Trunky's New Garden

@Trunky I agree that marrying my Suffolk man opened the doors to my acceptance in Suffolk I was told by a local historian that in this area (most easterly coast), local people possess an inbuilt mistrust of strangers. He claimed it was because of the viking invasions and more recently, the herring wars.
I agree @shiney, getting involved is the key to becoming accepted in any place you move to. I've found gardeners are universally friendly and helpful and since joining my local Horticultural club I've made many friends.

 

Couldn't agree more alana. Although our village has lost both its shop and pub, there is a core of community minded people here who organize and run various events which benefit the local community in some way. They're always looking to recruit new helpers and I've volunteered my services a few times now, it's a good way to make friends and meet people.

Of particular interest to me is the village's annual plant sale. Almost all the plants sold are grown by the villagers themselves, in many cases simply by potting up seedlings which appear in the garden, or by dividing, taking cuttings or growing from seed.

I managed to contribute a few plants this year and I've already got some on the go for next year's sale, I also helped man one of the tables selling plants - it proved to be an excellent way to meet people and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

A little more progress over the past couple of weeks.

I planted up this small bed by the front door today, using some of the plants I propagated from the previous garden before we moved last year. The bed sits against a north facing wall, with the front door facing east, so I chose plants which don't mind shade and will tolerate being confined to a fairly small space.

In the corner is an Athyrium filix-femina (Lady Fern), there are two Sarcococca (Christmas Box) and the rest of the bed is filled with a mix of two varieties of Euonymus - Silver Queen and Emerald 'n' Gold. This mixture should provide year round interest, with the bonus of the lovely fragrance from the flowers of the Sarcococca right outside the front door in winter.



Last weekend I planted some evergreen climbers against the trellis around the new oil tank. I've used a mixture of three different evergreen climbers - Japanese honeysuckle, Trachelospermum and Winter Jasmine. I don't know how well this combination will work, I'm going on the theory that all three have different flowering times and different foliage so they should provide interest and colour throughout the year.





The next stage will be to create a small bed in front of the trellis, using mostly low growing plants which will set off the climbers while helping to further soften the appearance of the tank and trellis.

The new bed we planted in April is still looking quite colourful, the Rudbeckias are still flowering and the dwarf asters are now at their best.





We have plenty of jobs planned for the coming winter. One of them will be to give this Horse Chestnut a tidy up and reduce the crown slightly. I'd like to keep it roughly at its present size, there are a few crossing branches in the crown and the tree overhangs both the neighbours garden and the lane which runs along the bottom of our garden, so I don't want to let it get too large.



There's also a small dead flowering cherry nearby which I'm going to remove. This area is at the bottom of the garden and has several other small trees, which provide a mixture of shade and sunny patches in summer - I'm going to leave some of the grass areas long and try to establish some wild flower areas in amongst the trees.

 

Your garden's coming on well Trunky. It's nice to see the colourful bed too, something that is missing from my gardens at present. What soil type do you have, like mine it looks very dry?

With the first year having moved on for both of us I think we're now getting a feel for what we want to achieve. Hopefully next year will be a little easier out there having got over the move and the worst of the issues that came with it.

 

You have done a lot of work there and it is all looking great.

 

You're right Sheal, it's very light, sandy soil here and if you dig down a couple of feet you come to a layer of flint, so it's very free draining. Added to that, the whole garden is south facing and slopes gently away from the house, so waterlogged soil is never going to be a problem here.

The soil in our last garden was similar, so I'd worked out over the years which plants were happy in this soil type. I brought several of them with me in the form of potted up plants and seeds I collected before we moved.

Absolutely Sheal. We've had a year of upheaval and we're only now beginning to feel a bit more settled, I expect it's been the same for you. I must admit there were times when getting out and doing stuff in the garden was the only thing which kept me sane.

We've got plenty of jobs lined up for the winter already - while we have definite plans for some areas, there are other parts where our plans are still quite fluid. I do think it's better sometimes to let a garden gradually 'evolve' and wait for those occasional sparks of inspiration as you tend and develop your plot.

Do you have a clear idea of how you want your garden to develop yet, or are you still dithering like me?

 

My last garden had sandy soil being coastal but now I have sandy loam sitting on a rock bed which is even more of a challenge. Like yours my garden also slopes away but to the south east.

I remember seeing the pictures of all the plants you potted up. It's a shame I couldn't do the same, but then many of the plants may not have survived here.

I've had very little time outside this year. The first six months I spent furnishing our home and emergency diy-ing. Then four separate lots of relatives decided they'd like a cheap holiday and between them that was a month written off. I could have said no but at least it gave me a break - out and about doing the tourist thing with them.

I like your thinking about letting the garden evolve. I'm the same. I never plan ahead and I don't like routine so all my decisions are spur of the moment.

Not so much dithering as I have a rough idea where it's going but I won't make any real decisions until it's under control, it's been neglected for years. I'm guessing on three years before it starts to look anything like a decent garden.

I think as time moves on for both of us the 'feel' of the gardens will develop. Also any parts of the garden we've already changed could well be changed again. It's all a case of what the minds eye sees and what clicks into place as the gardens progress.

 

This weekend saw the start of what we're calling 'Operation Wisteria'.

One of the things we inherited in this garden was a huge, sprawling clump of Wisteria about 12ft in diameter. It hadn't been trained over anything and had simply formed a dense, tangled thicket which continued to root and spread ever further as the year progressed.

It turned out to be Wisteria sinensis, one of the largest and most vigorous varieties, not really suited to this smallish garden. We actually have two of them, the other plant is trained over a pergola under a small beech tree and is happily scrambling up both, in the spring it produced a far better display of flowers than the 'thicket' one.

I want to create more new beds and maybe a vegetable patch in that area of the garden anyway, so we decided it had to go. Stage one of the operation was to cut down all the top growth and dismantle the 'den' or whatever it was, nestled in the middle of the clump.

Before. The sprawling beast in all its glory.



Several hours later. The 'den' is revealed. Or is it a very draughty dog kennel?



Nearly gone.



Gone.



I filled up six builder's bags with all that top growth! Stage two next weekend promises to be fun - digging out and clearing the mass of rooted, tangled stems and layered shoots left behind.

 

Well, I've done it!

Operation Wisteria is finished - mission accomplished.

Today I set about removing the last of the main stump with my trusty mattock. After a few hours of digging, hacking and chopping, the damn thing finally came out.

As you can see the central stump was quite a hefty beast, it certainly gave me a good workout getting that out of the ground.







Removing that huge, sprawling mass has opened up that area quite nicely, so now we can start getting creative with our plans for that part of the garden.

 

Well done Trunky! Would you like to come and tackle my Bamboo please?