first ever garden

Hi I am a complete beginner, neither me or my husband have had a garden before and now we have a 140 foot garden! we are complete beginners in so far as we are pleased we have mastered cutting the lawn and the hedges!!!
I planted some seeds in pots that grew but dies due to lack of water and im guessing over crowding too. we are going to have many many questions as time goes by.
we have a new baby and a toddler and so a lack of time to spend on the garden therefore will have to takje it all very slowly so we will start with the basics of lawncare.

our lawn seems to be clover than grass, is there anyway of changing it to more grass?

we have a small structure to remove that will leave a bare area of ground, is there a better time of year to plant grass seed?

a large area of lawn is very uneven and bumpy, how would we make it flat and even?

very basic questions i know but we really are complete beginners!!

 

Hi Clueless!

Welcome to GC

Regards, Clueless1

 

Hi! I'm new too.

"What to do" depends on a lot of things. How long do you intend to live at this house?

I'd suggest you try to think forward as to how you are going to use the garden over at least the next ten years. Draw diagrams on some graph paper.
Think about safety for your kids, secure fences, gates etc.,
Do you want an area for vegetables? You've room for it. If you decide later to have a greenhouse where will it go?
I'd stay away from water features with small kids, if you haven't already decided that.
Until you make up your minds just concentrate on maintenance, an autumn lawn treatment won't go amiss. As for the bare patch, if it isn't really big, I'd turf it as it's "cheap as chips." Grass seed isn't really the answer this late in the year. Have a look at photos of other people's gardens on here, they may give you some ideas, but you need patience, much of what you see probably took years of planning and hard work and still mistakes are made by the best, but it can be a lot of fun.

Best of luck!

 

Thanks for the advice, have decided gainst water feature and have good boundaries already fortunately. thanks for advice on grass seed, i have no idea of timings at all. lots of smaller things to tidy up before we start designing for the future, have been thinking already tho and will spend some time on these forums looking for ideas.

Hi clueless1 lol, as soon as id set up my name and started reading through i saw i wasnt the first clueless here, dont seem to be able to changemy name now, looks like we will have to be clueless together:dh:

 

Don't worry about We're not the only two, there is a 'clueless' registered too, although I haven't seen any posts from them for a long time.

 

Hi Clueless!-you will have to excuse me if I make any mistakes confusing you both.


Welcome to GC

 

"we have mastered cutting the lawn and the hedges"

Really? Great! Can you come round and make mine perfect too then please? :D

"our lawn seems to be clover than grass, is there anyway of changing it to more grass?"

Verdone Extra - possibly too late to embark on that until next Spring. Do NOT compost any clippings for a month or so (cut & leave on lawn is fine; if too shaggy them pile up somewhere where you have no intention of using them, and where nearby plants won't be harmed; don't put in council "green" bin)

Having said that, supposedly safe for pets etc :skp:

"is there a better time of year to plant grass seed?"

NOW !!

"a large area of lawn is very uneven and bumpy, how would we make it flat and even?"

Depends how bumpy - more than a couple of inches from Hump to Trough?

If not too bumpy you could spread some top dressing (good soil mixed with peat and sand), use a "lute" to spread it evenly (a ladder with some blocks on it for weight, and a couple of ropes attached for towing will do a good job). Then "over-seed" the areas where the grass is not easily poking through.

For bigger Humps / Troughs cut an H shape of slits, with a spade, centred on the depression / hump, peal back the two halves of turf, add or remove soil, replace turf, stamp down, water if it stays dry.

" I'd turf it as it's "cheap as chips.""

I don't think its cheap! £1 a sq.yard, at least. Soil preparation is the same as seed (so if your soil is lousy you've got to sort that out either way). If you already have a lawn that is half decent its a lot of work to convert it into a "seed bed" suitable for turf (but if you've just moved into a newbuild, and the house is surrounded by a foot of freshly imported tpsoil then its even-stevens between Turf and Seed I reckon)

"Grass seed isn't really the answer this late in the year"

Sorry, gotta disagree with that too. I think the first half of September is perfect. Its not going to need watering for months (as a Spring sown lawn will do during the following Summer), and the weeds are slowing down, soil is warm for initial germination and growth. OTOH Spring sown has cold soil, and weeds just getting cracking.

Downside of sowing seed is that its out of action to walk on until the following Spring (won't matter so much for over-seeding patches of an existing lawn though)