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Gardening

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

How do I garden?

7 replies

POPholditdown · 27/09/2018 14:33

We bought a house with a lovely big garden over a year ago, and I was so excited about getting ‘stuck in’, I forgot I’m clueless.

The garden is already has some fruit trees, and various plants. I’d love to be able to put my touch on it, put in some more flowers, another tree, some nice boarders, all sorts, but I’ve no idea where to start.

Spring snuck up on me this year, and I wasn’t ready. I’ve kept on top of mowing the lawn but that’s it. I didn’t know I had to cut back certain plants, and when. I’ve just about managed to keep on top of the weeding!

When my mum has been round, I’ve been in awe as she’ll just say ‘oh look you’ve got a plum tree/roses/tulips’, and all I can see is leaves and grass😶. How does she know what they are, before they’ve bloomed?

I’d also love to start growing some veg, but again I’m clueless.

I’ll post some pictures shortly, of the kind of things I’d like to do (some I’ve saved from MN as inspiration!) but ideally I’d like to start at the bottom and work my way up knowledge and skill wise.

I’ve had a look online on occasion, but I need to know the ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ to understand, not just ‘what’, if that makes sense. So for example one thing I’ve seen is to put cardboard down when planting something, but I’m not sure why? Or in any particular order? I wonder if a book would be better, as online I can get stuck clicking different links, and become overwhelmed with information.

I’d like to start learning now, so that when spring comes back around, I’ll be an expert!

OP posts:
Ariela · 27/09/2018 14:43

Alan Tichmarsh did a series and books to go with it, which was pretty comprehensive
www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/htbg/

I think this one is the complete set in 1 volume www.penguin.co.uk/books/1071801/the-complete-how-to-be-a-gardener/9780563522621.html

concretesieve · 27/09/2018 14:49

Good, comprehensive books definitely worked for me Grin

They're out of print now, but available second-hand - Geoff Hamilton's Practical Gardening Course and D G Hessayon's The Garden Expert. I was just like you when I started and those books were great.

Good luck!

POPholditdown · 27/09/2018 15:11

This is the kind of thing I want to learn how to do (the big red tree one is from MN, I remember replying saying I was saving the photo, wonder if the poster will see this and share her expertise!)

As you can see, very advanced for someone who was asking ‘but how do you know when the grass is ready to be mowed?’ a few months ago😁

Thanks for the recommendations I’ll take a look and see which one I’ll go for.

How do I garden?
How do I garden?
How do I garden?
OP posts:
TeamDixon · 07/10/2018 17:11

That's beautiful,
you could plant some bulbs now to come up in spring, tulips etc

Taffeta · 07/10/2018 17:16

I’d agree with reading

Go to your library and take out 4 or 5 gardening books a month between now and February.

Look at gardens in your area to see what grows well in the local soil

Think about

Structure, height
Texture
Colours
Seasons

Learn about
Propagation - save yourself £££
Pruning
Plant types

Don’t expect to get it all right, a lot is trial and error

squadronleader87 · 07/10/2018 17:16

I've got the RHS gardening for beginners book and it's great. If I need more information I go to their website or to YouTube. I'm also an amateur and really making it up as I go along!

madvixen · 07/10/2018 17:21

I'm a rubbish gardener but I managed the herb pot border.

Last winter, I laid down newspaper in the shape I wanted the border to be in. I topped this with black bags and pegged it all down with tent pegs. In April, I lifted it all up and was left with nice soil underneath. I dug in my pots and then filled the pots with compost and some feed pellets. I then planted some supermarket herb plants into them. They're all still alive so I must be doing something ok 😀

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