Hello guys... while i'm technically a beginner I spent mayt a year watching and helping my dad produce an excellent garden from a very 'natural' garden so i should be ok for most techniques.

OK, heres my position:
I inherited a house from my beloved grandad and because he wasnt very mobile he couldnt maintain it. Since then its been left for about a year. I would like to say its all overgrown but basically its just wasteland. Its a pretty big garden so i expect i'll have my work cut out but next weekend i'm planning a blitz on it to get it into some kind of order.

What I want is a clean slate... a blank canvas to work from. I have an exact idea of what i want the garden to be so i need a pointer from where to start.

I want to kill everything... just so theres not one living thing in the garden so i can start from an absolute scratch. I was in homebase on my lunch and saw some total weed killer (weedol i think) which will kill everything but wont halm the soil and you can plant there after a week or so.

Now, my garden is VERY uneven and i first want to level it all of to one flat area. Once its clear of all living plants/weeds then i will dig it all up and rate the thoroughly to level it all and create a base for things to work from. I will be having 2 ponds and such in there so i'll dig out a large area for this (Hoping that this will take up a large area making it more self suficient)

Thats it so far... does that sound ok? Is there anything i should be aware of? I will be laying a new lawn from scratch as the current one is apauling and i want a nic flat lawn.

Lee

Mr_Parsons wrote:
:: Hello guys... while i'm technically a beginner I spent mayt a year
:: watching and helping my dad produce an excellent garden from a very
:: 'natural' garden so i should be ok for most techniques.
::
:: OK, heres my position:
:: I inherited a house from my beloved grandad and because he wasnt
:: very mobile he couldnt maintain it. Since then its been left for
:: about a year. I would like to say its all overgrown but basically
:: its just wasteland. Its a pretty big garden so i expect i'll have
:: my work cut out but next weekend i'm planning a blitz on it to get
:: it into some kind of order.
::
:: What I want is a clean slate... a blank canvas to work from. I
:: have an exact idea of what i want the garden to be so i need a
:: pointer from where to start.
::
:: I want to kill everything... just so theres not one living thing
:: in the garden so i can start from an absolute scratch. I was in
:: homebase on my lunch and saw some total weed killer (weedol i
:: think) which will kill everything but wont halm the soil and you
:: can plant there after a week or so.
::
:: Now, my garden is VERY uneven and i first want to level it all of
:: to one flat area. Once its clear of all living plants/weeds then i
:: will dig it all up and rate the thoroughly to level it all and
:: create a base for things to work from. I will be having 2 ponds
:: and such in there so i'll dig out a large area for this (Hoping
:: that this will take up a large area making it more self suficient)
::
:: Thats it so far... does that sound ok? Is there anything i should
:: be aware of? I will be laying a new lawn from scratch as the
:: current one is apauling and i want a nic flat lawn.

A few points:

1) what is growing there now?

2) 'weedol' is not a good idea over such a huge area, especially if you want
to re-plant any time this year, and in any case it doesn't work, it merely
kills the leaves, the roots remain unaffected and will grow back within a
fortnight...to kill everything will require 'roundup', but this is very
expensive over such a big area.

3) What do you want to acheive in the long run? - what is your ultimate goal
for the garden?...if you are looking for a low maintenance garden then you
will be wanting shrubs and lawns, if you want some of it as a patio or
whatever, this is something you need to decide now...what buildings (if any)
do you intend putting in? - sheds, greenhouses etc?...personally, I think
you should live with it for a year to make some ideas about what you want
and where.





--
"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we.
They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country
and our people, and neither do we."
- George W. Bush, 5.8.2004

Mr_Parsons wrote:
[...]
Thats it so far... does that sound ok? Is there anything i should
be
aware of? I will be laying a new lawn from scratch as the current
one
is apauling and i want a nic flat lawn.

Bloody hell! You loved your grandfather: I don't like to think what
you'd be doing if you hadn't got on! Personally I'd kill as little as
possible: you don't get decent mature plants overnight. But it's your
garden, so get stuck in. There are a couple of very good websites
about lawns, which will tell you all you need to know.

--
Mike.

I want to kill everything...

I think that to come onto this newsgroup with the above statement, it is
either a wind up, or you really do not have a clue about gardening, and I
mean .... "a clue". You haven't watched the millions of gardening progs on
TV and you certainly haven't read any gardening books.

Which is it? Wind up? or clueless to the 'n'th degree?

Mike
who must be an expert after all

Thanks for such a warm welcome mike.... why should this be a joke???

