Tips for a clueless new gardener please!

[MavisEnderby]

I have inherited a garden.

The garden was always dps domain.When we bought our house it was a wild tangled overgrown mess.Over the years he transformed it into a lovely garden.

I haven't touched it,really since he died last year.

The winter has taken its toll though.I have just removed a lot of dead plants

I am in the North,the soil is mainly a clay soil

The garden is an L shape,with the foot of the L turfed with borders if that makes sense.

The longer bit is mainly paved with borders on each side.Currently there are mainly small conifers and hardy shrubs.There are also some bulbs,daffodils and tulips.We have some nice creepers that I don't know the name of on the fencing.

Plants that had died have tags-Hebes,ferns,japanese maple trees(small) to name a few.

The lavender hasn't fared well but usually grows loads

We get a lot of slugs and I have a cat which piddles on some plants

What do I plant??

Thanks if you have read all of this:)

Sounds rather nice! Sorry about your dh. My dh is an obsessive, 12 hour a day gardener, and if he wasn't around I wouldn't want to see it deteriorate after all his hard work, as I'm sure you don't.

I'm certainly not an expert, but I'd suggest:

1. hack the lavender back so it doesn't get too woody

1. liberally sprinkle slug pellets around, and use those copper circle things around any plants such as hostas which are particularly slug prone

1. Hebes would probably survive if you want to give them another go - this was a particularly harsh winter and the next lot may fare better.

So far as planting new stuff is concerned, I'd suggest you go on the RHS website for inspiration. Has your dh left lots of gardening books and plans? If he had planting plans you could use those for the basis of your plan for this next year.

Thank you Mumblechum:)

No plans..he was too poorly in the latter months of life

Will cut back lavender

hostas a no no from experience...I remember he planted some one year and the little slimy b***s had a field day!!

will check out rhs website,thank you

I am sorry to hear about your partner.

Give us some more clues about your garden -

How big is the garden?

How sunny is it?

Do you have children living at home and of what ages (in case of toxic plants etc)?

What do you want from the garden - somewhere comfortable to sit and eat? something pretty to look at? fresh fruit and veg?

What style of garden do you like - formal, cottage garden, modern and minimalist?

Do you want to plant something in memory of your partner?

How much (a) money and (b) time do you have to devote to this? Are you able and willing to do the work yourself or could you pay someone to come in to knock the garden into shape?

For now, I'll just say that before you rip out the dead things, make sure they are actually dead. Ferns, for example, may produce new fronds in a couple of weeks. Snip the end off a hebe branch and check whether the wood inside is dead - if you see any green there is still hope.

If you post pictures on your profile of the creepers, the MN gardening posse will try to identify them.

If you do want some sort of memorial to your dh, can I suggest an Amalanchia ? It's a slim-shaped tree with all round interest - blossom, berries and lovely red leaves in autumn. We have one in a corner with a white rose scrambling up the trunk.

Oh thank you!!

Mumblechum i was thinking about planting something in his memory for the first anniversary of his death (June) thank you.

No green on either hebes or ferns sadly COTGM.garden dimensions im a bit crap at,live in average semi detached.Would like something fairly low maintainence as work pt and children 7 and 5 with youngest having both physical and mental disabilities so needs to be fairly non toxic!Had gardener to do the turf bit after dp died but couldn't afford regular gardener am happy to do weeding and stuff on own.

Would love to post pics but digicam kaput.

Fav creeper has lovely tiny white flowers in spring/summer and then has beautiful red leaves in Autumn,could be anything I guess!!!

Just want to keep it tidy really,dp would be frowning at my slackerdom!!!

Oh it is most sunny in the mornings.No idea if it is North or South facing(or indeed east or west,lol)

Your creeper sounds like it could be Jasminoides something or other - we have some growing over a couple or arbors. Does it smell nice?

I bet your ferns suprise you, as Maud says. Cut off the horrible dead leaves and see what happens.

If you don't know much about gardening, it can be useful to walk around your neighbourhood and see what is growing really well in other nearby gardens, which probably have similar soil. Asking advice at a local garden centre can be a good idea too - they should have a good idea what is likely to do well.

If you've a lot of slugs, you're right to avoid hostas and also delphiniums, though some sort of gritty or bark mulch around tender plants can help. Encouraging predators helps (birds, frogs etc). For that reason, personally I'd avoid slug pellets. You don't want predators eating a poisoned slug or a slug pellet.

When pruning the lavender, do not cut too far back - if you go into the woody bits it doesn't grow back. Keep above the lowest growing leaves.

You might like to subscribe to one of the main gardening magazines which will give lots of information about what needs to be done. Or look for a suitable basic guide (get Heyasson if still available).

Lovely tips thank you:)

Sorry, that should be Hessayon - he did a whole series: the Garden Expert, the Tree and Shrub Expert, the Vegetable and Herb Expert etc etc

If you're not too sure what's in the garden, don't attempt anything too radical yet. Unless there's something defunct, rampant or loathsome, try to leave things until you've seen what appears and disappears over a whole year.

