GreenFly - A 'flylady style' gardening thread with weekly tasks to tame your garden

spendaholic

Cherryfudge said:

You've given us all a winter project, @spendaholic! Redo's advice (above) seems like an excellent starting point to me, the only variation being that I'd take out any weedy rose branches because I doubt they will benefit the roses next year. As Redo says, the roses will tell you what they are in their own time.

PS. Tie bright pink string to the secateurs or the garden will swallow them when your back is turned.  

Yes, lots of useful stuff in there! 

Excellent idea re the secateurs! I think we accidentally threw one pair away but the next pair broke in half! 

spendaholic

Cheery_Daff said:

@spendaholic welcome! 

So you'd start with observing your space, where the sun is at different times of year. Thinking about what resources you have, and your limits (in your case, you don't want to be installing anything permanent just yet, for example).

I'd say start small, start near the back door, and observe as you go. 

Thank you!

We've spent 2 years looking and learning and waiting for non-existent bulbs. I'm adding a 15-minute weekly assessment walk too, following the above advice.

I'm bookmarking the links too!

spendaholic

redofromstart said:

I am being tempted by more bulbs, need to plant these tulips first. 

Tulips *are* lovely.

Farway

spendaholic said:

redofromstart said:

I am being tempted by more bulbs, need to plant these tulips first. 

Tulips *are* lovely.

Temptation knocking, T & M have clearance bulbs offer, from £1.

https://www.thompson-morgan.com/newsletter-special-offers-wednesday2?source=newsletter-cleard-131124&acq_source=

offer ends midnight, 14th November 2024 or while stocks last. Normal delivery charges apply. Use order code TM_TN5419W.

redofromstart

Thank you Farway - I might just have to fritter on some happy things. The £6.99 PP charge is always painful though. 

redofromstart

Dear reader, I frittered some of my treat money.  As I was hesitating the post arrived, complete with a small (unexpected) refund cheque - so it seemed fated.

Spendaholic, I put my bulbs and any decent investment plants into pots as we were planning on moving house.

EssexHebridean

That T&M link has lead me to raspberry canes... 

debtfreewannabe321

Good luck spendaholic! I am also trying to rescue a neglected garden. The last owners 'tidied' the garden by throwing weed membrane and stones on EVERY single flower bed they could find 🤣🤪 I've found some right treats whilst pulling out dead plants and moving these stones though so prune carefully if you can. I have also since moving in, in August, been watching where the sun hits at certain points of the day, then drawn a garden plan for myself to keep me on track. I am planning lots of raised beds, fruit trees & bushes and some veg too. Oh and a greenhouse  

I collected 5 fruit trees from a friend today, they are very thin little things, but they are at least 6 ft tall and some around 8ft which is great. I will get them in the ground hopefully before the end of the weekend and definitely before the frosts really start up here. I wasn't expecting all these trees, but won't knock a gift horse in the mouth so gratefully accepted them.......but where to put them! I spent an hour staring at the garden until I could find spots for them
I have got DP to dig over 6 beds in the grassy area over the last week or so, and DP will have -as his winter project- a job of making some raised beds for those areas. I am determined to have somewhere to grow things by next spring The greenhouse i am working on....I am coveting a beautiful one that costs a fair bit of money (just under two grand) and the more I look at cheap ones on FB the more I am wanting the pretty green one with roof crests and nice curves

ElmoR

Thanks for the welcome @redofromstart and @Cheery_Daff

Completely failed to do spend any time in the garden during the week - I leave for work when it is still dark and return again after it is dark

The advice in the last few posts really applies here too. There are different areas that can also be tackled one at a time. I'm a bit rubbish at focusing though, I seem to jump around a bit as the mood takes me. The landscape gardeners were here during the week and laid a base for a shed and a greenhouse Hopefully some extra work I've done will provide the shed money in a month or so. They also chopped the back boundary "hedge" (it's not really a hedge, more of a few stringy hawthorn and elder plus ivy and jasmine) to shoulder height, so now I can keep the height trimmed at least. The neighbour gave me a few hawthorn cuttings (which may or may not be dead) and I want to get those planted in a few holes in the "hedge" tomorrow...

Today's progress - cut the browning iris leaves back to the soil (which seemed to be the best advice on the gardening advice sites?!), sprayed about a third of the back garden paving bricks/weeds with vinegar/salt/washing up liquid. That all took a couple of hours. I clearly need a bigger sprayer (I have a 2 L one) because I had to fill up 5 times and it lost it's "phut/spray" as the solution started to get lower in the bottle. I sprayed the front paving a couple of weeks ago and it's done a reasonable job of getting rid of weeds.

Enjoying reading about everyone's gardening, it gives me inspiration!

ElmoR x

debtfreewannabe321

We need to lay a base for our greenhouse too Elmor (which we need to purchase!)

I've managed to plant two trees out of five. We are going to put the other three in large pots for now as I'm not sure really where I want them just yet. They're already in pots so I will just put in bigger ones...they were patio trees anyway. I don't want to plant and then change my mind. 

Also cut back lots of trees that were ready for a trim (I tried to check on the Internet if it was a good time for each tree to be cut so some have been left). Still two more to prune but we need a big ladder out for those and we were losing light.

We researched how much a skip was but I think it might be more cost effective to buy a wood chipper to use each time we cut hedges/ trees back. We have a humongous pile of branches and bushes and dead trees in the middle of our lawn right now 🙈😂

I'm finding it a good idea to set a time limit on doing the gardening so I don't do too much. Little and often is the best way 👏🏼.