davidm31

Get Rid of your Lawns

This is good subject to discuss, and yes it all depends on the size of your garden, whether or not you or your children use the lawn for recreation. I am not in favour of losing all the lawn necessarily, grass has an pleasing aesthetic appeal,although I have got rid of mine simply because I only have a small back garden measuring 33' x 28' or 10 M by 8.5 M if you prefer and I chose to grow lots of fruit, vegetables and flowers. I installed a grid of narrow gravel paths between the beds, so I can get around and tend the garden.I have retained a small patio to sit out on and to dry the laundry, which I can get too either from the house or the back of the garage which I fitted with a corrugated plastic roof so I could use it as a greenhouse. At the front of the house the 20' x 10' or 6M x 3M space which was paved entirely when I moved here has been altered I have left the paving in front of the garage but the rest has been removed to create a cottage garden area, with just a path from the front door and garage and to the street. So I have no lawn to mow or edges to clip, but I do have to keep on top of weeding, deadheading, and replace plants that have gone over with something fresh, and of course watering, but I have three water butts. Some people would find my garden hard work, but I get a great deal of enjoyment from it and a lot of tasty meals. There are too many cars and vehicles on the roads these days, and folk have to park them somewhere I suppose, but concreted front gardens are lifeless and contributes to drains flooding, so I like to see front gardens with a bit of lawn surrounded by plants and often comment when I am out walking the local area. Each to there own, as has been said we are all free to chose how we wish to use the space, but these days garden space is at a premium

The best multi purpose compost this year

I have been using Wickes multi-purpose compost 3 x 70 litre bags for £10 for three years now and have never had a problem with it for growing on seedlings and plants.I put it through a rotasieve and mix it with some perlite for sowing seeds. When using it in large outdoor planters I mix it half and half with John Innes No 3 to give it extra weight and substance.

All used compost is recycled into my garden beds and raised vegetable beds usually as a mulch, which helps to improve the soil.

Can we eat these

Yes they are indeed Japanese Wineberries and are edible

Raised Vegetable Beds

When I first got rid of my lawn and replaced it with a mixture of raised beds I shopped around on-line, some of them are way too expensive.

I visited a local reclamation yard to pick up old scaffold boards or 1" thick gravel boards pretty cheap and with some 2" square timber made my own 8' x 4' and 6' x 4' beds.

I would also reccomend http://www.harrodhorticultural.com/raised-bed-gardening-tcid2.html  who supply wooden raised beds or http://linkabord.co.uk/home.page who supply beds made from recycled plastic. Both of them are very good and not too expensive or difficult to put together

Beware of gardainbargains.com

I too made the mistake of ordering from Garden Bargains back in July and I too having only received half of my order have been emailing and phoning them with out any joy. They said they were going send me a non receipt form to claim for missing plants but even that has never arrived. They really are an awful firm and have no idea about customer service, I will not be using them ever again.