What are we doing in the garden 2026

We have a pauls scarlet as well. I won it on ebay for a few pounds and it was 8ft tall when it turned up. It must be about 8-9 years old now and has cause no problems at all. I would say it took a few years to settle in and barely grew in that time but does grow at a reasonable rate now. It does look a bit sorry for itself in the drought years and isn't in the best position, some competition etc, as it's grown more in a mixed hedge.

Hawthorns are popular street trees locally but most have died in the last 5 years or so. They were very old trees and I don't think they could adapt to the weather and lack of rainfall, especially being surrounded by tarmac.

 

Definitely not. Could you add to the first picture a line or circle what the crown is for you, @Plantminded ? You know, I’m admittedly poor in pruning and wonder where you would prune.

 

It's been quite a nice day today, bit of sun this morning, cloudy but no rain this afternoon. I pruned 10 roses, mostly shrubs, but they are mostly rather spindly and didn't enjoy the hot dry weather last summer.

 

I have already just tidied the crown @simone_in_wiltshire by snipping off some damaged ends and equalising the size of a couple of the branches near the bottom. I will probably remove these once the tree gets bigger, to raise the crown. I will try to retain a natural shape, depending on how the tree develops. I believe it is naturally rounded.

 

Nothing today it's too cold outside.

 

Hearing the forecast with heavy rain and wind, I went into the garden at 1 o'clock and had finished tidying up it by half past 2.
I removed the leaves from the beds to give new grow a chance. I left the bags on the ground in one of the corners so that wildlife can come out in Spring time. I also put back the bricks to the little wall hoping the current foxy visitor that I still have continues to ignore the tree fern.
The only job I have now to do is to cut the ferns down in March. Not the tree fern, but the remaining 3 ferns that were severely damaged by the foxes.
The beds are prepared for the new plants. And of course, I have to observe what has survived last year's drought and our 3 weeks of frost between Christmas ans mid January.

 

Nothing today it's raining.

 

The only thing I have done today is to nip out and rescue the two new pots that arrived yesterday as they were blowing all over the garden. They can live inside for the moment until I get round to drilling drainage holes in the bottom.

 

After it rained for hours, I seized the opportunity to get screws into the wood of the VegTrug. The foxes had managed to break off one board while jumping over the fence. Since I found a way to minimise the foxes tremendously, I have new hopes for using the VegTrug again. I have only to order a new protection sheed and to buy soil from the GC.

 

Cut back some of the brambles that are slowly taking over around the side of the house, managed to pull some of the roots up, but will have to dig the rest out.

 

I repotted some strawberries (Mara de bois) into slightly larger pots as the original compost had sunk and the two smaller pots had roots escaping at the bottom.

Then I pruned the last two roses, thank goodness.

I'm thinking about having a large hedge removed and replaced by a fence. It's an unholy mixture of a vicious Berberis, a clematis Armandii and a self sown honeysuckle, which we are fed up with trying to keep under control and/or paying out anything up to £400 to have it cut. The problem is it's higher our side and lower on the roadside behind it with a ditch below a dwarf wall. There are houses the other side of the road which are higher than ours so there's the loss of privacy to think about as well. Decisions, decisions.......

 

If you get a quote for fencing @lizzie27, that will help with your decision . I had a small section done last year to replace some chain link fencing and it cost a lot more than the adjoining fencing did 10 years ago from the same fencing company.

 

Yes @Plantminded, I'm anticipating a larger fencing bill as I know the price of wood has gone through the roof in the last couple of years. It's not so much the cost of a fence that's the issue as cutting down on the effort of continual maintenance. We're both in our late seventies so things are getting harder to do and I'd rather save my energy for the more enjoyable gardening jobs!

 

That was my thinking @lizzie27, getting new fencing to keep my neighbour’s laurel hedge at bay and avoid having to prune it on my side every year (only the lower half though as it’s over 12 feet high!).

 

Cleared a bit more of the brambles but it was too cold to do much.