimenting. You don't have to plant up the whole thing in one go, just look for things you like and then see if you can grow them.

    This is just an idea, but there are lots of more knowledgable people on here that will have good suggestions.

    Good luck!

    Vic image

    Wearside, England.
  • Ant5Ant5 Posts: 7

    Thanks Vic for the response image

    I guess the pictures where a bit misleading, I see why you thought about the Pub garden but we're not going for that as the garden area extends behind the camera. We have a wooden table and seats which we use right where I'm taking the picture from.

    So we're re-doing it for the fun of experimenting (yes, I guess it's all a matter of trying image ) and aesthetics.

    Yeah, we'd probably invest in some proper tools. The fork you see (and some other gardening tools) were in the garden when we moved in and are in dire state.

    I guess I'm mostly worried about doing some novice mistakes :P Do you think it's worth getting some plant/weed-killer to start from scratch? Aparently when left untreated it gets quite wild and jungle-like haha.

    I'm already writing down: "Step 1: Turn the soil over by one fork deep" :P

  • Oh okay, I get you, yes i thought that was the whole garden...

    I have used weed killer in the past but not expertly so wouldn't like to advise either way. For my weeds now I just dig them out. I think even the nicest garden gets wild and jungle like when left to be honest.

    Unless the soil is very dry there should be some worms in there which I would take as a good sign, and that's why I mentioned turning the soil over at that depth. I don't normally dig much deeper than that in my garden as I hit solid clay, but you might just get stones like you say.

    Hopefully my reply might bump the thread back up so someone with better advice can assist!

    If you are not concerned about the landlord, I would just make the novice mistakes, that's what I do anyway image

    Vic

    Wearside, England.
  • Ant5Ant5 Posts: 7

    Awesome!

    Thanks Vic! This is probably what we needed to know then image I wasn't sure if we had to get compost or anything fancy... We'll try that then! Our Landlord is pretty cool and lets us do anything we want haha (as long as we're responsible).

    I may come back to this then when it comes to the actual gardening side of it... :P Thanks again! image

    Ant

  • I would only add stuff to the soil if it's terrible- dry, no worms, lots of rubble, that sort of thing and someone else on here would know better what to add whether it be more top soil or whatever...

    I hope you get more replies as I'm a bit of a bodger and 'what's the worst that can happen?' sort of person.

    It'll be good fun anyway image

    Wearside, England.
  • artjakartjak Posts: 4,167

    Ant 5, welcome and what a great project. A lot of the weeds will have given up after being covered in plastic and now you should schedule for a couple of hours each week, as this is the growing season to go round with a dandelion fork, digging up weeds as you see them. You can post pics on this forum if in doubt about what plant is whatimage Would be useful to have a pic of whole garden; perhaps from an upstairs window?image

  • star gaze lilystar gaze lily Posts: 17,657

    I would still keep the steps tho, they are great. Would love to see a pic of the whole garden, cos as Vic said I thought that was the whole area too. 

  • Ant5Ant5 Posts: 7

    Thanks for the responses.

    Yes, we are planning on keeping the stairs and round-table there. We're just going to mess up with the ground you see in the pictures. I can try and get another picture during the weekend from the top, but you would see that that's about it. There's no more "soil area". At the bottom of it there's just pebbles. A pebble beach with our tables and such, but no gardening options. What you see in the picture is pretty much it image

    The weekend after this one we're planning on start sorting it out. Will happily share pictures of the whole progress image

    Once we do the whole "turning the soil" and getting rid of plants and such... Should we wait until we start putting seeds? We're thinking of different flowers and plants to decorate it...

    Should we be worried about an Ant nest that's pretty populated on the right side?

    Thanks again image
    Ant (ironically)

  • DorsetUKDorsetUK Posts: 441

    Do you mean 'new to you' or a recently built house?  London is mostly clay ground hence London brick!  If there are lots of stone then maybe top soil has been removed or somebody has been dumping building material there. Your best bet might be to get a few large plastic tubs and plant into those.  You can get fancy ones but I mostly use horse feed buckets, punch a few holes a couple of inches from the bottom all  round the sides for drainage. I get the dark green ones and an occasional purple one. If later you find which plants flourish in whatever light etc your garden gets you can always cut off the bottom of the plastic tub and let the plant work it's way into whatever the soil is. You can use a weed suppressive material in between and cover that with some gravel.  As it's a small area it won't cost a lot and if something doesn't work it won't be too much trouble to try another plant

  • Busy Bee2Busy Bee2 Posts: 1,005

    There are two main types of weedkiller - the sort that blitzes the area but makes the ground unusable for some time afterwards - often used on paths or drives where you will not want to grow anything, and glyphosate, which neutralizes on contact with soil, but travels from the leaf, where you apply it, down to the roots to kill the weed for good.  Glyphosate will not affect your trees in any way.  However, I would only suggest using it for weeds where you cannot get the root out effectively - eg. docks have deep tap roots, nettles and couch grass have a nightmare tangle of lateral roots, sometimes a dandelion grows between stones, and you can't winkle the root out, and each time you pull it out, it re-grows.  And ground elder - ugh.  I have been trying to blow up your picture and tell you what you have.  There is some herb robert, which you can just pull up, there may be some bindweed on the left, which I would glyphosate, you have some self seeded sycamores in front of the two lovely trees in the corner - get rid of them asap.  You may have ground elder beneath the trees, but I can't see without a close up.  If in doubt, try digging all the weeds up, and get a glyphosate hand spray for about £3.99 and use on anything that is rude enough to come back.  (Sorry - just remembered you are in London - make that £6.99 image)

    I don't think that the cable reel adds much - certainly as a table it is made defunct by the fact you can't get chairs to sit under it as there's not enough space, and you say you have somewhere else to sit anyway.  Maybe it could become an architectural feature, a design element, but if I'm honest I can't think how - maybe upended to give a big circle - I dunno.  Ask someone artistic!

    Then work out where the sunlight is in the evening - usually the best place to site garden furniture for two reasons - 1. it is the place where you will want to sit after a day at work and 2. wooden furniture needs to get a bit of sun on it to delay damp rot.  Make sure your planting plan doesn't impede the light.

    Then work out your borders - how much privacy do you want?  Taller trees or shrubs are a good idea, but work out how much sunshine/shade is on offer.  Think big - some of the best small garden designs feature something really big - like a massive urn or something, and some larger plants, even though this is counter-intuitive, then you can set those off with smaller plants - preferably in bright, eye-catching colours - and make sure they don't clash - smaller gardens should be in harmony in my humble! 

    And finally, play to your strengths.  London is a micro-climate, and you have conditions which mean you can safely grow things that the rest of us would struggle with.  Why not take inspiration from that rather tropical tree in the corner and go for some more exotic things - I just got a couple of canariensis from Morrisons for a fiver each, put them with canna lilies, a tree fern, a banana plant, a fig, a cordyline.  The advantage of these things is that they look beautiful in the rain and create a feeling of being somewhere on holiday!!  And a London garden can do this.  And keep some of them in pots - that way, if you move out, you can take them with you rather than leaving them as a present to the landlord.

Sign In or Register to comment.