For the questions asked and doubts in mikes mind i shall elaborate on what my garden consists of:

The garden is roughly 17 metres long by 7 metres wide, the garden has suffered around 5 years of neglect and absolutly nothing grows there. There are 2 small lawn areas which i have cut down to a resonable state although the grass is of poor quality in areas due to lack of sun and moss readily grows in this area also.
The lawns run from the house to around 6 metres up the garden stretching the width of the garden. the rest of the garden has not been touched in years and there is all sorts of weeds and such growing there. The area is that over grown that digging is impossible for all the roots that are there. They are small stringy roots which need to be killed off really to weaken them.

The garden is completly uneven, especially at the bottom end so i want this all leveling out.

Yes.. it was roundup that i saw, my apologies. Basically, nothign in this apauling garden will remain the same. Every last detail will change and i know exactly what i want and where i want it. The part of the garden which gets no sun will be patio'd. I want a decebt sized custom point spanning the width of the garden with a wooden bridge over it. At the bottom of the garden will be a decking area for BBQ's and a wooden summerhouse overlooking the pond.

The plants and suchlike wont be thought about this year. My main aim is to get the foundations of what i want in my garden done in the coming months.

Mr_Parsons wrote:
[...]
Thanks for such a warm welcome mike.... why should this be a
joke???

For the questions asked and doubts in mikes mind i shall elaborate
on
what my garden consists of:

The garden is roughly 17 metres long by 7 metres wide, the garden
has
suffered around 5 years of neglect and absolutly nothing grows
there.
There are 2 small lawn areas which i have cut down to a resonable
state although the grass is of poor quality in areas due to lack of
sun and moss readily grows in this area also.
The lawns run from the house to around 6 metres up the garden
stretching the width of the garden. the rest of the garden has not
been touched in years and there is all sorts of weeds and such
growing there. The area is that over grown that digging is
impossible
for all the roots that are there. They are small stringy roots
which
need to be killed off really to weaken them.

The garden is completly uneven, especially at the bottom end so i
want
this all leveling out.

Yes.. it was roundup that i saw, my apologies. Basically, nothign
in
this apauling garden will remain the same. Every last detail will
change and i know exactly what i want and where i want it. The part
of
the garden which gets no sun will be patio'd. I want a decebt sized
custom point spanning the width of the garden with a wooden bridge
over it. At the bottom of the garden will be a decking area for
BBQ's
and a wooden summerhouse overlooking the pond.

The plants and suchlike wont be thought about this year. My main
aim
is to get the foundations of what i want in my garden done in the
coming months.

OK. Lawns are no problem, and involve no trade secrets, just a bit of
work (often less work than one thinks): all the books and websites
will broadly agree with one another. The overgrown beds probably
contain more plants than you think; but to get everything out, I'm
afraid you've just got to dig, even if at present it looks impossibly
daunting. You won't be able to plant without digging anyway, and you
probably won't be able to install hard landscaping features without
shifting soil, either.

To get rid of, e.g., a bramble clump, you have to cut away all the
top growth in convenient lengths (tough gloves, secateurs, patience,
and a bit of bad language). Then get the roots out with a fork. If
you just wait for new growth at the stumps and hit it with herbicide,
it'll kill them off nicely, but leave you with the roots in the soil;
these will militate against either new planting or hard landscaping.
Things without thorns you attack in the same way, but with less
damage to your ear-lobes (my barber once extracted thorns from my
scalp that I hadn't even known were there).

It's actually rather a satisfying job. You may not share my view, of
course!

You may want to consider leaving some of the unevenness alone, or
even increasing it: flat can be dull. You'll have to get rid of some
topsoil somewhere, unless you use it to level the lawn.

About the patio in the sunless spot: it may be less depressing to
make a bed for delightful shade-loving plants. If there's no sun,
nobody will use the paved area, and it'll grow green slime: very
frustrating having to carry out annual maintenance on a feature you
don't use.

What's a "custom point"? "Point of sale" kind of thing? Are you
planning to sell stuff to people?

--
Mike.

Thanks for that... i actually meant to say custom POND! Bit of a typo there

theres no brambles so that shouldnt be a problem, its just them damn stringy weeds which when I stick a fork in the spoil, simply dont budge!

The level thing, it wont be level when i have finished but i do need a flat surface to begin with so thats why i want to do that.

Hi.

It depends on your time scale. Why not do it the chemical free organic way?

Large sheets of black plastic or failing that old lino or carpet. That will kil most things if left down for a while including the lawn.

If it's too mucbh in one go just leave it on the patch you want to start on then move it to the next patch while you work on the first.