Almost Stumped !!!

Hi all, having read many posts on this site I thought I might share some of the 'projects' that have kept me occupied over the past 2 and a bit years.

I�m certainly no expert but I like to do a job to the best of my ability even if it means pulling apart and starting again. The reason for submitting this post is really to give inspiration to others. Looking at the garden now, I cant quite believe that I�ve been responsible for whole lot.

Although we had lived in the area for many years, I cant say that I had ever 'noticed' our house until the day we saw it in the property guide. We must have driven past it many times; just goes to show. Anyway it�s a corner plot and the 2 boundaries were lined with 20 foot trees ! (I must drive around with my eyes shut !) The prev (and first) owner of the property had all the trees chopped down about 2 yrs before we bought the place leaving an array of stumps !!!

I�m not sure if I actually set out to remove the stumps on purpose or if it just happened ! I recall having a bit poke at a few of them and they practically fell out; lulling me into a false sense ��. ! Then before I realised what I was doing I had most of the tools out of the shed. Spade, shovel, BIG pry bar, BIG lump hammer, felling axe and a pick ! All light duty stuff �� NOT !

I spent most evenings and weekends for about 10-12 weeks digging the damn things out. The side of the house started off like this . I systematically worked my way down the wall, meeting the odd stubborn stump and then marvelled at my newly created border . I was so pleased with it that I couldn�t wait to get stuck in to the other boundary. This was where things started to get difficult and I was now only averaging 1 stump every 2-3 days. The bottom of the garden started off like this, then this with the worst double headed stump almost breaking me. However after many trips to the council tip with loads like this , I ended up with a fine trench ! All I needed to do now was build a wall !!! :eek:

 

Looks like hard work, but I bet it was worth it.
Well done :D

 

good on yer matey, we have a few conifer stump left in our garden, but brian got that pissed off with em, ive ended up having to plant around em!!! ill occasionally drill a few holes in em and leave em to rot, respect to ya chuck!xxx

 

Having cleared all those stumps I now needed a retaining wall so that I could put the new found lower half of my garden to use. At this point I still wasn�t sure what use; but I knew something would come up !

Wondering what I could use for shuttering I came upon an ample supply of plasterboard pallets (8� x 4�) which I duly hacked the ends off . I also found a guy about 15 miles away that had just knocked down an old garage made from rather substantial blocks. Best of all they were free to uplift. Took a few trips and a lot of hammering with a big chisel but I turned this pile of rubble into a retaining wall .

Backfilled the wall and decided that this area would be best suited to being a hard standing for ââ?¬Â¦Ã¢â?¬Â¦ mmm cars, trailers, caravan, anything else ! So, trailered 9 tons of hardcore into the site. After being well compacted with a whacker from a local plant hire firm the rear area was now useable but not quite complete. 6 tons of gravel on top of heavy duty landscape fabric resulted in a 20m parking area . A huge improvement over the moss ââ?¬Ë?carpetââ?¬â?¢ that used to slope down to the neighbours fence.

Next project �� the patio, but only after I finish building my new trailer. You may have noticed the chassis just off to the right side of the latter photos. Best use of a 30 yr old caravan that prob hadn�t moved in over 15 yrs.

Col

 

I forgot to mention that I removed 48 of the damn things ! I have 3 left in my property but have no great desire to go down that road again ! I'm with you "Plant around them !"

Col