Have you planted any trees, bushes or flowers?

[Willtheymakemegoonthemeds]

I used to love a tree in someone's garden when we went past. recently their neighbours have cut the overhanging branches back to the trunk. So its now half a tree. this made me sad and I was thinking about all of the big trees that have disappeared from my childhood memories.
So I'm trying to think of the ones that I could grow. and that others have grown.

I have planted 3 fruit trees in my life.
I want to plant more.
My parents have planted a hedge in their old house which is still there and let their hedge in their new house grow to nearly 10 foot all around. So they haven't really grew trees but they have in a way.
Grandparents have lined their huge back garden with fruit trees. Easily 20. maybe more.

Have you planted anything?
Would you consider planting trees/ bushes/ flowers on wasted green space such as grass verges? or on communal/ council land?
A neighbour has planted loads of beautiful flowers on the grass verge outside their house and it makes me so happy when I walk past.
I am considering doing the same.

@workwoes123

There are loads of options and a lot of support for community gardens etc to be set up. Maybe something like that? I worked with quite s few of these in the past.

We had a big problem in several reserves I worked with: what looked like scrappy «waste» land was actually of relatively high native species and biodiversity value… or at least it would have been if the neighbours could be stopped from planting random exotic / invasive garden species in it 🙄.

Just to be clear, I'm not on about planting bluebells in a woodland area, I'm on about planting anything other than grass. There are about 20 areas of just grass on my estate alone. Just grass squares, where most people take their dogs to poo and leave it. A couple of neighbours have planted trees, others flowers. Someone else got funding for some benches. But most are just cut grass.

Planted lots of trees in my garden - plant trees as a volunteer in a forest too.

Yes. We rewilded a field this year with wildflowers and natural grasses. It was teeming with wildlife, from bugs to deer, all summer. We deliberately missed the flailing window to allow it to thatch down to protect the mini creatures living within it. I’m not sure how it’ll recover next spring but we’ll see.

I've seen signs up to say the verges have deliberately been planted up with wildflowers, so hopefully that helps educate people.

I have a garden, so of course I have planted things. Last week, I planted 3 dwarf fruit trees in large tubs (which they are designed for, according to the catalogue.) I have a cherry tree at the end of the garden, but it's got canker, and I think needs to come out.

No.

Because 20 years ago I planted trees on a plot of land we own, knowing that eventually we wanted to build on it, but wanted local wildlife to benefit in the meantime.

I am now not allowed to remove the trees that I planted myself, so have essentially lost the land.

”Well perhaps the council should have been a bit better at communicating their plans so people knew what they were doing.”

Eh? The council should have to proactively seek out and tell newly moved in do-gooders that yes, the roadside wildflower and long grass verge outside their house that has been there for a decade is deliberately left like that?

Or, perhaps people could ask before they dig up land that doesn’t belong to them!

YANBU
Have planted a lot of trees, bushes, flowers, vegetables, herbs etc.

I also do not use pesticides so my garden is bee and hedgehog friendly.

Of course, its not easy to give up pretty flowers and postcard looks for nature though. For example, the ants in my garden keep invading my camomile and farming aphids on them...which over the course of the summer ends up killing my camomile.

I have four small fruit trees in my front garden and a small apple tree and a hawthorn in my back garden. Numerous shrubs in the back as well. We live on a new build estate and very few people have planted trees. It makes me sad as the miniature fruit trees don't take up much room and you can trim them. The birds love our trees and I hang food out in them. They're well worth having and don't take any effort to look after.

@Theyellowflamingo

”Well perhaps the council should have been a bit better at communicating their plans so people knew what they were doing.”

Eh? The council should have to proactively seek out and tell newly moved in do-gooders that yes, the roadside wildflower and long grass verge outside their house that has been there for a decade is deliberately left like that?

Or, perhaps people could ask before they dig up land that doesn’t belong to them!

and it was council owned and had a particular purpose then maybe a sign saying what it is and the reason. Education is the fight. Lots of younger generation love wildflowers and leaving grass verges, leaves etc. Lots of the older people round here rake up their leaves and black bag it for the bin. Horrified me. My garden horrifies them

I planted two dwarf apple trees (and raspberry canes and currant bushes) in my old garden - all good for very small gardens. I also planted rhubarb, bulbs, perennial flowering plants, a couple of shrubs and grew lots from seed each year.

We’ve just moved to a new house, which sadly only has a courtyard garden, but we’ll plant a couple of dwarf fruit trees and rhubarb, bulbs and a few perennials again in the two brick raised beds, and do some pots.

