Dig up and make new

I'm always at it Verdun. Very satisfying. This garden is built on old gravel diggings with rubbish dumped. I planted stuff where i could find soil without too much brick rubble/glass/plastic/agricultural poison containers and have since taken an area at a time, dug out rubbish, added the contents of the compost heap and planted. If I live long enough I'll get round the whole garden

Hi Verdun.

today i moved a large fern, i hope to build a stumpery, i also aim to incorporate a small pond.

i have also widened a boarder, i realise now that i should have marked clearly beforehand to have  marked where i had previously planted bulbs!

Forget where the bulbs are? The most extreme example of this was 20 minutes after I'd planted them

All the stuff to do later is a good reason for doing some now.

er, um, no, can't remember who I am. Yes, hang on a minute. No, it's gone again.

Nutcutlet. Im not that bad yet. Mind you, a friend fetched back some black tulips from Amsterdam last year for me and planted them. An hour after I spoke to my neighbour and he said that we had Squigs (squirrels) and that they would dig them up. Mum and I spent a further two hours searching. Head torches and all. We got them all but one. I have found it now as its started growing in the garden.

Verdun, thats good news. I will start moving stuff when the rain has gone 

I removed a twisted hazel in October after it got far too big for one of my borders (despite radical pruning).  I have mulched and put compost down to be taken into the soil over winter and also planted a David Austin climbing rose (Gertrude Jekyll) to train against the fence.  My new year's resolution it to think carefully about what is going to go in place of the hazel - I am determined not to buy loads of plants just because I like them and just plant them anyoldhow.  I do fancy a nice hebe at the front, along with a couple of lavenders and then perennials and annuals like the rest of the border.

Nice picture Sam.

Novel idea SFord, not buying plants randomly. I'll give that one some thought. Won't change anything I'm sure. That's why I've got so many things in pots waiting for a home.

In answer to Verdun's original post, I do give plants a chance before I decide they have to go.  Once they've had their last chance, thats it!  Living in Cornwall, most things do reasonably well but the thing that causes problems is the strong wind and the salt laden sea breezes we get (I live very close to the camel estury).

I like to re-do a border after a few years and joy re-planting shrubs or plants .

Do you guys find the salt causes alot of problems then?

Hi Verdun - Yes, lots of growth already (hoping we dont get a frost now!).  My roses are showing shoots already and I still have japanese anenomes and penstemon still flowering in the garden from the summer.

I also use sand mixed in with top soil for my carrots.  Keep meaning to collect seaweed too but have to choose my moments to fight my way through the visitors!  Christmas and new year were incredibly busy.