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Gardening

Find tips and tricks to make your garden or allotment flourish on our Gardening forum.

My garden depresses me

16 replies

duckypoo · 21/04/2011 01:15

I don't like gardening (I have no clue whatsoever, plus a fear of bugs), we moved into a house a little over 2 years ago with a largish established garden, plus front garden. Basically the only things we have done in the meantime are to trim hedges (badly Blush) and cut the grass.

I did actually do a bit of weeding last autumn in the front garden and went on a roundup rampage. It's all looking a bit erm bushy and unkempt though (back garden) and I honestly have no clue where to start. There is a bed with lots of rose plants which haven't been pruned, 4 small trees ditto, the bushes down the side are enroaching, the weeds are rampant. I just don't know where to start tbh, I don't really know how to prune (what is deadheading?).

We have small children and I don't have the time or the inclination to be reading books about it all. I am honestly considering moving or getting a swap, I dream of a flat patch of grass.

We also inherited a greenhouse with a couple of panes of glass missing, can you buy these to replace?

Sorry for the stupid questions but any tips would be appreciated.

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stream · 21/04/2011 01:34

Could you get someone in to do some basic tidying up and pruning.

My next-door neighbour has someone who cuts the lawn regularly and does the odd bit of tree care.

duckypoo · 21/04/2011 01:42

There is a bloke who I see gardening for neighbours and I think he must have done this garden before we moved in, but we are pretty skint tbh, I might get his number though even a couple of hours and a bit of advice would be good.

It's basically an old persons garden, ideally I would rip everything up and returf, but seeing as I don't know if we would be allowed, I would have no idea how to do it and we don't have the money for external help we are pretty bloody stuck. There isn't room for swings/trampoline etc because of the 4 trees plus random tree stump Sad.

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Slightlyreluctantexpat · 21/04/2011 01:46

Nothing to add except empathy, OP!

I've always thought of gardening as "outdoor housework" despite having friends and family who love it.

Used to think I would grow into gardening as I aged, but it hasn't happened yet.:)

duckypoo · 21/04/2011 01:52

Exactly slightly, I haven't the will to tame the inside nevermind the outside. Dp is no bloody help, he was all enthusiastic about the greenhouse and growing veg, not so much about the boring/mundane weeding/cutting activities.

Fair enough he did well with his tomatoes, but he has lost interest in that too since the iphone invaded .

I miss living in my poky flat.

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gillybean2 · 21/04/2011 07:59

You've been threre 2 years that's certainly enough time to give it a chance and time to see what comes up and how it manages/looks etc.

Badly trimmed hedges are better than over grown. And chances are it'll grow back anyhow even if you do make it a bit lopsided. Have you got a hedge trimmer to do these? Invest in some of you don't. So much quicker than chopping with the shears. Just trim over the top and sides, try and keep it level ish but don't worry too much. It will grow back!

Ask the neighbours for the number of the guy you've seen and give him a call. Say you only want an occassionally tidy up of your bigger shrubs and ask what his rate per hour is. The going rate around here varies depending on how professional they are and what the work is. I have a friend who mows my parents grass (2 hours work) for 12 quid cash using their mower. Before that they had a guy come with his own tools, took cuttings away, proper invoice etc (had been to hoticultureal college etc) and he obviously charged a lot more.
If you're not too bothered about the welfare of the plants (and are secretly hoping they'll keel over) go for the cheaper option Grin

Major pruning should only be a once, possibly twice a year job. And not everything will need doing every year. Do you have somewhere to put/dispose of the trimmings? Some branches may be quite big if it's not been done in a while and he may charge extra to take them away. If you do it yourself you will need loppers, possibly a small garden saw, and time/inclination to do it.

Do you like the roses? Basically prunning helps them to flower more but they will still flower without it. Also allowing air and stopping stems crossing can prevent disease (if you worry about such things - My garden phiolosophy is that it has to look good, look after itself mostly or at least be enjoyable enough to view for the effort required).
Roses are pretty thorny though and nasty to deal with. Apart from climbing roses I'm not that keen on them myself. Yes they look lovely but not worth the effort needed imo.

Would you miss them if they went? Ask around your neighbours to see if any of them are interested in taking any of them off your hands and tell them to come take what they like! That's more of an autumn or very early spring job though so you'll be lumbered with them a bit longer if you go that route unless your neighbours feel brave enough to move them now. Do you know what colour or types they are? If not be honest on that. If they're not in flower say it's pot luck, or if you know one is definitely red or yellow tell them that much.
If you can't rehome them and want them gone ask the gardening guy how much he'd charge to clear the bed for you. Tell him you're not fussy when he does it and he can come and do it any time he has a free day. They will be horrible to take out yourself (you'll have to buy protective gloves and they'll still go through those) so factor that in to the cost of getting someone else to do it. And then grass it over when they're gone.

