Rhododendron....Good Idea or Not?

A few years ago I was given a couple of large Rhodies. They were from a friend's garden. They were large but only had leaves at the ends of the branches. I stage pruned them fairly hard over a period of two years and now have two gorgeous bushes about four feet high and so bushy. I have really bad soil in my garden. I was puzzled though with one of these bushes. the slightest dry spell and this one flopped. Strange because it's where i do all my potting up and it gets all the spent compost. Anyway I dug it out today to see what was going on. I dug about a foot down below the root level and .............aha found what must have been a drain at one time. Loads and loads of stones. Mu house is built on the site of a very old cottage. I din't want to move the Rhodie from it's position so..............................I cut a piece of carpet put it in the hole then filled to root level from the compost heap and then put the Rhodie back. Do you think this will help to retain the water a bit? Sort of an upside down mulch.:hehe:

 

I don`t see why not `granny, as long as the water can slowly drain away.:gnthb:

 

A lass at work constantly boasts about her friend's 'carpet garden'. Apparently it is really nice, low maintenance, and weed free. The story goes that they had an old carpet to chuck, but no means of transporting to the tip, so they laid it across the garden, cut holes for their plants, and covered it in gravel.

Not quite the same thing, but it sounds pretty good.

Incidentally, I too have an old carpet out the back waiting for me to get round to taking it to the tip. I also have a Leylandii hedge that sucks all the goodness out of the main border. After hearing the tale of the carpet garden I now think I'm going to bury the whole lot under my border (which is currently empty), so it covers the Leylandii roots but is far enough under to allow me to plant over the top. The idea being that it will slow down the drainage of water and nutrients into the Leylandii.

 

My old carpets go into the roof space to help with insulation and my heating bills ......

 

Clueless i too have a very dry border backed by Leylandii and backed again by Ash trees it also drops into a field by about 2 feet. If the border hadn't been completely planted i would do that with the carpet. I've had so much bother with it i would nearly buy carpet and have it fitted:lollol: