Help me plan a very unusual blank canvas

[AlanThePig]

Hi all,
Firstly, I must state I'm no gardener. I've never had a useable garden before so this is all a bit new to me.

We bought this house in August last year after falling in love with its unusual feature. The house has spent many years as a rental so people have mowed the lawn and that's that. Very little has actually been done to introduce any colour in here at all.

I know we have a huge expanse of beautiful pink water lilies as they were open when we moved in, but other than that there is no colour.

Around the banks are reeds and grasses which we will keep for the wildlife (we have ducks that spend a lot of time in there).

I've used google maps. The key is as follows:

Pink outline is our front garden. We have a small patch to the left of the picture where it doglegs back. I'd planned to let this small patch grow wildflowers and plant some lavender type plants there for the bees.

Red circle is a huge, beautiful willow tree.

green is a small tree, not even sure what it is, and to be perfectly honest I only actually noticed it a few weeks ago

blue is a newt habitat. We were told the pond was protected for great crested newts and this habitat, which is section of rockery like boulders, was put there when the house was built to compensate. Local council however have no record of this. Either way, we do have newts (not great crested that I've seen) so this needs to stay for them.

My brief is I want colour! There are going a row of hawthorn bushes in the top middle as we have had the odd issue with kids sneaking through the fence but other than that it's a totally blank canvas and I have zero idea where to start.

Suggestions desperately needed on what to plant, where and when!

Perhaps you could contact your local wildlife trust and ask their advice. Native species would be good, and they'd know what to suggest.

That looks amazing!

What exactly do you have in mind? Do you mean you'd like waterside or semi-aquatic plants such as iris? Or do you want to convert some of the grassy areas into borders with colourful plants?

What's the edge of the pond like - is there a damp boggy area ?

Your 'dogleg' area looks like it might be a bit shady for lavender. Maybe something else would do better there? What about some tall shrubs at the back such as buddleia? Wildflower areas are great, but they do require some careful management. You could google 'native species' so that you keep some control over what grows there, otherwise wildflower patches can revert quickly to grass and dandelions.

Strange, that's a genius idea! I'll speak to them tomorrow thank you.
Mrsaird, not really sure what I want to do to be honest other than inject colour in there. Point taken about the lavender, there is a large area of tree screening there so it can be shady.

The sides are solid bank around most of it, the area around the willow is a little boggy at the moment but not really sure what it's like in the summer months.

Ideally I want areas of colour whilst still maintaining the ease of mowing, though I'm not objectional to letting an area grow wild to grasses and flowers. I just have no idea where to start with it all.

Wow, that looks amazing!
What about planting bulbs all around the pond for a start? Choose bulbs that will flower at different times and put them in groups together. They will look better as a group of flowers rather than scattered.

Perhaps some brightly coloured small trees? Acer / sumac / even something like betula (birch) with a bright white trunk would look good.

If nothing else, it will inject some colour instantly whilst giving you a bit more time to get to know your garden.

Regards newts - are you sure you are looking in the right place for them? Ours liked to hide under the log pile, slightly damp but not at all wet.

Thanks squeezle another fab suggestion! Daft question, i only ever considered bulbs as spring flowers (daffs crocus etc) what else is there?

Yes we've seen the newts, squished a few up the drive as well with the car 😳. They have all been common newts as far as I could tell. I'll continue to look closer as the weather gets better for great crested though.

If you moved in last August you might well have not seen a lot of the colour the garden has- I'd sit on your hands if you can bear it until you've been in a full year (bar the defensive hawthorns! They sound more urgent!). Sign up for the sarah raven catalogue in the meantime...

This is true Dusty. I've been out this morning and had a walk around the pond (mostly looking for frogspawn but can't see any yet) and there is a large patch of something appearing under the willow tree which could be crocus or something along those lines. There are a few areas where there could be 'something' appearing.

The hawthorns will need to go in this year, I was also thinking maybe a few rhododendrons along that fence line too. I could step back a little this year and container garden instead I suppose.

And I have requested a Sarah Raven catalogue thanks!

I would plant pockets of bulbs where possible. Spring bulbs in the edges of the grass, crocus, daff, snowdrops, tulips, etc.
Snowdrops - buy, beg plants NOW while still in leaf form this years. For example, I could dig up a clump and split it and give you half. That is the best way, don't try and get them as bulbs. The rest plant in the autumn, so you will have time to see what is there, and paln for the autumn. The edge of the pond woudl look fab with swathes of bulbs from feb to april.

But then you will probbaly need to mow, so summer bulbs probably don't want to be in the grass!