If I had a huge garden one day I’d plant lots of trees.

I’m part of a community food growing group where we grow fruit and veg on disused spaces around town. We just ask the council if it’s ok then do it, and also approach those with land such as churches.

We also planted a community orchard on a public field. Just ask the council...

Also do some gurilla gardening! If there is an unloved space, take some compost, seeds, plants and plant it up!

People “guerilla planting” often don’t understand the land they are planting on though... so far I’ve seen an oak sapling planted directly over the path of the foul sewer on a grass verge, a cherry above an underground (culverted) tributary Etc. If you don’t know the infrastructure beneath the land, don’t plant! Some apparent “wasteland” is left wild for a reason!

We have a titchy town garden and have managed to fit in an olive, a fig (still small) an amelanchier and a cherry. The fig may outgrow the garden in due course but the others will stay smallish.

If the neighbours be back onto ever get rid of their windmill palm tree (hope not) we’ll put something in that spot too.

Considering a dwarf cherry for the front garden now

I plant loads and loads of annuals each year as we have bees. We also have figs trees, an olive, an apple, raspberries and mulberries. I need to get some more bulbs for the spring as well as there were a few bare patches.

We've planted more trees shrubs, flowers, vegetables than I could count. We've another big delivery of trees due next week for an area we've fenced off to landscape. I do live seeing them take hold and become independent. But do feel a bit bitter that the bastard trees will live longer than me most likely.

I've planted a lot of willow ,alders,apple trees,ash and beech in my own garden. I live in a very rural area and plant willow from cuttings on numerous sites.It's a very wet area and because of it being so rural there are no issues with them being near drains where they could cause damage.Cutting them back really strengthens them so damage from animals etc isn't an issue.
Willow can be grown from stick like cuttings and can be bought from ebay v cheaply from mid November onwards.

We planted three trees twenty years ago in our garden. One is now about 30ft tall and has a wide canopy. The other is around 15 ft tall and the last is a small pear tree. We have just planted a hawthorn tree to fill a gap.

I planted a couple of slow growing conifers in the garden of a house I used to live in but I don't think they're there now.

In our current garden we've planted a few things: a bay tree, a strawberry bush, a japonica bush and another bush that I forgot the name of as well as some annual plants that don't count for this. We moved into a house with an already well established garden. There are several bushes and trees in our front and back gardens but we have had to remove some things because they were either dying, diseased or causing damage to neighbours' gardens (a rose bush that somehow grew through their fence and up their shed).

I am a keen gardener but will admit to taking down several trees since we moved into our present house.
1.as it was a leylandi which was taller than the house and sucking all the goodness and moisture from the soil around it.

1. A eucalyptus tree as the roots are invasive and it was to near the house and main drain.
2. A beech tree that was diseased.
3. Several cordyline palm trees as they were messy and I was always fighting against spider mites.

I have replaced with a native hornbeam hedge and an area growing cardoon and buddleia for bees I also have a an area left pretty much alone full of English ivy for the insects and holly for the birds.

Yes, at my last house, I planted two plum trees, perfect hammock distance apart.

I hope the new owners get great use from them.

That sounds lovely - and plum blossoms in the Spring. 🌸

Did you ever get to use as such for a hammock, before you moved?

@MintJulia

Yes, at my last house, I planted two plum trees, perfect hammock distance apart.

I hope the new owners get great use from them.

Oops -- forgot to add quote!

Yes for a few months. Now I've bought a doer upper with an overgrown garden, where all the trees need cutting back and thinning out.

I spend my time digging seedlings out before they take over.

I've planted 13 trees in my garden, and 2 on the nature strip, the space between the pavement and the roads. Nature strips ( Australian) are odd in that they belong to the council yet the owner has to maintain it, unless they are physically unable to. This gives quite a lot of leeway. I only plant native (Australian), and mostly indigenous (native to local area).

Where I live the council has ensured that every nature strip has a native tree on it.

I forgot to say how splendid is the idea of the nature strip. Just before Christmas, the streets are alive with those mowing and tidying nature strips for the festival. It's a law, like having a lemon tree in your yard. :o

Absolutely loving this thread. "Guerilla seeder"... what a concept! Mum and I have done this with leftover wildflower seeds but thought we were the only ones loopy enough to do it. Our council allows some areas to go wild, and had also planted areas of wildflowers,I think it is fantastic. But oh my God the people my town moans about ticks ENDLESSLY. It is very depressing.