What's eating my seedlings? Beginner/ new garden

Hello, a question by way of introducing myself to the forum!

We rent a terraced back to back which has a small garden in the front. It's one of those patchy lawns with borders types. When we moved in eight months ago, the borders had been dug over but it had clearly been suffering from neglect for a few years. There are two hydrangeas that seem to do well in, and that was it. Some unidentified weed had colonised the borders, don't know what it is but it's easy enough to remove. Basically, it was a wasteland with some remnants of a garden in.

It gets some sun in the afternoon, but half is quite shaded. The soil is clay type and one border doesn't look like it drains very well.

I'm planting slowly whilst trying to manage cost (bearing in mind we rent, I'm working with the layout as is and just planting the borders, mostly from seed). Some things are working and some aren't. The thing that is driving me crazy at the minute is something is eating my young plants and new shoots and it's driving me crazy. I'm wondering what it is and what I can do to manage it. This is my first year gardening - last year I had a balcony full of seed trays and plant pots, but even this small garden brings it's own challenges!

What's getting eaten: any of the seeds I planted directly into the soil (sorrel, dill, spring onions). The alliums got slug damaged but survived. My poor tarragon survived the winter but any new growth is consistently nibbled off. Some snakeshead fritillerie did really well, others got completely nibbled. Some bedding annuals I put in have not put in any spring growth, which could be they got killed off over winter, or something is eating any new growth. The beetroot seedlings I got given in a tray and haven't yet planted: nibbled.

What does the damage look like? Like a big bite has been taken out of the plant, or it's leaves have been sliced off.

What's not getting damaged? The blasted weed, whatever it is, that was the only thing growing in the garden apart from the hydrangeas. Any established plant. Weirdly, the mangetout which I planted out as a youngish seedling are relatively untouched?

The garden is full of pests that have probably lived off unidentified weed for years, and are now enjoying my tasty additions. Slugs (I've done two rounds of pellets, second time round not half as many corpses). Ants. Aphids (they love my fritellerie). Earwigs. But are any of these able to completely write off seedlings as I describe? And what can I do to give my seedlings a chance to get established? The beetroot seedlings got nibbled and they weren't in the soil... Is this rodent damage?

 

Here are some photos which might be useful?



This is one side of the garden. Note the sorry looking lawn - my plan is just to mow it. I'm not a fan of lawns, if I could I'd get more beds and less lawn. It has dandelions and other weeds in it.



This is the other side of the garden. Again, attractive concrete path I can't do much about!

This is my beetroot with bites out of it



And this is the blasted weed, if anyone can identify it I'd be interested!



Any help re plant eating greatly appreciated!

 

Ah yes, didn't think about the lawn as hiding place. You mean disturbing the surface of the soil in the beds, yes? And not sure what you mean by plugs (not great on my tech terms )- some of the bedding perennial plants were plugs and have survived. The beetroot pictured is from seed, grown in the seed tray by my mum and still not put them in the soil yet. Am a bit nervous once they're in the soil they'll get totally eaten.

 

Those blasted slugs are still eating everything, and I swear my garden looks the same as those photos from months ago! We cut the lawn, and I've bought some weed and feed for the lawn in the vain hope it might improve things. It has quite a lot of speedwell in it which I'm sorry to kill off as I think it's pretty. I'm not such a fan of the dandelions and other oddments in there though.

I went a month with no slug pellets and they went crazy. I started picking them off, over a 100 in my tiny garden. I bought some little viola and put them in - gone overnight. I discovered some of the perennial plugs I had put had not died over winter. I'd just done a bit of tending to help protect the shoots, and of course a cat promptly dug up that bit of the border and turded on it. (I've since found that sticking bamboo sticks in the ground deters this. But it's not very aesthetically pleasing!)

The problem is there's not a lot of biodiversity and not enough plants, so the slugs just eat anything new. Any new shoots get mown down so it's a vicious circle. There are some assorted bedding plants valiantly trying to establish themselves but I can't seem to adequately protect them.

Sooo

For the little plugs of bedding plants, would it work to surround them with cut off plastic bottles? I'm not convinced. Or heap slug pellets (doesn't recommend on the instructions)

I've held off putting in really vigorous plants (mint) because I was worried they'd take over as it's so bare. But last week after the viola episode, I got fed up and put in applemint and sweet woodruff. The way forward or a bad idea?

Perhaps I'm just despondent, but I swear it's June and surely this is plants go crazy time? The only thing going crazy in my garden are the hydrangeas. And the lawn dandelions. And the privet hedge! Why aren't my favourite plants having a similar growth spurt?

 

yeah gardening can be a bit depressing to start when hopes are so high... you've just got to take every little win, like the hydrangeas... i have similiar slug+clay conditions.

 

I'm taking a lot of joy in finding slug carcasses everywhere the last couple of days. The couple of geranium grandiflora I planted are looking like they're going to pull through too, and one of the other perennials although I have no idea what it is.

I suppose the difference is last year I had a balcony with herbs bolting left right and centre that I had to give away because I'd got so many and they grew so fast. Now I have a garden where it seems difficult for anything to get to the point of bolting!

 

I took some more photos this morning. It confirms my suspicions that it all looks the same as before, only with more hedge and more hydrangea!

Left of the garden


Right of the garden



I would have had some lettuce in there, if next door's little girl hadn't come in to my garden and upset the entire seed tray, setting me back three weeks. I've got a new set growing but they've all got scorched. I don't dare put them in the ground though because they'll all get eaten.

And my container tomatoes have developed some kind of wilting, so are probably goners.



Urgh. Depressing.

And last night the bloody cat found the only bit of it's chosen toilet area that I hadn't managed to cover with sharp pointy sticks.

The lawn weed and feed seems to be working. At least, some of the moss and weeds are dying. We'll see if The grass actually grows. I think the lawn is 50% moss and weeds. With my gardening skillz at the moment, I'll probably be left with a patch of mud. Harrrrumph!

 

What you need are some small victorys to encourage you, your best bet would be growing something easy in containers to give you a start. then you can wage war on the rest at your leisure.

 

My hydrangeas are pretty magnificent but it's not anything to do with me, sadly! They were in the garden when we moved in, only thing left in the borders.

I've since decided that plants with a month or two of growth are the way forward. I've found a couple who sell some nice home reared perennials for not more than a few pounds a pop at the local market. I think growing from seed might be out for me this year. They get into containers too, anything small and tasty is lunch/dinner.

Some of the bedding plants might still be alive, which is nice. And a couple of new plants have survived the slug attack, so happy with that. I'll take survival as a win this year!