Inspire me with your garden plans! - Ideas for this year - I'm a bit stuck

[BBQHulaHoops]

I am usually longing to get out and into the garden by this time, eager for spring and full of plans for the year, but this year not so much. Didn't manage much last year either. Nothing was doing particularly well last year either - dahlias didn't flower, peonies were a bit pathetic, cerbena is just leggy and irritating, clematis wer pathetic. Rose did brilliantly. Everything feels like it needs moving or starting again.

Leaving things for the birds means it all looks a bit of a mess and it's been grey and soggy for weeks. I always want more flowers but never manage it and the snails decimate everything.

What are you planning to do? Veg? Cut flowers? Rewilding? Drawings, pictures, mood boards most welcome.

We've had several disasters befall our garden in the last year or so - two separate water leaks several months apart, which meant whole areas had to be dug up so the leaks could be mended, and a dreaded mole which made the most unbelievable mess over the space of about three weeks before it migrated into next door's garden, where their dog had it.

So much stuff is overgrown or has got out of hand, and we seem to have lost nearly all our bulbs and a fair few perennials to saturation when we had the leaks.

I sit at the dining table staring out at the garden and it depresses me!

Last year was pretty rubbish. But things are perking up in my garden now - Daphne and sarcocca are working hard and smelling lovely, and bulbs are popping up all over.

My big plan is to replant one of the patio beds. The tree that made it shady has bloody died (definitely dead) so now it's in full sun. Taking advantage by planting grasses, tall verbena, rudbeckia etc for a sort of hot prairie look. Which means relocating all the ferns. I have a small garden so something else is going to have to come out so the ferns can go in, which is fine by me.

My plan this year is to add lots of pots and planters to my small tropical-ish garden. I want my patio to be bursting with colours and beautiful foliage. I’ve just started lots of canna tubers indoors, and have started multiple batches of elephant ears (Colocasia esculenta) which I’m trying to grow from corms for the first time. I also want to add some Brugmansia in pots, and try my hand at growing stuff from seed for the first time - maybe some ipomoea, cobea, cleomes and amaranthus. I would like more climbers too and I’m annoyed at my lazy clematis, so I’m moving on to star Jasmine and some annual climbers.

I think I’ve got enough trees and shrubs, so the structure is in place and just needs time to grow and fill the space. So all I’ve got to do now is to plant herbaceous plants more densely.

Last summer I had a really lovely flush of red coming from the crocosmias for a few weeks. They are cheap and easy to grow from bulbs, and really lit up the garden. My bananas also did really well, they multiplied and I now have nice clumps which I’m hoping will be even bigger this year. Salvia (amistad and pink) looked lovely until the first frost, I’m hoping they will return. Eucomis (pineapple lilies) stayed gorgeous for months, they are no-maintenance and fill the space well under palm trees.

I try to avoid plants that are susceptible to slugs and snails. Ferns, Crocosmia, Colocasia, Brugmansia, cannas, bananas, salvias, Eucomis are all impervious to them.

Last year was a tough gardening year - we had such a wet winter, a lot of my bulbs rotted in the ground and everything got eaten by slugs as it emerged. Then a dull summer, everything flowered late and it was all a bit underwhelming. I'm hoping this year will be better!

I've been clearing dead leaves and cutting back perennials since maybe mid-Jan, so that the early bulbs are uncovered (just a bit when I have time). Just one more area to do, and next weekend I intend to get some manure from the garden centre and spread it over the bits of the garden that need it.

I've successfully grown a lot of autumn-sown annuals this year, so I have tons of snapdragons and larkspur to plant out in April. You could start some hardy seeds now?

I am glad the consensus seems to be that last year was a bit tough! Lots of good colourful ideas here - though @Koulibiak your amazing garden sounds like it is not in the UK!

We have a lot of well established shrubs and too many trees for a small garden, but I love the shade and privacy they give. I think it may be time to move things around though, and possibly get rid of some things that just aren't working.

Am I allowed to dead-head and cut back the hyrnagea yet? It look awful.

Not the hydrangea just yet, not until March. Have a Google. I think pretty much everything else enough. Roses can definitely be tackled now.

I would advise going to a garden centre/nursery right now. I went yesterday, bought three lovely plants (two ferns and a heuchera), all ripe for splitting -I think I'll get three plants from each, easily. The staff seemed to be working their way through dividing all the plants up, so I'm very smug I got there in time!

Lovely to get out at the moment and see how much is actually flowering - I wouldn't have realised, but my hellebores and sweet box are both doing lovely.

On the slugs - when it's a bit warmer, get some nematodes - they work so well, I don't think I lost anything to the slugs last year, even the hostas were untouched.

@BBQHulaHoops definitely in the UK 😊! I’m in London, but you’d be surprised at the number of tropical (or tropical looking) plants that are hardy enough. There are lots of tropical gardeners with amazing gardens all over the country, some of the most famous are in Cornwall (obvs) but also in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, e.g. the Secret garden of Louth.

I actually think it's snails and I don't think the nematodes work on them? i have used the nematodes a couple of times and they help, but the snails are still rampant. But good advice on a garden centre trip now. I definitely need more ferns.

I'm going to plant some topiary cloud hedging around my sunken eating area. I'll be using ilex crenata as it seems to like living in my garden.

@mastercheat I love cloud pruned trees. I’ve been watching lots of videos on how to cloud prune, but am still a bit scared to take the plunge. Do you prune them yourself? Please share pictures! (@BBQhulahoops sorry for highjacking your thread ☺️)

@Koulibiak I'm not creating a cloud tree - it's cloud hedge - something like this the topiary balls will be random sizes and will form a hedge of sorts
www.crowntopiary.co.uk/topiary-cloud-hedging

To brighten up a garden in a low bit, head to a garden centre and buy whatever is colourful and cheap and group it, perhaps in its pots, wherever it’ll make most impact. Treat it like a bunch of flowers. A parch of brightness in one spot helps you appreciate the subtle beauties of non-flowering growth elsewhere.

And whatever else you don’t do, trim your lawn edges. Makes the whole garden look cared for.

Beer traps for slugs & snails - I catch loads every year. Put them out early, the more you catch in early Spring the less there are to breed, less overall all year. Have also heard marmite traps work well (marmite mixed with water), going to try that too this year. I re use the bottom half of a plastic milk bottle for the traps.

I’ve just cut back a bay bush that was taking over the bed beside the house. It was here when we moved in and not the best place for a large shrub. I’ve taken out the low bushy branches and left the top so that it looks more like a tree. This has opened up all the bed beneath it. Once I finish the clearing of the whole bed I’m going to add either Mediterranean plants such as lavender or rosemary or just some colourful summer perennials.