Starting from bare earth

[HarrietJonesFlydaleNorth]

How do I do this! We've got a digger coming in a few weeks to do some demo work and move some earth around so the ground will be bare earth.

I would like to plant something like a food forest, so lots of planting - trees, shrubs, climbers, then flowers and annual veg, maybe with a small seating area somewhere. Paths running through but no lawn to mow!

Do I just cover the whole lot in woodchip or other mulch and then plant stuff? Will that keep the weeds down until the planting is established?

Ive only ever had a grass with borders, and veg patch type of garden so not sure how to manage with what will pretty much be a plot of mud!

How big an area are you talking about?

How long do you expect it to take you to plant up?

No, just some wood chip/mulch will not be sufficient to suppress weeds, but timeframe depends on what else you need to do.

Budget is also relevant, the mulch alone for a large area could be prohibitively expensive, let alone cost of plants.

Do you have a plan? How much experience/knowledge do you have?

Ugh I was fearing this! It's about twice the size of our previous garden which was a three bed semi.

Hoping to get it all planted up this year - I know it's not ideal but I can't realistically do it all quickly.
Maybe I could plant some green mulch? I have budget to buy a couple of trees (plum and cherry) and bushes and shrubs, but it's all the spaces in between 😐

I'm afraid I'm very inexperienced and it's not what I would choose as a starting project but I can't afford to get someone in to do it!

Woodchips, or bark mulch, or similar would do the job for a while if you put it down thick enough. But cost may be prohibitive if you have a large area.

So if you are planning to plant it all up this year then use cardboard (flatten Amazon boxes etc).under your mulch. Will block out more light and mean you don't have to mulch so thickly. It will slowly decompose and act as a mulch itself too (just make sure you remove any tape).

For areas that might take longer you can use the bags that your compost/mulch comes in as a weed suppressant. Cut them so they are flat and put them black side up. You don't have to mulch on top of those (but you can if you want to). You can use stones etc to hold them down. It won't be very pretty but will keep the weeds down until you can get to it.

Re planting... Now is a great time to buy bare root plants which are much cheaper and can establish quicker. I found the concept of bare root plants daunting before I'd dealt with them, but they are easy peasy (you just have to plant them or pot them quite quickly).

https://www.wob.com/en-gb/books/martin-crawford/creating-a-forest-garden/9781900322621?cq_src=google_ads&cq_cmp=19583702814&cq_con=&cq_med=pla_with_promotion&cq_plac=&cq_net=x&gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiA5rGuBhCnARIsAN11vgSHelhCnKUWGkCeVMllC8ZJUJo5-zOc9BbNu29ZSJAGLZFpE6Yn7uQaAhI6EALw_wcB#GOR005238079 this book is really worth a look.

Personally, I wouldn't rush. Take your time establishing a good foundation. Also, some things are better planted at different times of the year.

We started from scratch with a garden where nothing had been done for many years. Weeds, a few scrubby shrubs, diseased trees and honey fungus. Not much topsoil, compacted over builders' rubble. No worms or ecosystem to speak of.

We focused on the borders. 1m deep on three sides of an approx 10m by 10m garden. First we cleared. Stripped out pretty much all the plants. Left 3 shrubs and 1 tree that showed no signs of disease, but pruned them all drastically. Dug everything else over and ground out all stumps. Removed sackfuls of stones and builder's rubble.

Next we started improving the soil. We spread composted manure densely over the borders. 10 sacks IIRC. Then covered it all with gardening membrane. Then covered the membrane with bark chips. Another 10 sacks.

And then we left it alone for nearly a year while I had another baby and started thinking about what I wanted to plant. The garden looked simple and neat. The shrubs that we left thrived in the cleared borders.

When I was ready to plant anything, I would cut a cross in the membrane and plant through it. The soil beneath was lovely - moist and diggable, with lots of worms and a thriving ecosystem. No weeds! Pretty much everything I planted did well.

Ah brilliant thank you all! I had heard about putting cardboard down but stupidly wasn't sure if it would then need removing before planting 🤦🏻‍♀️

I think we can get woodchip fairly cheap where we live so a combination of cardboard and woodchip and then adding plants as and when I can looks like the way forward.

