EXTREME GARDENING

2008
Things just keep growing! I've moved several plants around last year because some areas became overcrowded. I'll have to do some more of that this year.

I had the Cannas in pots last year. The idea was to make it easier to put them out in the summer and take them back in for the winter. However, most of them seemed to have picked up the Canna virus over winter, so I dumped a lot of them. It seemed to be the pale-leaved ones which were most affected. This year I planted what was left. The big Red Russian ones have now reached about 7 feet.

The statue has now been almost hidden by the surrounding plants. The pond had become overgrown by some bull-rushes. I took them all out, they had roots everywhere. They were obviously not the right choice for such a small pond.

The decking is holding up well. I scrubbed all the green lichen off in the spring because it was making it a bit slippy. It has now weathered to a silver colour. So hopefully I won't have to coat it with preservative again.

We got a good deal on some solid oak benches, so we replaced the old ones. The new ones blend-in quite well.

The vine produced a couple of pounds of grapes last year. The late summer this year means that although there are more grapes they might not ripen.

I installed some black plastic edging strip around the lawn. It makes it much easier to manage the edges. Hopefully the trampoline will go in the next couple of years and I can finish off the lawn?

Statue 2006
I don't know what I was on, but I decided to create an Easter-Island 'Head' statue. I'd been on a plastering course and felt that I could make a statue out of breeze blocks and then render it with sand and cement.

I build a stack of light-weight blocks and then attacked it with an old panel saw and chisel.

Pete and Daniel came round to help me get it into the garden.

Once it was in place I plastered it with sand and cement mix.

The effect was just as I wanted.

The Final Result 2005
After about 8 month's work and a much longer time planning it, the garden make-over is finally complete. It provides a stunning extension to the living area of the property, which is accessible at all times of the year. Helicopter and Micro-Lites now regularly hover overhead, it's that good!

The top end starts from the bottom of the existing steps from the top patio area. In fact the bottom two steps have gone, since the top end of the garden was raised up by about 12". A small retaining wall along the fence was required to keep the soil off the fence.
The visitor then walks down a decking pathway across a pebble river-bed. The increase in height at the top-end allowed the pathway to be sloped at a gentle 1 in 15. The planting in this top section of the garden is meant to give an exotic 'jungle' feel. To the left are broard-leaved cannas, fatsias and bamboos. To the right, along the fence, are shade-loving ferns and hostas. Two matching benches complement each other. The main structural planting impact comes from two large tree-ferns.
The pathway winds its way past the two benches to the top of a flight of low decking steps. The two sheds have been moved from the bottm of the garden to a less conspicuous position to the left of the steps. They have also been painted dark green and 'planted' with climbers to further hide them.
The steps lead down onto a large decking area. Low grey concrete walls provide retention for the sloping flower-beds on either side. The right-hand section of decking area runs alonside a small pond. Bamboo posts and ropes give a quayside feel to the pond.
Beyond the decking area the garden consists of a circular mounded lawn, surrounded by deep hebaceous borders. This extends to the 60' ancient oak tree and back fence. The lawn is also the home to the kids trampoline, which is constantly in use!
The make-over has been a lot of work. In particular digging up the old patios and moving the sheds and many tons of soil and rubble around. However, it has been well worth it. As the structural plants mature, we can look forward to the garden becoming even more divided into two distinct, very different areas.

July & August 2005
Some further adjustments to the walls. Finished the pond. Completed the main structural planting.

Finished the pond. This was quite awkward because I had already built the decking area. I had to put up hardboard shuttering and brace it against the opposite walls of the pond. It was difficult to get the concrete in under the decking. I used polystyrene sheet to provide some 'give' against the decking and avoid cracking the concrete due to expansion. Once filled, the pond made a great paddling pool to cool off in. The water-boatmen were the first to arrive, then the dragon-fly larvae. The frogs waited until there were some plants. The final touch was to thread some 2" rope through the bamboo posts.
Added some height to the walls. This was to balance things out either side of the steps and to support the soil in the sloping flower beds. This time the cats did not leave their marks!
Completed the main structural planting. After much deliberation about their hardiness and maintenance overhead, I finally decided to buy two 4' tree-ferns. I got a good deal on them at Homebase by using all my discounts. They caused quite a stir as I wheeled them through the store on a trolley. It looked like a mobile jungle. The fonds filled the widest of the isles. I only just got them into the Zafira with the help of an assistant. They weighed about 120lbs each. I had to carry them down to the garden through the garage and kitchen, on my trolley as much as possible. It was quite simple to put them in. What a result! Instant effect.

