A distraction! Talk about your garden plans

[Maydayredalert]

I need a distraction from all the news, so tell me about your garden and your plans. I think maybe some of us will be spending more time in the garden this year.

I have a big garden. I don't know where I'd be without it, for my mental health. It is a lot of work but it keeps me busy and it is nice to be outside.

Currently I am tidying up from winter. We have lots of trees so everything is covered in leaves.

Tell me about your garden, and your plans?

I

Mayday thanks I'm a novice when it comes to planting fruit. I might also plant a BlackBerry shrub too as I had a bush where I used to live.

I've bought a clematis and a passion climber too.

We can help each other emilybrontescorsett!

A blackberry bush sounds lovely. I have gooseberries, blackcurrants and jostaberries alongside my self seeded raspberries everywhere. We usually lose them overnight to the little muntjac deer who visits them. I don't mind too much as I only really give it to my friend to make jam.

What clematis did you buy?

I put a pond in our garden 2 years ago, now filled with just hatched taddies. Also newts You're lucky! We've now got so many newts that we have to give the taddies asylum in a fish tank.

It was cold yesterday, so I didn't spend long in the garden. But there are so many green shoots everywhere. My lovely early flowering clematis has big fat buds already. :)

It was freezing yesterday! I wasn't out there long at all. Pruning massive fuchsias that I don't think have had a prune for at least 3 years.

Today I'm lifting some plants from the bed at the front laying weed membrane, replanting and covering with bark.

I was at physio yesterday so it's going to be slow going haha!

Just taken delivery of some new peony roses too, so I'll get them planted.

Can see some buds starting on my acer, really looking forward to spring.

Hi I've a success of Edinburgh clematis. Thinking of buying a rose but it says not to plant near/under trees and that's where I was thinking of putting it.
It's not my tree it's on the field behind my garden. I do cut the branches which hang onto my garden back and I have another rose in that position which appears to be doing well.

Duchess of Edinburgh that should be.
My early flowering clematis is budding too.

I have a rose under a tree (albeit not a large one) and it does great. It's about a million years old though and is more of a rose tree than a bush! The stem has grown alongside the tree and now it virtually covers the tree completely! It's a banksiae which may be worth a look for you?

You could always try it and move it if it wasn't happy.

I've been walking around for weeks in an anxious mess. This is exactly what I need, thanks OP. I'm a complete novice but really enjoying starting to grow things.

Our garden needs a complete overhaul and money is going to be a bit tight, but DH is putting it together tiny bit by tiny bit. We have a large shed and an old coal shed at the bottom. He's built an arch for climbers and sectioned off some lawn for the kids. I have a wild area and a mini orchard of 5 trees so far. Next we plan to put in a small ornamental garden.

Meanwhile I have an indoor garden that I've been working on with the kids, including several fruit seedlings that were an experiment from supermarket produce and some herbs, fruit and vegetables for planting out as the weather improves. We may keep some indoors.

The sun is beaming through the windows, the fresh air is incredible and I just felt the stress lift away tending to my houseplants this morning. It was a wonderful feeling. I can't wait to start getting out in the garden and seeing what we can make out of it!

Meanwhile, I have an indoor

I have a lovely big rambling rose next to my cherry tree - a Mme Alfred Carrie re that clambers through the (medium size) tree and up onto the shed roof. This year I'm hoping to train it over the path next to the shed and onto the pergola. The pergola was new last spring and has a very young wisteria making its way up one leg but it didn't get much beyond head height last year. Lots and lots of buds now though so I'm hopeful!

My garden is fairly typical London terrace size - - tho not as long and narrow as some. We're south west facing so things happen early: my apple tree now bursting into leaf and I have pots of gorgeous bright coral early tulips now in full flight and bringing me joy.

I'm asthmatic so we're in our house for the forseeable so am hoping to do a couple of gentle gardening hours a day. This week we sorted the pot situation, cleaned the ones not in use, arranged them for the best view from the dining table where we're working. This weekend I want to get some seeds started for the allotment. Next week there is a lot of weeding to be done to catch the evil bindweed early.

I replanted most of my beds last year (not the rose though which has been in for a few years) so thrilling to see all my tiny plants from last year coming back strong. My one-stem peony is back with multi-stems and loads of tiny buds already! I can see it growing practically day by day. Small things but important now.

Sounds fab hooki.

We moved last summer and have inherited a small woodland garden. Lovely surprises in the spring with a camellia and a beautiful pink prunus tree. A pink and white magnolia is also in bud. My husband has already built a wooden rose arch and rustic fencing. We've planted out the plants I managed to bring from our very large cottage garden in our old house. So far I've bought a red tree peony and some tulips for pots. Just ordered a load of seeds from Thompson and Morgan, mainly on a red, pink and white theme. My husband has made me a cold frame which is instead of my beloved greenhouse at our old house. I've also just bought some plug plants so I will have some colourful pots on the terrace. Gardening has saved me from despair on many occasions. I'm so happy that we managed to move last year - downshifting to be near our children. I am really happy with my little garden and looking forward to seeing it develop under our care.

