What a difference 5 years makes

5 comments

Hi all
Time for the annual update again.
Hope everyone is still with us.
Sadly we lost one of the family earlier this year and it has left a huge hole in our hearts.
We seem to be of an age …!!!!
Anyway … back to the garden …..
I thought i would put up a pictorial update. We (the garden) seem to be maturing quite a bit now.
The raised garden at the rear of the pond has really come on with the Gunnera taking centre stage … it is twice the size this year that it was last year.

The Montana has really taken on the pergola and the Arbour … beautiful display of colour

The Acer took a battering over winter this year and one side of it has come into leaf this year. Such a shame as it was a beautiful tree in previous years.
I have purchased two small Acers to compensate this year. You can see them either side of the large acer in the green pots.

The rose bed has matured nicely over the last 12 months and i have started to train the climbers up the arbour, across the wires to the pergola and hopefully they will spread across the beam of the pergola.

The veg patch, although small now has two rows of potatoes, a row of peas, two wigwams of runner beans, a small row of beetroot, spinach and broad beans.

Instead of buying ready flowers for the borders this year, i ordered a shed load – (sorry – greenhouse load) – of plugs from a jersey based company. They arrive by post and have all been in exceptional condition with every single plug growing on without loss.
I bought 450 petunias, 200 pelergoniums, 200 salvias and some fuschias as well as some slug, snail and vine weavil eating plants – (just for fun)…. Total cost just short of £150 somewhere around £0.15p per plant in total. Much better value than the normal £5.00 for a tray of 6 or 8 plants.

I grew the tomato plants from seed this year as well as the runner beans from last years seeds.
I purchased the black plastic staging this year for the greenhouse as i always run out of space to put the seed trays. They worked very well. Have to say that they are almost empty now as i had just completed potting up the 15 hanging baskets that take 21 plants per basket – (315 plants for those that have difficulty with maths)
This year i have fenced off the garden with a temporary fence that i can move for mowing. This confines the dogs – (bless ’em) – to one area and leaves the rest of the garden looking like a garden and not a giant pooh patch.

….and finally …….
for those that remember my blog about the weed in the pond last year…..
I haven’t had to do anything to it this year so the treatment i gave it last year does definitely work.
It is looking a bit brown at the moment as Rusty – the German Shepherd – managed to knock one of the pots into the water … couldn’t have been a small one … had to be one of the big ones ….. so the water is a sort of peaty colour at the moment.
However, i cleaned out the filter unit and the water is now clearing slowly.

So that’s it folks … update complete.
I hope you like what i have managed to do with the garden over the 5 years we have been here.
Just to remind you … this was the day we moved in.

• 22 May, 2015
• 9 likes

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