June 2005
A continuation of the structural work done in May. The work so far has consisted of:

Construction of the Pond. This was done in several stage. The hole was dug out to the desired profile. I'm not keeping fish in it, so the depth was 18" and the shelf around the edge was quite generous to take lots of plants. After the hole was dug I covered the ground in the hole with chicken wire. Then poured the based and shelf concrete. While the concrete was still wet, I pulled the chicken wire through the concrete until it was virtually on the surface. I then let the concrete set and poured a second layer of concrete on top of the first. This gave me about a 3" thickness. I then 'plastered' the walls between the base and shelf with more concrete. The curved edge wall was next. I used hardborad as the form-work and supported it within the pond with bags of ballast while the concrete set. The wall next to the decking was done in a similar manner, but had to be poured in two stages. The first stage took the wall up to ground level. The second stage took the wall to witin an inch of the decking. I packed out the decking joists with DPC and polysturene so that there would be no damp or expansion problems.
The current state of the whole garden can be seen below.

May 2005
A continuation of the structural work done in April. The work consisted of:

Constructing the steps. I poured the top one. It was coloured with black cement dye, but this just made it a light grey colour instead of off-white. I embedded the mosaic tiles cut from the bathroom left-overs. However, I did not like it! Too complex and did not fit in with the decking walkway. So I changed my mind and decided to do decking steps, but screwed down onto concrete steps. I poured the sides to the new beds by the sheds and another wall on the right of the new steps. With these walls in place I then poured all six steps in one session. All that remains is to screw down some 4x2 timber plates and then screw the decking onto those.
Dug-out, filled and planted the beds next to the sheds. Two more palms went into these beds.
The level of the bottom step and hence the planned decking area was now lower than the mound of rubble which I had piled up in the decking area. Basically, I would have to get rid of all that rubble somewhere! My solution was to bury it under the new lawn. This neant stripping back the top-soil from the lawn to create a big hole. I then dug-out the rubble and filled the hole under the lawn. There must have been a couple of tons of large stones in the rubble. I placed these in the middle of the hole and put the rest around the edge. I still have the rest of the pond to dig out and some more levelling to do along-side the decking path. All this waste will go in the hole as well. I will then cover the big stones with the rubbish soil and then cover that with the top-soil. This should give me the mounds lawn I wanted in the plan?
The decking boards for the steps and the decking area have arrived, but I need to place the support posts and joists for the decking area before these can go in. I decided to go for three plates made from 3"x3" timber, supported along their entire length by a concrete footing. I screwed 3" screws to the underside of the timber before pouring the concrete to ensure they didn't move. I dug out shallow trenches beneath the timbers and put some shuttering up along-side.
I did all the joists for the steps at the same time. These were 2"x4" timber screwed onto the new concrete steps. Once in place all the joist woodwork was painted with creosote before the decking was screwed on.
Poured conrete walls to the left and right of the new decking area. As usual the cats were keen to leave their prints in the wet concrete once my back was turned.
Painted the retaining wall dark green. The first colour was not dark enough. So I mixed-in the black cement colouring I had left over.
Painted the sheds dark green. This made them blend-in a lot better.
Erected a fence at the bottom-right of the garden. I used up all the old fencing material I had saved. This fence has already made the garden more sheltered from the easterly winds which come across the valley.
Filled the space between the decking pathway and the edging with scottish pebbles. I went for the 20-30mm size. It took 45 bags to fill it, many more than expected. However, it really finished off the top garden.

April 2005
A busy month which showed good progress with most of the main structural elements. The work consisted of:

Put in edging along the path. I was originally not going to do this, but it seemed the right thing to do to sparate the gravel from the soil in the beds.
Filled the gap between the edging and the path with rubble. I used up all the rubble I had extracted from the garden so far, plus some from my neighbour. Linda sieved several barrow-loads of top-soil to get even more small stones. The soil went on the top beds and the stones in the gap.
Concreted in some pads for the bench feet. Also assembled the second bench.
Raised the gulley from the Garden room by about 10 inches and concreted it in.
Built the revised step layout at the far end of the Garden Room.
Built a low barrier wall along the fence so that the new soil level was not up against the fence. Also stops weeds coing through under the fence.
The two large shrubs which were moved from the top garden did not survive. Chopped them up and dug them out, shame.
Dug-over and levelled the top beds. I had to dig in a lot of compost and sand to bring the beds to the correct level. As soon as this was done I planted the Palm tree and the hostas which had arrived a few weeks earlier.