I haven't done much in our garden up til now, but now we are stuck at home with the children I'm planning for us to grow things together as part of their home 'education'.
I've ordered seeds for beans and sweetcorn, as well as some strawberry plants and a potato growing bag.
I'd love some raspberry canes, but there's no point because at the moment we're renting and I'm not sure if we'll stay here long term.

I have a couple of flower beds in front of our flat and they are at their best at this time of the year as the wallflowers come out. I bought a pale yellow one 5 years ago or more and its offspring have self-seeded all over - pale yellow, bright yellow, brick red and this year a new one which is a sort of dark pink with pale yellow streaks as it ages. Some of them have been going for several years, I just have to prune them back a bit as they spread onto the path. Also purple Bowles Mauve wallflowers (bought separately), grape hyacinths, white daffodils and the odd tulip popping up here and there. I have a dark blue Ceanothus covered in buds waiting to burst out as well.

kizzywayfarer I love wallflowers, they remind me of my Dad and my childhood garden
I've planted loads of seeds today, leeks, cauliflower, calibrese and calendula. I feel so much better being able to be outside in the sunshine.

@DaphneduM a camelia and a magnolia - - sounds like a dream garden! I have neither and no space for adding sadly. But I adore seeing them flowering in other people's gardens. Good luck with establishing your new garden - - I replanted mine on quite a strict colour scheme of white, green, purple and orangey tones last year and thought it might be too restrictive. In fact having limits has really brought things together

@Tangelo - thank you. Someone must have had very good planting skills in terms of those trees and shrubs. The pink, dark pink and white blooms are echoed by the pinky red new shoots of a photinia - genius. Your colour scheme sounds stunning, those opposite colour wheel colours must be lovely, especially balanced with the white. What plants have you grown?

I'm always guilty of cramming too much in, I must try not to overdo it, as it's a very small space. But weirdly I've always said I would like a walled garden and it is just such a garden, walled in pink old sandstone.

@DaphneduM
Oh it sounds lovelier with each post.i would adore a walled garden. I have dreams of growing figs and peaches on warm garden walls. Maybe one day!

My new(ish) borders have verbena bonaseris, copper-coloured peonies, tangerine geums, purple sage, nigella, chives, white and apricot roses, and white foxgloves. Lots of scabious, penstemon, lavender and astratia, with clematis, passion flowers and jasmine on the fences.

I planted white daffs, alliums and orange tulips in autumn so it is starting to look very full already. Probably too full! But I like a generous garden, nothing too formal (tho I do actually have very geometric landscaping). I'm so glad it seems to have finally stopped raining and things are beginning to bloom!

A walled garden sounds absolutely wonderful!

Thank you all for keeping me company on this thread. I love hearing about your gardens and your plans - please keep posting!

We are just about to get out in the kitchen garden. I'm pulling in the mothers day privileges and both teenage DC and DH are coming out to help me get it into shape. The resource is needed since I have 7 large raised beds and 7 smaller ones and I haven't been out there for a couple of months.. Hopefully by the end of today it will be in a decent state for the growing season to come.

@Tangelo - your plants sound amazing! You're obviously a very knowledgeable gardener. I love the sound of your copper coloured peonies, white foxgloves, verbena boniarensis , roses and geums with the purple sage. How lovely. Penstemons are great, aren't they? Lovely colour at a time of the year when other flowers are beginning to fade. And so easy to propagate from cuttings. I do mine by putting them in a round small flowerpot and then a cut in half tonic bottle on top!!! I bought a lot of mine from my old garden and some babies that I'd propagated - can't remember the names, but they're bright red, a burgundy red and a lovely mauve with a white throat. I envy you your white foxgloves - makes me think I must grow some from seed!!! So beautiful out in the sun today - we sat on our little terrace with my daughter, son-in-law and baby grandson. I showed my son-in-law the cold frame as he is getting ideas about gardening now he is working from home for the foreseeable. We landscaped their original garden for them and planted it, so it will be lovely if they both get into gardening. Such a solace and all engrossing past-time. He did say he'd cut their lawn so the baby can crawl about in the playpen out there on a mat - we've still to tackle ours!!!

We've just had an extension so the small garden is now titchy. Trying to compensate by a) doing hyroponics inside for herbs and such like, and b) using vertical space more.

Just spent a couple of hours planting strawberries in a hanging felt pocket thing. So they are all on the fence now. Have bought lightweight felt growing bags for beans and peas so I can put them on the patio and grow them up the walls. Seedlings planted and sprouting.

Will order nematodes soon as the bastard slugs are poised, the little shits (see attached).

Productive day here. We dug up the last of the Christmas potatoes and so have another 40-50 potatoes in the store. Cleared 8 vegetable beds and covered them with chicken poop and bedding which we will dig in in a few days after the worms have pulled some down. We also cut dozens of runners off the strawberries and planted them in the strawberry beds, cut the straggly tops off the hedge and swept the patio. Lovely time with the family followed by a delicious roast dinner. Nice way of forgetting about the troubles.