Thoughts on my garden plan please!

heynonnynonny

This is my first house with a garden, front and back.

The back has a raised brick area about 2.5 x 2.5 m square which looks like it used to be a pond, with loads of rubble and soil thrown in to fill it up. The previous owners have thrown deep gravel and covered the whole of the back apart from the lawn and this raised bit.

I've gone mad and bought quite a lot of random plants as I wanted to get it sorted ready for this summer without really giving much thought as to a particular design, knowing nothing about plants and gardens I thought what's the worst that can happen, it's only flowers. I tried to follow a principle of tall at the back getting to shorter near the front and added a couple of evergreens for interest.

What I have in the raised bed -

At the back is a hebe veronica, harts tongue fern, and a white agapanthus in the middle at the back with a couple of blue geranium cranesbill mixed in. I then have put nearer the middle of this bed, a couple of yellow primula, and some white creeping phlox and blue aubretia near the sides either edge so they will look symmetrical and hopefully drape down the wall. I also randomly bought some little alpine plants cos I thought they looked cute so there is saxifrage, houseleek and a few other little plants right at the front of the bed and I have put a couple of rocks in between them for interest.

There is still room for more plants can anyone suggest anything for me?? Nothing too high as it is going in the middle of this bed, and also do you think it will end up looking a mess or does it sound ok??

Guess I'm just looking for reassurance - never gardened before so any thoughts gratefully welcomed!!

PS sorry can't add photos not sure how to

GreenFly_2

Well done on taking the plunge! You may find some plants work better than others, some may thrive and others may fail. Nothing is right or wrong and I think you have done the best thing and gone with your own intuition. You also have to remember some of the plants on your list will grow to fill the gaps.

If you want a planting plan you can find many idea's by googling planting plan for a raised bed.
:T
Good Luck
GF

Linda32

Sounds okay to me, I agree with Greenfly some will do better than others, so then at least you know what works and what dosn't.

There are some very nice plants there, btw.

conradmum

I think they all sound as though they have a good chance of surviving except the primula, which like damp shade. As to what else to put in there, as you seem to have a white, yellow and blue colour theme going, what about some perennial rudbeckia (big yellow daisy flowers) and some day lilies? These are pretty trouble free and will tolerate a dryish position.
Do make sure the bed is well watered for the first year to give the plants time to establish and get their roots well down into the bed.

Other than that I'd go for things like lavender and hyssop, which will like the dryness.

If you find most things die off this year you'll have to dig the bed out and take out most of the rubble. Isn't it so rude of people to leave their rubbish behind for others to dispose of? I filled two skips from my garden in the ten years we've been here.

katholicos

i know next to nothing about plants, but just wanted to say that it sounds like it is going to be fab!

heynonnynonny

Thanks all. It's so hard starting afresh isn't it. The soil I guess will be very free draining at least with all the rubble but there is plenty of soil in there, it is about 50-60cm high, some parts the soil is pretty deep.

The primula don't seem to be thriving but like you all say trial and error. Conradmum I forgot to mention I threw in a coupe of leftover munstead dwarf lavender so they should do well. I guess the key is to be patient, water water water and wait for the gaps to be filled out and replace what doesn't do well!!!

I wish they hadn't gravelled it all off (uneven slabs and soil all underneath) without even weed mats etc. I found myself desperately scraping all the stones off and throwing plants in their place. It will be like day of the triffids soon

conradmum

heynonnynonny wrote: »

Thanks all. It's so hard starting afresh isn't it. The soil I guess will be very free draining at least with all the rubble but there is plenty of soil in there, it is about 50-60cm high, some parts the soil is pretty deep.

The primula don't seem to be thriving but like you all say trial and error. Conradmum I forgot to mention I threw in a coupe of leftover munstead dwarf lavender so they should do well. I guess the key is to be patient, water water water and wait for the gaps to be filled out and replace what doesn't do well!!!

I wish they hadn't gravelled it all off (uneven slabs and soil all underneath) without even weed mats etc. I found myself desperately scraping all the stones off and throwing plants in their place. It will be like day of the triffids soon

Eeek! Let's hope not. I like my plants stationary! :rotfl:

You may find you have a great, ready made bed where the gravel is. I have a large patch of slate chippings under my washing line and I get loads of pretty self-sown plants in there. I selectively weed and end up with lovely display over the summer. Although the washing does tend to catch on things sometimes.

heynonnynonny

At the front, which is a deepish gravel garden, a pansy popped up the other week I was blimmin over the moon!! It had found it's way through concrete and several inches of pebbles! I will look into self seeders for the back garden must be lovely having them pop up everywhere. I guess once it's all been scraped back I can sit, take stock of what I want to put in blank spaces and choose carefully instead of possibly wasting money buying lots of random plants

Wookey

If you want to upload photos you need to create an account at a photo sharing site such as imageshack or photo bucket, you then just post a link to them from here:)

zarazara

your garden sounds lovely

ixwood

What kind of thing do you want to grow? Fruit, herbs, wildlife attracting plants, shrubs etc.