Making a start

so lovely and exciting,what a project,i would probably leave it.i wouldnt no where to start.

I agree, for I did leave it and nor do I have to foggiest where to start.

Having had some experience with trying to develop a huge wild overgrown space into a garden ... it's best just to concentrate on one small space at a time. Get that bit right .. stand back and admire .. and you'll get the strength to go on and on.

That sounds very good advice Bernieh, makes sense, thanks.

I think this is lovely. The hard part will be I imagine not too over garden it and loose the natural beauty The heathers, ferns rock plants etc native to the area would look good. Also Its a life time project to enjoy. Good luck

Remember the old Irish (I think) quote....
“When God made time, he made plenty of it”....and as Drc says - its a lifetime project - try to enjoy it. I am just envious of your energy!

Hmmm, unfortunately when god made rain he made plenty of that too (lol) which at the moment is quashing some of that energy. Standing at the window watching and waiting doesn't get things done. I had also planned to paint the house (walls and woodwork) this August too!
Oh well, can't change anything so will just keep on digging gullies!!!

.....or making rowan wine!!!!

That sounds far better. Trouble is....I know how to dig gullys and I don't know if I can start trying to add another 'string to my bow' just yet.
I think of my 'bow' not as a fiddle players but as an archers....if I can put enough effort into one string then there is a chance I might, just might hit a target one day. Lol
My brain is full up, needs a recyle bin and 'defrag'!
Seriously though, one recipe online says to freeze the berries for a while (to sweeten them up) so perhapes I should pick 'n' freeze for now and see what comes.

OMG...hadn't realised it was so complicated! I have just had a look..as my memory was a bit hazy....I think I used the same recipe as my folks always used for their elderberry wine and elderflower champagne - (which was lethal stuff actually!!) I once made my own "sherry" and nearly knocked the assembled company out before we ever got to eating dinner!!! Anyway - making rowan jelly sounds a LOT simpler and more immediate - but maybe a few apples or even crab apples improves the flavour as rowan on its own can be decidedly SHARP...eek!

Lol, I think I'll pass on the sherry thanks.
Sharpe is how I had imagined (I won't try one to see) but jelly sounds good and apple sound a good sweetener.
Its been a long time since I was involved in the production of home brews etc. One time (early 70's) our gang did a heap of wine (we were in our teens) in a very old chalet in the middle of a friends forest.
It did not taste to good so we set up a still (gas cooker, kettle, rubber and glass tubes and flasks etc), boiled off and collected the alcohol from some of the wine to add back into the remaining demijars. The best part of a day later (and half a lab flask of alcohol) things seemed to be going quite well, if not rather slowly, when his father decided to venture in. He Umm'ed & Aaah'ed for a wee bit, tasted the contents of the flask, exclaimed how discusting it was, promptly finished it off and then, quite rightly he 'closed us down'. Kids 'ay?
You'll be no doubt relieved to know that none of our future careers saw any of us enter the beer, wine or spirit producing industry.
I can't think how making jelly could possibly leave such a long lasting memory (scar?) ingrained in my head..... so logic says that it MUST be easier to make!! lol. (ever the optimist!)

Great story...obviously firmly etched in your memory...I love it ! Reminds me of our son and his pals who made lots and lots and lots of "beer" !! Very good beer apparently - never tried it myself - but he bottled it all up in those good old-fashioned proper screw-top bottles that lemonade used to come in! One night - and it wasn't the 5th of Nov.....we thought that Guy Fawkes had made a comeback as one by one those dratted bottles went off.....nobody dared go into the box room they were stored in - they were going off so frequently...by next morning - the whole lot had "blown"....and the smell and mess was indescribable!!
Oh well...boys will be boys. Me - I stuck to sherry making - but not drinking - I've been TT for almost 40 years!!

Messy business! Theres nothing quite like hinesight is there. How on earth do you get the house cleaned up, an awful task I bet.

I fought the grass on a rocky hillside in Colorado for years, and am thrilled that Piet Oudolf made grass fashionable mixed with wildflowers and shrubs. He has something like your "bottle brush" called Persicaria amplexicaulis or bistort or knotweed: syn. Polygonium.
Alzheimer: hope you remember to blog on how to make sherry!

What a brilliant idea!!!
With all these TV shows of makeovers for people, their meals,houses, cars and of course gardens perhaps I should attempt to start a movement to make all weeds fasionable.

Look at the local meadows for flowers and grasses? and you could gather the seeds free? I think the back ground in your picture is already stunning and the rockery could add to it and be spectacular with local growing colour?

Thanks Drc. When we first bought the site it was still being grazed as it had been probably since the highland clearences in the mid 18thC if not before (although I have heard it may have been cultivated at some point but when and for how long I don't know). As a result of the grazing and when it was left to grow we had a fabulous meadow with grasses and flowers. In my attempt to let this grow and self-seed each year there was a almightly regrowth of the brambles and bracken. Now I'm trying to start cutting it back earlier in the year to hinder these undersirable weeds but by doing this we loose the desirable 'weeds' namely the flowers and grasses.
So they are here just waiting to flourish but finding the balance between growth or cutting is not that easy just yet, particularly with my time being in so much demand (self-employed work, kids, house building etc).
It may be a case of cut for the next four yrs to weaken the bracken and then to then cut every other year. Will have to see.
I tried to convince my wife only yesterday while planing out the next stage in the garden that bracken looked nice!!!....did'nt work though. Lol

Lots of info on meadows and when/how to cut etc www.meadowmania.co.uk/meadows is one. Braken cannot be fun?

Your right about the bracken. The meadow info looks intresting though, thank you very much for that.

Nice list of plants on meadowmania, Drc. At least the young fiddlehead ferns are edible, tho large quanties later can be toxic, esp for children. I let the plantain & hawkeyes & dandelions grow in the front parkway, throwing in other wild seeds as found: want a sign to put there "Maurice Sendak Memorial Meadow" so the neighbor's will stop asking if they can mow it for me.

Sounds a lovely meadow Orgratis, most worthy as a memorial. The sign sounds a good idea, The last thing you want is to one day find its been mown as a 'good deed' while you've been out .
I would gladly make you one (at material cost only of course!!) as countryside woodwork & signage is my job but I fear the price of sending it from the UK would not make if cost effective either in postage or 'air miles'. Perhaps that creative daughter of yours can get something made up!!.

Think I'll steer clear of the potential toxic's until the boys are older, one is very curious!!

Thanks for the offer anyway. Got an Arabis (rock cress) on half price sale this week: A. variegata whose leaves turn purple in the cool fall, making a tricolor. Think it will have white flowers, but there are others rose pink. An alpine, it takes harsh conditions and good drainage, staying mostly ever green, drought tolerant once established: grew it at 9800 ft in CO. Rock gardeners complain that it's too "invasive" for their collections, but great if you're trying to cover a largish area around rocks.

Thanks for this info, by coincidence my Mum has ordered some for me, should be here in the next 2 or 3 weeks so looking forward to those. It does sound an ideal plant for what I am wanting here. Thanks again.