Mrs C's new garden tool..

I have been creating a new border over the last two days.. the ground is clay and had set rock solid with the dry weather. I meant to do it in the spring but have been waiting for rain to soften the soil. No such luck.
Unperturbed I dug around in the shed and unearthed the pick axe, wielding said axe I took off the top layer of clay and broke up the soil beneath to a forks depth chucked in three bags of soil improver and compost soaked it with last nights saved bath water and mixed the lot up to a workable loam, edged the border and planted it up. It looks good but it was a lot of graft but if the weather continues to be this dry I guess others will be turning to pick axes to do the digging.

Mrs C
(pooped but chuffed with my new border)

 

Good job I didn't pop by today then:D

Been digging my clay out bit by bit and posting it by taping freepost junk mail envelopes to it.

 

Good job Chopper. It doesn't take much to make me turn to the pick, its my favourite garden tool

I had no option but to use the pick on my back garden when I first moved in here. The ground was (and largely still is) all clay, and it had become so compacted that my spade just wouldn't touch it, even with me balancing on it and hopping up and down like a mad man.

 

Our first garden was solid clay and hadn't really been touched since the house was built 6 years earlier. My Father (who after 30 years of battling with his clay had pretty much got it tamed), rummaged around in his garage to find and lend us his pick axe which hadn't been used for years. We took it home, waited for some rain then, Mr. F'smum - remembering everything he'd been shown on how to use it correctly without doing himself a permanent injury - raised the thing, let it go and .... the head stuck firmly in the ground while the handle snapped in two, leaving Mr. F'smum holding nought but a 15" piece of wood!

 

Very hard work Mrs C but so worth it now you will enjoy planting up.

What are you going to plant.

Can we have a before and after photo please.

 

I'm hoping now its broken up a bit the rain , if we ever get any will soak in instead of running off. But the pick axe is definately living in the garden shed from now on .

Hey Zig's you should pop round and you can have some plants to replace the ones that got damaged, we have loads that REALLY need to go in the ground now as they are starving in their pots.

Mrs C

 

I feel like a big wuss now. Am waiting for a man with a digger to come and dig out my new bed! It took me three days to dig an outline. It is 24 feet by 7 and very rocky as well as basically clay. We will need literally a lorry load of topsoil to fill it. And that will have to be barrowed (by us) from the top of the drive 70 yards away. Maybe I'm not such a wuss.

 

You need one of these Lorna.

JCB Dumpster Wheelbarrow Hire | Electric Wheelbarrow High Tipping Wheelbarrow

 

Wow, Ziggy, just wait until the other half sees that! Thank you - it might just be the answer. Then I'll be even more of a wuss, of course!

 

Might be tricky as I didn't do a before and now it's after, and there's no way I'm putting it all back!!

Mrs C