March 2005
This month started off with some snow. It was also time for me to have the operation on my elbow. So this will hinder the work somewhat. The work consisted of:

Putting pegs in to mark out the levels of the new steps. I have been reconsidering the steps and might make them from decking instead of concrete?
Placing some more rubble in the top garden. I also put down some of the old slabs to make getting up and down the garden easier and less messy! The cats had been bringing in loads of dirt into the house. Now they use the temporary path there is less dirt.
Planted several packets of hardy annual seeds around the lower garden.
Burnt the last of the clippings stored in the shed. The final 3 bags went to the tip to clear the shed.
Built the walkway. This consisted of concrete slabs placed on gravel. Each slab was levelled off and then more slabs were placed on top to bring each slab 'set' to the desired level. An old plastic sand-bag was placed under each of the top slabs to form a crude sort of DPC. The slope was about 1 in 15 down the garden. I made a measuring stick to ensure that the slope was constant. The slabs were placed about 1m apart. On top of the slabs were fixed 2"x4" timber sole plates. I cut a sloping rebate in each plate to take the two joists. The joists were also made from 2"x4" timber, one at each end of the sole plates. I jointed the joists at each sole plate to allow me to turn the path. All timber was screwed together. All the joists and sole plates were liberally painted with creosote. The space under the walkway was covered with weed-control fabric, just in case. Finally the decking boards were screwed onto the joists. I angled the boards at 45 degrees to the garden so that I did not end up with any very long sections. The gap between the boards is 5mm, attained by inserting two identical screw-driver shafts while fixing.
I lost two old friends while doing the walkway: (1) My 20 year-old Black & Decker workmate. (2) The chuck on my Altas drill. Goodbye guys, we have been through hell together!
The final walkway was an instant success with kids and cats alike.

February 2005
This month started off mild and dry one but ended with rain and snow. The work consisted of:

Marking out the new lower lawn and digging over the new beds around it.
Moving the existing shrubs into the new beds. The Pampas grass had to be moved back 3 feet. Some of the planned locations of the shrubs were changed after looking at their sizes.
The Weigela proved the most difficult to move. It took me an hour with my pick and spade to dig it out. In the process I broke my spade, only 20 years old, don't make em like they used to! The root ball then weighed so much that I could not get it out of the hole. So I dug a trench out of the hole and tried to roll it out. It was still too heavy, so I had to trim the root ball down with a fork.
The tallest plant was over 9 feet tall with a trunk over 4 inches across. However, it only took about 30 minutes to move. I had to chop through a couple of tap roots, but otherwise it had a very small root ball. To give it a start in its new position I proped it up with some timber. I might even tie it to the fence?
I'm really not sure that any of these plants which have been moved will survive. I put some chicken manure pellets and bone-meal in each hole and watered the plants in well after their move. It has rained quite a bit this past week anyway. Only time will tell I suppose.
After moving the last few small plants from the top garden I could then start to dig out the new beds. The process for digging the new beds in the top garden was:
1) Dig the good topsoil out of the bed and pile it up in the middle. The topsoil depth varied from 1/2 to 2 spade depths.
2) Fork-over the clay & flint sub-soil. Add some sand and soil improver and fork well in.
3) Replace the topsoil.
This did expose the drains to the soak-away. So I had to be careful not to put my fork through them!
When I had finished the beds on both sides I dug out the topsoil from the centre, where the old lawn was. This topsoil was piled on top of the new beds. Since the whole of the top garden would be sloping, this extra soil will be required to bring it up to the new level.
Another job required at this stage was to break-up some of the existing steps at the top of the garden. These would be replaced with the new pathway. All of the rubble from the steps was used as hardcore for under the new path.

January 2005
The weather had been very mild and dry. I was able to do work at night (after 4pm) with the help of a small flood-light.
This month the work consisted of:

Removing the three large plants along the fence where the large shed would be going. Originally I thought that I could move them, but after looking at the thickness of their 'trunks' I decided that they would not move easily. Being close to the fence also made them difficult to dig around.
I eventually got them up The roots were not too bad, but I could not see them surviving the move since I had to cut away most of their roots to get them out. The largest one, the vibernum, was quite rotten at its base, so it was just as well it was going.
Moving the large deciduous bush with white flowers? to next to the Hibiscus. This took about an hour to move. It had a good root ball, so I hope it will survive.
Dug out the good topsoil where the shed would be going.
Filled the hole with rubble.
Dug out a 2 foot deep trench at the eastern edge of the new shed location. This I filled with the paving slabs from the patio and the top garden. To form a retaining wall on which one end of the shed would rest . This saved on bricks and made good use of the slabs, which I would have broken up otherwise.
Emptied, dismantled, moved and re-filled the large shed . All went well except that the roof proved too heavy for me to handle on my own and it fell on my face. I felt a bit giddy, like someone had punched me, but apart from a small scratch there was no lasting damage. After that I got my team of willing helpers in to move the other panels. The big boys then helped me lift the roof on. After I had screwed the roof on I realised that it was the wrong way around. The felt lapped the wrong way and would have let the rain in. I quickly unscrewed it and swivelled it around for re-fixing.
Removed the extra fence-panels I had put up around Shed 1 to form the walls of the 'summer-house'.
Removed the slabs, scrapped off the ballast, dug out the hard_core and refilled with top-soil, Shed 1 base.
Prepared the new base for Shed 2. Originally I expected this shed to be 18 inches lower than Shed 1. However, when I looked at the ground levels I decided that it only needed to be 12 inches below Shed 1. I had to build another retaining wall out of spare paving slabs at the far end.
Moved Shed 2 to its new postion. Dug out the rubble from uner where Shed 2 had been. Filled the hole with soil. In the process of this I discovered that the Pampas grass had been jumped on and had almost split in two. I chopped away the drooping section. But then I noticed that it had quite well formed roots. So I replanted it in the corner where Shed 1 had been.
This left the garden with most of the structural moves and digging out completed. I remeasured the location of the new lawn and marked it out by digging a small trech around it. The garden is now ready for the remaining palnts to be moved around to their new positions.

