I'm new to gardening - HELP!

Hi, I'm new to the site as I've just moved to a new house and need some advice about the garden.

The house is over 100 yrs old and has a mature garden. There is a hawthorn hedge and a border of Cherry blossom trees. Then there are big shrub / bushes which at present are brown in colour. I believe they may be Rhoddedendrons (spelling??).

I also have an area with large tall spiky plants which are also brown and dried up looking.

My question is really whether I need to cut away all the brown dead looking flower heads / stalks or should I leave them be?

Apologies if this is so simple and thanks in advance to anyone who answers!

Edit to say - I'm in Cornwall, not sure if climate is an issue for this question.

[ 06. February 2006, 05:21 PM: Message edited by: lorniewill ]

 

rhoddies will not be brown. could be hydrangea ..... best to ask neighbours maybe

 

Welcome to the board!

Unless they have died Rhodies are evergreen and should have smooth waxy dark green leaves with loads of swelling flower buds just now. They could be Azeleas which are deciduous, if so leave them as the buds will soon break open and be a mass of flower with the leaves coming along as well or soon after. Touch them now and you will loose the blossom.

With any old established garden my advice would be to leave it pretty much as it is for the first year, just tidying and weeding to keep things under control. Take notes and photographs so you can identify what you want to keep and what bulbs etc are where. Any obviously dead plants or trees can come out but otherwise just enjoy the surprises.

The dead looking tall spikey plants could be anything but keep checking round about the base of the plant for new spring growth. Once it's grown a few inches you can then remove any untidy old flower spikes from the base as this old material does help to protect new growth from strong winds. Frost shouldn't be too much of a problem in Cornwall and if they are really untidy cut them down with a pair of shears to about a foot high. Check one stem first - if it's hollow it will likely be an old spike but if it's solid and woody with what looks like buds on then leave well enough alone untill you can get a positive ID. Post pics here and someone will know what it is

 

Thank you. I'll put the shears away for now!

It's dark now but I'll try and get some photos tomorrow.

 

I quite agree with both Frogesque and Lady gardener - don't do anything until you see what happens through spring and summer. If you could put up some photos, that would help a lot. By and large, with things that look like they've died, probably it's last year's growth that's died, and it'll be protecting the new growth, so be careful if you tidy up. Have a look under the dead stuff, and if you see new green things happening, you'll have to do a balancing act between protecting the new growth from expected or unexpected frosts, and avoiding disease that might lurk under dead material! My advice would be to trim back the dead growth to make it tidy, but keep enough to giove protection against the frost, etc. Then, in April, say, the new growth can take over, or you can do a tidying up job around the new growth.