Same with the trees in the lawn. How big are they? Presumably they wouldn't have a tree preservation order on them....? If fairly small (you can get your hand around the stems) and unlikely to fall on house or fence if they went down, then ask the gardening guy for a quote and bear in mind you will have to dispose of the bits (bonfire?).

If they are much bigger trees then consider the cost and effort of doing it yourself (buying an axe, ropes, or chainsaw hire), possibly it falling on neighbours fence/house... You may need to ask a tree surgeon to do it for you. The plus side is it should be insured so if they break your neighbours fence they have to replace it. And they take the bits away too.
If you do it yourself cut the branches off first and then reduce the trunk from teh top downwards. Wood is much heavier than you realise so take it down in manageable bits.

Get as much to lawn as you can and get those swings up. That's assuming the trees aren't big enough to support a swing from them as is? :)

gillybean2 · 21/04/2011 08:05

Meant to say as well you can get some stuff to paint on the stumps to stop them regrowing and also to speed up them rotting away. If you don't paint them with the stuff they will try and regrow.

Cut the existing stumps down to ground level if you can. But if they're fairly biy it can be fun to leave them as sort of stepping stone things for the kids to play with. Or my friend has nailed a plank across hers and they use it for pirate games, obstacle courses etc. Just be careful where you place climbing frame/swing if you have stumps about though.

KnickersOnOnesHead · 24/04/2011 17:41

If you don't want your greenhouse, I'll have it Grin

I felt the same way you do now. Garden was like you described, deff an old man's garden.

Slowly but surely I am getting there, in fact, I've just started on the veg patch now!

foxinthewoods · 24/04/2011 18:48

If you have a service to offer, ie computer skills, you could ask for garden help in return for some admin work/babysitting/ironing etc. A friend of mine has just done this.

Bunbaker · 24/04/2011 19:02

Do you know anyone who doesn't have enough garden space to grow vegetables. Can you rent out some garden as allotment space?

We are desperately short of allotmenst round here and there have been appelas in the local parish magazine asking for people who won't or can't garden to rent them out.

Bunbaker · 24/04/2011 19:02

allotments doh!

GrendelsMum · 24/04/2011 21:58

Deadheading is just nipping the dead flowers off a plant. You do it so that they can't put energy into creating seeds, and so they have to put their energy into either creating more flowers now, or growing their bulb bigger for next year's flowers.

If you deadhead daffodils, for example, you just take off the dead flower and the little swollen green bit behind the flower where the seeds would form.

whatatip · 24/04/2011 22:28

Baby steps. Break it down into very small tasks/areas, as small as possible. Then you can pop out now and again when your dcs are asleep and get something complete and ticked off your list in half an hour. You can also hand out jobs easily to your partner.

The list will be very long but hopefully each separate bit will be easily achievable.

My children only go out in the garden if I am there, so if you are out there they can come out too and make dens. Also mine like nooks and crannies rather than lawns/paved areas.

Flisspaps · 25/04/2011 09:31

duckypoo You can get replacement glass for greenhouses, but I have filled in the missing panes in mine with this stuff and then lined the panes DD can reach with the same stuff.

Prunnhilda · 25/04/2011 09:35

I second the idea of trading skills. What can you do? I've got a tiny garden yet I love gardening and if I had my chance to redo a biggish garden in return for something done in my house, I'd be delighted.

Firstly, what kind of tree are the 4 that you want rid of?

duckypoo · 15/05/2011 01:49

Oops sorry I didn't come back to this thread, thank you for all of your suggestions, although unhappily I don't have any skills to trade SadGrin.

After Dp has cut the grass it doesn't actually look so bad, he also attacked the damn Roses with the hedge trimmer, they are stumps now and I plan to dig them up when I have the time. Probably wrongly I have used weedkiller on the front and back in areas which are totally overgrown, remains to be seen whether it will work and I still need to attack them with the strimmer.

Thanks for the tip about breaking it up into small chunks and attacking whilst the baby naps, will do that. Still need to trim side hedges in back/trim trees ect although will need more equipment for that, amazing how much just chopping the roses down has opened the whole area up, feels much more spacious.

Although we have 4 trees, they are pretty small, one apple, one pear, two decorative afaics. Would love to get rid of the decorative ones tbh, they are pointless.

Thanks flisspaps have bookmarked that page. Would people still want my Roses now dp has butchered them Gilly? They are about 8 inches high atm, but were doing very well before the cull lol. I would rather give them away than just dig them up and chuck in the recycling.

OP posts:
duckypoo · 15/05/2011 01:58

I don't think it's big enough to rent out space tbh (I'd say 65ft b 30 ft, complete guess btw)

Knickers, Dp was so enthusiastic about growing veg at first, he did really well with tomatoes, we had millions, plus courgettes, not so much success with other veg, they were eaten by pests lol he cba now though Sad.

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