If you're worried about possible bare patches this year, grow easy annuals from seed. Actually, gardening catalogues are a kind of porn. Recommend Thomson and Morgan to start with - they give a clear idea of what's easy to grow and whether they like sun/shade/damp etc.

Now this is weird!Feeling inspired,I took dd to the nursery near me after school.(Not far,halfway up my street).Who should be coming out of the nursery when I went in?Only the lovely vicar who did dp's funeral!!!I haven't seen him since (not religious).I am seeing it as a sign!LOL:o

What did you get at the nursery, Mavis, apart from divine inspiration?

He He!!Bought some more lavender,and a few evergreens with lovely red and green leaves that the lady assured me were quite hardy they were called "Red Robin" I can't remember the latin name!!Additionally they were selling off hyacinths dirt cheap as I guess they were near end of life but for 30p each I figured they would give a splash of colour in the pots I planted them in even if just for a short while.I am goign back next week to have a serious look round minus the dcs when I have more time!!

That would be Photinia Red Robin! Hyacinths are divine, too. I have some in a big tub near the front door and the scent is wonderful at the moment.

If you out the hyacinths in fairly deeply, they'll keep coming back year after year. Lovely!

Thanks.Could I pick your brains about turf??The back of the garden got returfed in Nov.The cold weather appears to have killed some of the grass off.It is very patchy in places.Do I just leave it and hope it starts growing in the next few weeks or should I put down some grass seed or something???It is quite unsightly at the moment.TIA

What exactly has happened to the turf? Has it died back from the edges of the turf (this can happen if the pieces of turf aren't butted up close enough) or are there random bald bits?

Have you got a springy rake? You need first to rake the grass to get the dead bits out. Dig out any weeds too. If the individual bald bits are small, you can probably just hang on and the grass will grow to cover them during the summer - you can encourage the grass to grow by applying a spring weed-and-feed mix (from a garden centre). If the bald bits are huge, then rake over the soil again so that the surface is slightly rough and sow some grass seed. You'll need to peg some wire netting over the seed to stop the birds eating it.

MY 2 top tips for your situation:

1. grass
   I keep a £3.99 box of grass seed from wilko, wait for a rainy & warm few days, spread a handful on a bare patch and knock it in with the back of a spade to give good contact. THere are more scientific ways of doing it, but I can't get terribly excited about them as this works perfectly well

2. other
   in the next few months, fetes, fayres & whatevers will have a PLant Stall. The £15 which might get you a couple of decent garden centre plants, one of whihc will be dead by next year, will get you 8-15 plants instead. THey may (actually often aren't!) be smaller than you would like, but you will get a whole range of goodies & surprises that would cost you a bomb to buy one by one. Get perennials, avoid annuals.
   YOu can do things like collect lots of diffeerent varieties of lavender or geranium or whatever, stuff you know grows well locally, enough that people can pot up a bit to sell. And the stall holders are usually good gardeners who can tell you exactly the right place for an X or Y. AND you are supporting good causes

Thank you so much for the grass advice and general garden advice

re turf,there are random bald bits all over.

Talk to your neighbours, particularly if they have nice gardens, they may help / have advice / let you have bits from their gardens that grow well and have survived the last two hard winters.

Our ferns often look bad / dying then grow really well in the late spring and our japanese maple still looks dead so don't give up on them yet.

I'm not great at growing from seed but do sometimes buy plug plants on line which seem to do quite well. I think my garden style is more "wild" than yours sounds but I quite like wild flowers like primroses, daisies, floxglove in the borders.

I am so sorry about your partner.

See if your library has 'how to be a gardener' by Alan Titchmarsh, it has lots of nice basic info in.

Also second the idea of looking at your neighbours gardens, if something grows well for them it might be a good bet for you. If you have any old lady neighbours ask them for advice.

Having bark or chippings over the soil in the borders will help keep weeds down.

After flowering you can cut back lavender a little but not too much or it won't grow back, so usually after a few years I would replace. Perennials and bulbs good value for money as come back year after year.

Good luck with it :-)

also try and find a real nursery not a garden centre ie just plants no cafe no bird tables wobbly mushrooms etc; nurseries are cheaper and they owners know more also if you need lots of bark/compost its cheaper in farm suppliers so if in th countryside it might be an option

I needed some new metal wedges to hammer in wall for my wisteria garden centre £3.95 for 6, ebay 50 for £8.95 new!!

see if you have old photos taken in garden and study the background; then though the photos were of people it might help you remember what might come up in the summer in way of perrennials and what it should look like

if you want kids interested plant some sunflowers with long canes

No tips because I am new to gardening myself but thought you might like these quotes...and planting in memory is lovely. You could plant something beautiful and long lasting, or something delicious to eat and remember your DH in a celebratory way when you harvest what was grown in his name. Enjoy it - that's the main thing.

I conceive that the land belongs to a vast family of which many are dead,
few are living, and countless numbers are still unborn.

• A Chieftan from Nigeria

Now the gardener is the one who has seen everything ruined so many times
that (even as his pain increases with each loss) he comprehends - truly
knows - that where there was a garden once, it can be again, or where
there never was, there yet can be a garden.

• Henry Mitchell