To ask for gardening advice? Pic included!

[LouBlue1507]

Posting for traffic!

What and how can we make this into something nice? Maybe a flower bed or a veggie patch? Where do we even start?

Help!

[LouBlue1507]

Just to add, we've never had a garden before so we have no clue what we are doing!

[GingerKitCat]

Come over to the Gardening sub-forum!

How much sun does the corner receive? With your back to the fence which direction does it face?

[LouBlue1507]

Not sure about how much sunlight! Left fence is NW and back fence is NE when I stand my back to them and look at my phones compass Hope that makes sense

[Girliefriendlikesflowers]

That should be pretty easy, i'm no expert but have created a garden from scratch in the last 4 months!

I would dig the area over a bit (need a spade or digging fork) and put a bag of compost down, then go and choose the plants you want. Check for plants that are hardy (so won't die in the winter) most garden centres sell borders if you want one.

Plants I have done well with are things like roses, lupins, snap dragons, pansies.....

The biggest thing with plants is to water them loads at least until they are well established.

Gardening to me seems a lot like trial and error but as a novice I have to say I am really enjoying it

[Girliefriendlikesflowers]

Gah just lost a long post!!!

I would say dig it over with some compost and stick some plants in!!

As long as its not in the shade all of the time most plants should be o.kay (disclaimer I am a complete garden novice!) Check for plants that are hardy so they won't die in the winter....

[Girliefriendlikesflowers]

Haha for goodness sake it did bloody post

[LittleOwl153]

What do you like eating? Plant what you eat. Soft fruit is good to plant now - and selling cheaply in Aldi/tesco ..

[LouBlue1507]

Lovely thank you! Ohh I'm excited

[viques]

Good things. The soil will be warm so permanent things you plant will get off to a good start. Bulbs are coming into the shops.

Bad things, that looks like fairly cruddy soil. You are at the tail end of summer so need to be planning ahead for late autumn, winter and spring.

I would start by loosening up that soil a bit and seeing how it looks. It could probably do with some conditioning so I would get a couple of cheap grow bags , split them open and dig them in. I would also decide how far you want the border to come out and tidy up the edge so that it is well defined, it will look a lot neater! You could define it with a curve of bricks if you have any kicking about. If you bury the short edge of a brick at an angle of 45degrees (up to about half the bricks length) and then put the next brick against it you will get a zig zag effect that looks good on a curve.

It's not the most exciting looking corner, so I would think of putting in a smallish tree to add height and interest. A crab apple could look good there for next year, you get blossom, inedible(mostly) fruit and sometimes autumn colour if you get the right sort. It would be a good time to plant now but keep it well watered. Underneath you can then put some spring bulbs,stick to daffodils and tulips, put them in clumps rather than rows, maybe a couple of hellebores, but they will need extra feeding, and also autumn bulbs like cyclamen . A tree will tend to dry out the soil so to plant under you will need fairly tough stuff that is not too fussy to take you into summer. I would go for geraniums(not pelargoniums but border geraniums) or ornamental grasses could look pretty there too.

[MaxPepsi]

Personally I'd dig out a border along the fences too. Put in some edging and back fill it all with bark chippings.
I would then place tubs all along and fill with a different assortment of plants so you have colour all year round.
Tubs are much easier to maintain.

[MikeUniformMike]

I'd put in a shrub and put spring bulbs around it. with the shrub, check how big it will grow. Soft fruit is an option. Something like clematis is good if you want to hide the fence but it will leave it bare in the winter.
Roses are very rewarding for the amount of effort needed.
I'd recommend a flowering shrub with a long season or small tree depending on size of garden - look for dwarf rootstock). For a tree, pear is good as it has pretty blossom and will give you fruit in the autumn.

[Motoko]

Crabapples aren't inedible, they just need to be processed into jams/jellies.

Start watching Gardener's World on Friday evenings on BBC2. I can't garden any more due to disability, so I get my gardening fix watching that! Also, Monty Don's dogs, who follow him around "helping", are lovely!

There's not a lot of room that bed in your garden, so you won't get a ton of plants in. A good tip is to check the label on the plant to see what position it likes to be in, and it will also give you the rough height and spread of the plant when it's been growing for a few years.

A perennial is a plant that dies down in winter, then regrows in spring. An annual only lasts for the summer and will need to be replaced the following year.

Have fun!

[GingerKitCat]

Just replied on your post in Gardening!