06 April 2021

Spreading order in the upper garden

When I bought the house, the garden was in a bit of state of neglect. And I had started my efforts in fighting back the chaos in the lower part of the garden. If it is nice weather and I hang out in the garden it is always down there. It gets the sun, it is beautiful, and it has the view over the river. And I made good progress! So much so that over lockdown I had even started on the garden upstairs. I had ripped out lots of weeds, and started one slightly raised bed for growing edible plants, and another one for decorative plants. And that was the site of the garden on the river side mostly sorted. But then there was the road side as well! And that was still quite a jungle. There was a huge rosemary growing there, and some willow had seen its chance and colonised a raised bed, and there were a lot of brambles. It was time to attack this.

I started with the willow. I dug that out. I have no problem with willows, but this was not the place for one. I already have a big one in the garden downstairs. And in order to get a good grip on the willow I needed to remove some thorny vegetation around it. So shortly after the willow was pulled out, I had also removed a lot of brambles, and two rose bushes. And I decided to keep at it!

I kept chopping and pulling until I had removed all the brambles in that corner. To my surprise, there turned out to be a rhododendron living underneath! I'm sure it's glad it now doesn't have to compete so heavily for sunlight. I also cut down a buddleia. These things go rogue all the time! I had already murdered one that was trying to suffocate my apple tree, and another one who tried to block my view from the conservatory. Now this one needed to be stopped from suffocating my rosemary bush.

When I had removed all that and removed all the waste that produced, I had a very, very empty upper garden. It would be a while before it would look cosy! I would have to think of ways of achieving this. I want something to cover the fence. Maybe I will transplant some ivy. I want to paint the fence first, though. Then the raised bed can be used for edible plants, but I might wait a week putting anything in there, as frost is still predicted. 

I also have a bay tree in a pot standing next to the bathroom. I think that needs to move. Maybe it can join the rhododendron in that corner. And I will have to go to the garden centre for some additional plants. I hope I can make this part of the garden look nice as well!



The work is just getting started

The removal stage is complete



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