Saturday, May 5, 2012

Another garden bed.

G'day. I dug this garden bed out some time ago now and a few days after doing it, we had the mother of all storms and it all washed away. I was not impressed.

This bed was all my own doing and the digging was hard work, not to mention that it took a few hours of solid toil.

But, not to be outdone, I dug it all out again. The black stuff you can see is weed mat. Then I decided that sugar cane mulch on top of that would look good, so we bought many bags of it. Trouble was that those blasted blackbirds that we have here(I call them wrecker birds) kept
digging and scratching the mulch up and it ended up everywhere and I was forever raking it back onto the bed.

I decided to have a talk to the gardener at work and she advised me to get rid of the mulch and lay rock down, which is exactly what I have done. I told hubby of my plan and that we would need to get a truck load of rocks in, but bless his heart, he told me that he can get as much rock as I wanted for free, providing that he load it all himself. Now, poor hubby takes the trailer and loads all the rock on with a shovel or for the bigger pieces, just his bare hands. This is seriously hard yakka. So far there have been about four trailer loads and the job is still not over. This garden bed was finished after this photo was taken, but, there are other garden beds that now need the rock treatment, much to hubby's dismay.  To be fair, I should tell you that when the full trailer load is home, I, my dear readers, do my bit of hard yakka also and barrow the rock to it's designated area and unload it myself. Sometimes if hubby is home, he will fill the barrow and wheel it to me for me to disperse of it's contents. Slowly we are getting the garden beds done. I was not sure how all the rock gardens would look, but must say that I am really pleased now and even hubby commented today on how good it looks.

This bed has Native Iris, which has purple and white flowers.Buddleja (butterfly bush) this has beautiful purple flowers that hang in clusters.Salvia "Hot Lips",this glorious bush is one of my favourites, it's flowers are two toned, red and white, plus there are a few other little bushes. When they all grow, it should look very nice and will really brighten up this area. To try to green the lawn up and cover the bare patches, I have thrown copious amounts of grass seed around and I have learned that it pays not to throw it willy nilly, as it gets into areas where I don't want it and I now have lovely little green grass shoots popping up in other nearby garden areas. A lesson was learned there. Take care. Liz...

5 comments:

  1. Oh no! At least it hasn't rained that much here (although it is raining RIGHT NOW!) I like the rock idea, seeing as how I have a big pile of them in my garden and was wondering what I could do with them... guess I need to put some anti-weed membrane down first, though, or all I'll get its hiding to nowhere with a weedy rock pile!

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  2. It looks gorgeous Liz...well done to you and your beloved. Smiles - Astrid

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  3. Husbands are great. Mine spent all day outside painting furniture. He's still wrapped in his down coat now- it may look sunny in the Irish Spring.... Liz, would you mind emailing me your address- I'm putting together the address sheet for the rest of the Willows tour, and can't quite beieve that their trip down under is now approaching so fast!! Flower beds look fab- send both of you over here forthwith!

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  4. Yes, your rock mulching seems to do the trick! Have you tried turf squares for your lawn in bare areas? Or even better, forget the lawn, go with native grasses and paths. I'm redoing my garden too this season, and the choices are endless.

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  5. hey Liz, your garden is looking great! You'll have to do an update when all the plants have grown a little and start to flower...love buddleja bushes..I have quite a few, just lovely!
    take care Julz

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