December 2004
Work began in earnest. The logistical solution had to keep digging and moving of soil and waste down to a minimum. This month the work consisted of:
- Marking out the planned areas.
- Planning which plants would be moved or removed.
- Moving wood and bricks out of the way.
- Cutting back the plants to be moved.
- Digging out the patio back to the shed bases. The ballast would be used under the sheds in their new position. The larger stones were dumped in the new decking hole.
- Digging out the topsoil from beneath the new decking and pond area.
- Filling the hole beneath the decking with the rubble from beneath the patio.
- Back-filling the hole where the patio was with the spare topsoil.
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Early 2004
- THE PLAN
  While the building work was being done on the house I decided that I would move the sheds to either side of the oak tree and create a kind of summer-house between them. I successfully moved the sheds. But then several things happened. My Uncle Peter died suddenly, we gave the kids climbing frame away and I ruptured my achilles tendon .
  
  Peter was a keen gardener. He came down to the house shortly after we moved in and helped me to lay the original lawn.
  
  I started to think a lot about Peter and gardening. I realised that I had always enjoyed it, but didn't really have the time for it. With the climbing frame out of the way I decided that it was time to have a more mature garden. One for Linda and me instead of devoted to the kids. While recuperating from my achilles injury, I set about the new design.
- The Sheds
  I had been watching 'A Year at Kew' and 'Gerdener's World'. The problems they were having with stressed-out trees at Kew seemed to be what was happening to my oak tree. The paved area and two sheds beneath it , were denying it the nutrients it needed. Every year it seemed to die-back a little. I decided that the sheds and patio had to move. The sheds would move up against the garden-room on the north side of the garden. This would have several advantages: 1) The sheds would be away from the tree. 2) The sheds would not be visible from the house. 3) I could get power to the sheds easier if required. 4) The sunniest part of the garden would become available.
- The tree seat
  With the sheds and patio out of the way. I planned a wooden seat around the trunk of the oak tree. This would be protected by some sort of canopy, yet to be determined.
- The Pond
  My Dad was very keen about his garden pond, which I had helped him to build over 30 years ago. I had avoided having a pond in my garden because of safety for the children and maintenance aspect of it, especially pumps/fountains etc. Watching the gardening programmes had given me a lot of ideas. Consequently I incorporated a small pond in the new design, mainly as a show-case for plants. By all accounts fish tend to imbalance a small pond. Algae can now be kept down by introducing a black dye in the water. Pumps and fountains can now be solar-powered. The pond will start off with no running water until I can figure out what will work best.
- The decking
  Although decking is almost becoming out of date, I saw it as the ideal replacement for the patio which was beneath the oak tree. The deck would edge onto the pond to make it look like a quay-side.
- The Statues
  I planned some interesting statues for the garden. All based on robots: C3PO, Iron-Giant and Cyberman. I don't know how I will make them, but I'll have a go.
- The top garden
  The initial ideas I had for this section of the garden were to replace the lawn with some form of paving. The lawn had never grown well and the south side of the garden was shaded by a six-foot fence.
  
  The large plants along the fence would be replaced with smaller shade-loving hostas and ferns. The 'sunny' side below the garden room would be tropical plants. I wanted to increase the height of this garden at its top end to give a bit more cover to the foundations of the garden room . In June I visited the offices of UIA in Stevenage and was instantly inspired by their gardens.
  
  They had created a basement garden of pebbles and shady-place plants which looked fantastic . This made me re-think the top section completely. Futher Inspiration came from a visit to the Eden Project and my neighbour Pam's garden.
- Waiting game
  With the plan in place I had to wait most of 2004 while my leg healed and I had completed at least one of the bathrooms. In the summer of 2004 the 10 foot diameter trampoline arrived. I had not really planned for this, but all it would mean is that the new lawn would not happen for a few years. By December I was ready to start.