Spontaneous & Radical - Conifer Corner is Born!

 Without doubt, this as the single most radical change ever made in the garden in 20 years!!  Utterly spontaneously we decided the raise the crown of the conifer and remove huge branches which filled this entire border and totally obscured our general stores.  These huge branches (some of which had rooted) grew down from the trunk, along the soil surface and then up to heights well above the apex of shed roof. It was a dense wall of green.  Having disposed of a HUGE amount of conifer brash on the bonfire, we stood back in shock at such a change!

After barrowing away about 15 loads of soil, Chris then levelled and graded the soil.  This avoided the need to retain a higher level of soil close to the far path leading around the shed.  Having done that we divided the London Pride - a red Saxifrage which does well in this dry shade and replanted them.  We even managed to find a few stray Cyclamen and fill the gaps on the inside path curve.

Our vintage root cutter, hoe and mangle have all found new spots and this new area is now known as Conifer Corner!

Path Titivation

 

The new Fernery Path is now finished at both ends.  It's taken a little while to find the time on a dry day to titivate both ends!  I picked out the date numerals with brick acid as I did with the rising sun.  It defined the edges making them look sharper and stand out more.

It's actually not being used too much owing to the excessive wear & tear on the grass which occurred during it's building.  We absolutely love it as no more muddy path and deadly slippery stepping stones.  The photo of the old path was taken in early autumn; by winter's end the much of the grass was worn out as we avoided treading on ice-like stepping stones!

The grass will recover in spring by which time our new path will be in full use!

Win - win!!

PROJECT PATH!

Here we are and it's nearly the end of September and little time for blog posts - partly because Head Gardener sneaked a few days away and partly because she spent a week on her knees with a new and major garden project!!

Project Path!!  Using and recycling 700+ old mixed/mismatched roof tiles.  Earlier in the year whilst actually just sitting in the garden (a very rare occurrence) I had this idea!!  The Fernery path was made from reclaimed York flagstones set into a turf path.  The turf never thrived due to poor and dry soil conditions & its shady situation.  The stepping stones aquired too much algae and were lethal in winter.  One was forced to step between the stepping stones which rather made the whole design rather pointless!

I thought of the massive stack of roof tiles behind the garage and then the light bulb moment!!  What if they were all laid on edge as a path?  How much safer and prettier would that be?  Even Chris Genever thought it was a failsafe idea.  He who should be obeyed had been grumbling about the great tile mountain for AGES!  Why didn't I sell them?  "Who on earth would even want such a huge amount of odd mismatched tiles?" I countered.  So now it was time to convince him that my plan would rid him of his mountain and provide a path compliant with the most ferocious of health and safety concerns!!

Eventually, Himself saw the advantages of my idea and during a real heatwave (yes, heatwave in September!) Chris Genever & I spent 7 days on our knees.  With sharpened pencil, spirit level and line at the ready we set to work.  Having already dug out the excess soil, Chris did the clever part of actually laying the tiles and I compacted the morter down between them leaving a small gap at the top.  When dry (and using a 2" paint brush as precisely instructed) I carefully brushed in a mixture of cement and kiln dried sand then gently sprayed it using a garden spray.  Bingo!!

Not quite completed yet, but looking pretty amazing.  We even re-recycled a secret stash of Victorian blue edging tiles which had been crying out for use!

I can vouch for the fact that it is totally NON slip in fact, it boasts greater traction than any other hard landscaping surface in the entire garden!! Himself is genuinely thrilled with it - phew!!!  Awaiting a finish touch is the rising sun at one end.  At the other end, we plan to put in the date - Roman numerals of course!!

The knees have since made a full recovery but I've since been forbidden from having any more ideas!!!

TWILIGHT GARDEN BY CANDLELIGHT

CAN HARDLY BELIEVE IT!!!

'TIME FOR A CHANGE!!'

 Well, it came as no surprise - sniff.  The much loved Costco Acer bought by Himself no less had been looking poorly for quite some time.  We decided to cut out the dead wood and all the die-back but it looked worse than ever.  Time for Chris's chainsaw!!  Moments later, a whole new view opened up.  I liked it so much, we also took out Kay's Blue Ice which was always far too close to the remaining Acer.  Suddenly, things have opened up around the pond.  I did have this idea though - long pause.  I have a self seeded Yew and an Osmanthus both of which are evergreen so no leaves in the pond.  Better watch this space again in the autumn

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Some Saturdays, the ideas just keep coming!  A genius idea from Chris was to move the old sun dial into the sun!! I know what you're thinking!  Sun dials NEED to be in the sun!! For so many years, we couldn't seem to find the right place for it so it spent much of its life in the shade - not ideal for accurate timekeeping! Now it sits in a gap in the Lavender and is deadly accurate on G.M.T!  It really was 'time for a change!'

Of course taking out a couple of trees wasn't going to take up much time - well not in Chris's case.  It so happened the the circular Box hedge around the well was in need of a trim.  Say no more!!  A  quick swap of the chainsaw for a hedge cutter and, as if by magic, it was totally transformed!!  As if that wasn't enough, Chris went on to clip all the Euonymous and Box in the Lower Border, the Berberis, Weigela, Lonicera and Snake Bark Maple in the Sofa Border and then the Philadelphus by the summerhouse.  

 

LILY MONSTER

 Whilst the lilies are blooming in the posts and looking fabulous, down in the pond lurked a different kind of lily. A monster Lily!  A giant of a water lily which had grown SO huge its roots had lifted up the pump and its leaves covered every square inch of surface water.  It was so enormous there were far too many leaves to sit  flat so they grew upright and sat above the surface. It was a regular forest of   leaves! I wish I'd taken a photo of such congestion!

It was time for Chris to don on his waders and to go into battle!  It was a massive undertaking and he had to cut off sections of the monster root system in order to  be able to lift them out.  Sadly, this was when he discovered that he had mistakenly picked up the old leaky waders - not the shiny new pair!  He filled 5 wheelbarrows (2 of which were very large wheelbarrows) with its weighty root system. All of the barrows were too heavy for me to lift. 

Normally Chris rehomes plants but on this unique occasion, he decided that the compost heap was deserved along with invading Lysimachia & Symphytum - much of which I had removed from around the pond margins.

Once removed, a massive clear up job ensued, the pond was topped up and the muddy water is being allowed to settle and clear before the pump is switched back on.  The last job of the day was to remove a dying Acer Platanoides columnar so we has laft a bit of an unwanted gap around the pond margin.

Upon hearing of yesterday's exploits, we were contacted by our neighbours.  To cut a long story short, we invaded the compost heap and retrieved most of the water lily root sections filling large numbers of plastic trugs, loaded them into a car for rehoming in their newly dredged lake!!  The monster lives on!  We look forward to James sharing pictures of its new home.

Trimming the Yew Sofa

The last job at the end of a VERY busy and exhausting day!! (Oh - and in case you're wondering; a metal frame sits inside the Yew enabling it to be sat upon!)