All advice/ideas greatfully welcomed!

Hi

My family and I are just about to move into permanent accomodation for the very first time (yippeeee) and with it comes a garden.

At the front of the house there is a small strip underneath the window that we can plant (currently housing a very neglected looking red rose at one end) a very small lawn (a patch of grass really), and at the back a small garden with a shaded end overlooked by several trees.

There's not much opportunity to plant in the back garden (but thats ok I don't mind container gardening and there is space for that on a paved bit nearer the top of the garden) except for the fact that we have a charming stone path which I would ideally love to dig a channel along either side and plant up.

Problem is we are complete beginners!

We've never gardened as such before unless you count mowing some grass now and again or sticking some lavender/roses in a pot (and that not always very succesfully).

I would love to plant some pretty things in my small spaces, plants that look lovely, smell nice but don't need an awful lot of looking after and that will come up for more than one year.

I love things like lavender, rose, peonies, herbs,sweet peas, night scented stocks, etc etc..nothing too formal (I like the idea of planting things in old enamel kettles/saucepans, that kind of thing).

We live up north, not far from the Pentlands so it gets pretty rough here in the winter, though I do think our back garden is quite sheltered (but definitely not the strip at the front), and even in summer it tends to be colder and wetter here than just a few miles away, so that needs to be taken into consideration too.

If anyone has any advice or thoughts we would be very greatful for them, thank you!

Hetty x

 

Hello Hetty and welcome to the forum.
I'm glad you've got your accommodation and a bit of a garden. You will be able to make it lovely. It's possible to do a lot with small spaces.
The year is quite far on now and what I would suggest to you is wait until you have moved in, take time to look at your space, see where the sun comes from and which areas are really shaded and windy. Look around the area and see what other people have done with similar spaces and what ideas you like. Take time to think about it and come back here with questions. Come spring you'll be ready to make it just the way you want it. Good luck and enjoy.

 

Hi Hetty, A nice start to next year would be some daffodils and crocuses, other than that I would try to gather as much info as you can about your garden-just like Alice says-your soil type, where the sun hits at certain times of the day etc. There isn't that much to do at this time of year apart from tidying up, and in doing so you will learn a lot about your treasured space.


And honestly don't be at all concerned about being a beginner-it is a very exciting place to be, and the more experienced still make enormous goof ups.

 

Now - there's your first great suggestion from Lollipop, Hetty.
If your dying to get something for your garden that you've planted yourself then daffodils is the way to go.
If you decide to go for that then come back and ask about growing daffodils in containers and I'm sure you'll get great advice to give you a really good show.

 

Apart from the excellent advice already given, there are many shade loving plants from which you'll be able to choose. A winter spent searching the 'net' or raiding the library gardening section will give you lots of ideas ... oh! and we like (before and after) piccies on here too!!

 

Thank you very much to everyone who replied! sorry it has taken me so long to get back to you, been totally caught up in moving/decorating and all the minutae that go along with that!

We've got a few things done in the garden - planted some roses and lavender in the front, which seem to be thriving so far - which I'm hoping will survive the winter with some tlc (there were old roses there before which had been totally neglected but were still blooming, so should do) -we have aquired a compost bin (not too sure what we are doing with that!) - and we have a garden shed coming..oh and we have a bird table! (but seem to be having difficulty in attracting any birds.)

Small beginnings, but it's dead exciting!

 

Hetty,
I'm pleased you are enjoying the garden! The results will be well worth the hard work you put in
The birds will come-have you put different types of food on the table? I put different seed in each feeder and I hang fat balls everywhere. The birds are so grateful in the winter. One of the best things I got was a tulip shaped feeder on a spike which I put in the flower border and have a regular robin who has it to himself
If you haven't a cat you could try some ground feeders.

 

Hi Hetty,

Good luck with the new house.. i'm sure you'll have great fun getting the garden in shape too. Although you can't do much over the winter you can have containers full of bulbs filling your garden full of colour from early spring. You might be able to get hold of snowdrops too and they don't even wait for spring. As for the birds.. well if you supply food they will come. If you can get niger seed you will soon have loads of Goldfinches virtually living in your garden; you'll soon see why its called a 'charm' of Goldfinches.
Good luck, let us know how you're getting on.

Ian. TDH.

 

Thanks both for your replies :gnthb:

I've got some bulbs that I bought to try and plant in tubs - bluebells, dwarf narcissi, fritillaria and hyacinth - no idea how they will do but will give it a go.

I would love snowdrops too (and muscari) so will try those too.

I was wondering about planting them among the stuff I've put on the small strip at the front of the house (I've planted roses, lavender and pinks - hoping the lavender and roses will survive, not sure about the pinks but I love the smell of them so wanted to try) so that it would have something growing in the spring but I'm not sure how to do it (how deep? do I just plant them randomly? will they damage the already planted stuff? will they come up every year/spread?)

We also managed to get 2 twisted stem small bay trees for the front door from Ebay at a very reasonable price, those seem to be ok so far too.

It could all go very wrong I know, but it's dead exciting!

Ref:the birds.. we live in a fairly rural location and our new house is literally 5 mins from where we were before..where we were before bordered onto a strip of wood (here we just look at it in the distance) and the garden was teeming with wildlife..squirrels, loads of different birds (including a much heard but never seen woodpecker and owl) and there was even a tamish fox that came around and the odd rabbit...now though the only birds I see seem to be bigger ones such as the ones that like shiny stuff (I forget their name, sorry!) and very few of the smaller ones (which I prefer), which is strange because we do still have some trees nearby.

Husband thinks it's because it takes time to attract birds and also possibly because of the fact that we are drowning in pets (not us but neighbours) - next door has 3 cats and other next door a cat and two dogs.

I'm not sure how I can overcome that if thats the case as copious amounts of birdseed/peanuts don't seem to be working.

I did buy a Bill Oddie (attatch to the) window birdfeeder yesterday in the hope that the small birds might feel safer using that, not sure it will work though.

The bird table is currently in the back garden, I wonder if it might be better in the front garden, just think it might look a bit poncy there.

God bless,

Hetty.

 

Have just been washing the dishes and gazing out the kitchen window..I noticed that there were a pair of either Blue Tits or Great Tits (I think perhaps the latter due to the size) on next doors fence..watching them they seemed to be picking stray chipboard fibres off the roof of the garden shed ..nestbuilding or something?

Anyhow I've put the window bird feeder up on the windw, it'sa very near them, perhaps I'll have some luck with it

 

Hi Hetty
We moved here just 2 years ago next month it was a new build bungalow,
we put out feeders and fat balls and trays for scraps of meat etc,
After 2/3 months i had to clear everything out, the fat balls had gone horrid,the peanuts were dessicated and the seeds sprouting.
Not a bird ,then slowly they started coming and now we have a fair selection.
We lived before in a ground floor flat and the small garden was surrounded by bushes, we had an amazing selection , my favourite was the nuthatches i really miss them, i am unlikely to get any here as its a different habitat

 

Thanks Pam, I really appreciate your reply.

No takers so far with the window feeder, or much of anything on the bird table, but you give me hope to persevere!

It's sad to lose all my wildlife (unless you count my teenagers!) but we will keep trying!