Total Beginner

Hi all

I am a total beginner an know absolutly nothing about gardening, but need to do something with some large borders in our newly rented house.

I dont want to spend to much on this as its only a rented house an although we are planning on being here for 2 years its pointless spending to much time or money sorting this.

The borders are on the southside so get sun most of the day, when its sunny that is lol.

Would like something that will fillout really quick and easy to get the borders looking reasonable, they are totally bare near enough at the min and look a mess.

So cheap easy to maintain border, I know that is probley what alot of people want an its not that simple but it dont need to look great just better than mud with weeds growing.

Any advise on this would be great.
Cheers
John

 

The problem is at this time of year totally bare doesn't really mean a lot. What looks like a dead plant to spring to life soon.......in spring . Do you mean its just dirt by bare, or there are dead looking plants?

Oh and welcome to GC :D

 

Yeah its all pretty much just dirt, all the old plants were ripped out by the guys doing the main refurb work of the house by the look of it so I gotta do something now there is a couple of bush type plants in there but 90% just empty dirt that needs something planting, just not got a clue whats going to make up an easy border to maintain and be cheap to do.

 

As you only plan to be there for two years I would suggest annuals. They grow really quickly, give you a full show in a year (as they only live that long) and will not break the bank.

If you go to the garden centre you can get trays of small annuals. Even better value at the nurseries.

 

i would mix a few perennials with annual seed sowing and bedding plants, that way you would have colour straight away and colour coming on through the year.
there are plenty of perennial to choose from, obtainable from car boots, markets etc. at reasonable prices or free of course from friends and familys gardens, these increase yearly so i'm sure a few can be spared. some border examples are lupins, grannys bonnets(aqueligia),poppy's,irises,scabious, primulas,catmint, perennial cornflower etc. all these should show flowers relatively quickly and there are lots of annual flower seeds you could sow now like 'love in a mist', clarkia,marigolds, candytuft etc. which will all flower this year and in the meantime there are plenty of bedding plants on sale which will give you instant colour from now or at least after all danger of frost has gone, just bung em all in,lol, and see the difference. good luck.

 

Carnt belive my luck, I went an got a load of stuff an got them planted over the last week couple of Hardy Fuchsias, load of Dwaf Lupines and Pansies and few others carnt remember their names top of my head now. An woke up this morning to a light frost just hope they can cope with it or wat a waste of time an money that was.

 

Well looks like they are all fine anywayz, thankfully. Would have been gutted if they all died after all my hard work.