Use your pond. Can you go round the egde with a stick and see how deep it is? Is there a shallow ledge for plant to sit on?
Is this a natural pond or with a liner? If natural, you may be able to dig an ledge.
On the ledge, plant bog bean and water iris and other. they all flower in May ish, you can get loads of yellow flowers right across the water.

Water plants go in baskets, but I would put wire netting across the top to stop the ducks digging them out.
You could get LOADS of stuff round the edge of the water actually, and the wild life loves having things to hide in.

Ducks can be pretty destructive. You may find the reaosn there isn't more is due to the ducks.

If you've water lilies I bet you've tons of irises!

I've found a couple of photos from when we moved in, you can see the lilies though they are starting to die back at that point.

Pond is natural (can trace it back on maps a few hundred years) and I believe very deep. It's quite silty around the edge, I tried to get in with waders late last year to get rid of some weed but found I was instantly sinking so I'm not sure baskets etc would work.

I believe moorhens arrive here at any time as well as the ducks.

I was thinking edge of the pond planting though to keep the rest of the mowing quite simple. Am now leaning towards a few pockets of Irises, containers with some bright summer flowers and see what pops up!

The baskets etc shoudlmbe fine, as they are not nearly as heavy as a person. The secret is the make the roots duck proof. You can do that by using chicken wire and sort of wrapping the basket in it, then the plant grows up through the chicken wire.
Irises are a good water plant. You can get loads of pretty coloured leaf plants too, we have one which is spikey and striped green and black, looks amazing. Go to a good garden centre with a good pond section. I think you could get a lot of colour from water plants round the edge.
Water lilies need roots in the ground, so they are not over the middle as it is too deep. But there are one or two floating plants that would go over the middle too.

@averystrangeweek thank you again. Contacted our local wildlife trust and by coincidence the wetlands expert lives a mile up the road. He's calling in later in the week to have a look and give me some advice, he's also going to see what he can find out about the newts and who built the huge habitat for them.

@steppemum that sounds good. I do love iris as well so thats a definite! I live not too far from a 'water gardens' centre so might drag DH for a wander at the weekend.
I was told the water lilies from last year had doubled in size from previous years and that really they needed cutting back. Hopefully the wetlands guy can tell me what's best for them.

I'd kind of assumed with it being here for a few hundred years that it was fairly self sufficient in terms of weeds etc so be interesting to see what he says.

Meanwhile, Lidl have Rhodas for a fiver and they are big too!

before you buy your rhododendrons, check you aren't on heavily alkaline soil.
They will grow huge....

The pond will naturally silt up over time I think (trying to remember, we used to have one in front of our house) There may be a natural spring that keeps it flowing, is there an outlet/stream?
If not then it will silt up over time, and weeds add to that. Water lilies are lovely but a bit of a thug, not natural and do take over a bit, but they are dead easy to control just scoop out.

No advice to give but what an interesting project.

by the way, if you like iris, the different ones flower at differnt times, so you could get a few and get a wide flowering time. Most water ones are yellow.

Oh just remembered, kingcups, giant and small, like buttercups but float

bogbean, nice leaves and has little white flowers

Fantastic news Alan, keep us posted

I believe its fed from a spring yes, though not found any stream directly connected to it. There is a river a few hundred yards away as well.

I'll try and find out what soil we have before I buy rhodas :)

bsaically rhodas like acid soil, so clay, London area, peat etc
alkaline is limestone, chalk, so cotswolds etc

Ahh, well this area would certainly be clay. I've just discovered the soils capes site and it tells me:

"Slowly permeable seasonally wet slightly acid but base-rich loamy and clayey soils"

Does this mean my rhodas will be ok?

I have a much smaller pond ☹️, but full of wildlife. Your project sounds wonderful.
I would warn against the natural yellow iris ( flags) they multiply very quickly and are very difficult to remove. Having said that you’ve got a lot of pond for them to fill!
In shady damp areas I’ve planted Cranesbill Geraniums, there are loads of varieties, easy to look after and different types can produce flowers all summer. Bergenias are lovely plants that will grow in the shade and have very pretty spike flowers. Also easy to look after and bees love them.
Persicaria is a spreading plant that has a long flowering period, comes in large and small varieties. Insects really go for the flowers that bloom all summer.

Thank you @Beebumble2 I have noted those down in my project book. Getting in to the pond will be impossible so I'll avoid the yellow iris I think. Persicaria are beautiful, thats a definite as well I think.

Must admit I could sit all day and watch life go by. We have a visiting heron, a kestrel, many birds, bats at dusk and frogs, lots and lots of frogs. At some point people have dumped goldfish in there meaning we have a lot of hybrid fish, a small cheer goes up if the heron manages to catch a goldfish 😂

You may find you have wild orchids, some of them like damp shady areas to grow.