I know you're addressing a different type of garden. Are you talking about the sort of plants which would do better on poor soil? Or, if you're looking to create a woodland, do they need leaf mulch?

I don't think I would try to plant it all up in one go. Maybe work from the outside inwards, or from the paths outwards. Put the slower-growing plants in first, or the plants which will provide shade for other plants.

Whatever you do, cover the unplanted soil to prevent unwanted plants establishing themselves. I'm not keen on reusing the plastic sacks. They're non breathable, so could encourage the wrong sort of mold, and they're not biodegradable, so need removing and could leave behind microplastics. Membrane, carpet off cuts or cardboard are better options. Wood chips hold them down and looks better.

@Dilbertian I don't disagree with you, but they are free and I have so many of them that at least it's reusing some waste instead of creating more (which membrane would ultimately do as I would also lift that before planting, and it also creates micro plastics).

I do worry about the fact they aren't breathable. But they are temporary. I have a large garden that I'm starting virtually from scratch. So in the grand scheme of things the time they are done for should be more than cancelled out in the decades to come.

Morrisons it great for small cheap plants. They need a few years to get going, but that's the joy of gardening.
I would focus on annuals. Grow them from seed, it's super cheap. Caldenula is crazy easy to grow and looks lovely on mass. Love in a mist is easy to grow. Poppies, Chives are surprisingly pretty. Throw in some gladiolus bulbs, very cheap and pretty.
Plant as much as you can, bare soil is a nightmare to keep the weeds off, plants are the best for weed suppression. I agree with the cardboard and mulch suggestion. I did that for a large bare garden once. I just cut holes and put plants in. The weed membrane is really bad for soil health so I'd avoid that.

I would also start some perennials, as next year they will flower. If you wait until it warms up, you don't even need a greenhouse.

Also look on Facebook, or ask gardeners, I regularly give plants and seeds to people.

If you don't have trees and want them, I'd start them a few years before anything else. See forest gardening book above. Decide where you want the trees, plant them, then I'd honestly just sow a grass/clover seed mix for the next few years, leaving at least a 2ft circle around the trees. Then take up grass as you want it. Cheaper than membrane/sacks of bark, nicer to sit out on in summer and it'll protect your soil and keep weeds at bay.

Weed membrane is biodegradable. At least, most of what we bought was. (We made a mistake with our first roll, and it is still in situ, not degraded at all.) both sorts have been excellent for our soil. Perhaps because of all the manure we added. I expect just suppressing poor soil isn't going to improve it.

OTOH reusing what you have available is the most sustainable choice.

Ah you were already onto my suggestion with the 'green mulch'- yes, clover is great and fixes nitrogen. I think this would work well.

If you are looking for plum and cherry trees, I was in Tesco yesterday and they had their two for £12(? or thereabouts) bare root trees in now. Unless you are looking for a particular rootstock/variety, you might consider buying them and planting in a pot for the moment if money is a limiting factor.

Just be aware woodchip can change the PH levels so keep that in mind when planting.
Other things to consider: shade, drainage, tender or hardy, sheltered or exposed, spreading or contained, low maintenance or higher maintenance? Plant according to conditions and your plants / shrubs and trees should all do well.
I prefer using weed blanket as weed control. I have wood chips for my acid loving plants, but not for anything which needs neutral / alkaline soil.

Brilliant thank you all! Yes I think I will go with getting a couple of trees in and then sowing grass/clover to protect the soil. Maybe try to work out some paths and mulch them or pave them. Stupidly I hadn't really thought of grass as I don't want a lawn, but it'll do fine for a few years and give me time to see how the drainage is and plant other stuff accordingly.

I'll also get some annuals in to help the look of it - it's a complete building site at the moment and quite depressing.

I don't mind hard work but I didn't want to end up doing stuff wrong and then twice, so this will hopefully mean I'm in less of a rush.

Lucky you! You need to get reading. We’re downsizing, I’ve some excellent ones you’d be welcome to. What part of the country are you in?

If you have suitable access to the garden you may be able to get woodchip free: https://freewoodchips.co.uk/