New House, Clean Slate!

Wifeygirl, the soil marks I'm referring to are from the photos you posted in the Cottage Garden forum. I hope you don't mind I copied a section of one of the photos to show what I meant. Notice in the attached photos there are straight-line impressions in the surface of the soil as if squarish objects had been sitting there and were removed? That's how clay looks when an impression is made on it.

This is only from my experience. Clay tends to be light-colored and very dense, so an object placed on it when it's soft would leave a clear long-lasting mark. Loam tends to be dark and fluffy like store-bought potting soil, so if a person makes a footprint in it the print will be rough and eventually the wind will straighten the print and it will look blurry or gone altogether. So just by looking at your light, dense soil with strong, clear line-marks on it left from some square-type object that was placed on it I assumed you had clay soil.

Our yard has a clay substrate a few inches under the loam topsoil, and the NE side of our house is pure clay so I'm used to working with clay. We have a variety of plants that do well in this soil. Clay holds water and nutrients very well. Our mock oranges didn't thrive in clay soil but our begonias, hostas, pachysandra, asters, hydrangeas, thujas, and so many other plants grow well in the clay.

Nancy G.

Very interesting, DoGooder! I always guessed it was clay (it sure is hard as rock when dry), but your observations make me sure of it. I'll make sure to take this into account when I choose plantings. (I think I've lucked out so far because most of my garden is made up of donations from neighbors, who obviously have the same soil.)

The soil on the right-hand parking strip is really terrible. I'll have to dig it up and amend it like crazy when I try again. It has tons of construction debris in it, which makes it hard to dig, and the drainage digs huge furrows that take the water straight down to the sidewalk, where the water pools up because there is no easy access to the street.

Wifeygirl, yes, the negative side of clay is that if it doesn't have access to water it will become rock-like. My mother lives in zone 10 Greece which has an arid climate like Fresno, California and her yard was mostly empty until she added a drip irrigation system. Now she has a bountiful garden like she used to have in the Massachusetts though with different types of plants for the Mediterranean climate. As you can see from the photograph my brother took of her driveway a few weeks ago, she has plenty of color and the plants are doing well in the clay soil so long as they're watered on a regular basis.

Nancy G.

Look into a product called Turfstone. It is what you would use when you want to drive over an area, but also plant the area.
It is made of concrete, but is a lot of diamond shaped holes for the grass or other ground cover to grow through. The company I work for did one with ornamental strawberries (Fragaria chiloensis). This is a sturdy ground cover that does not mind a bit of foot traffic. The client was going to drive a car over it, but not very often.
Anything else I can think of (except lawn grasses) won't handle that much traffic.

A tree right where you are trying to drive in and out, or open the car door can be a problem. I would not. Keep the area clear, or else practice what you think you want to do. Put a garbage can right where you think a tree is OK, then drive in and out, and get out of the car, carrying a big bag of groceries or soil amendment. Walk past the car, as if you went to the curb to get something, then retuen on that side, in that planter. Does the 'tree' get in the way?

A tree between 2 houses can work, and your idea of a Crape Myrtle or other small, well behaved tree is good. The deep pink one most common in California is 'Tuscarora', though there are others. Make sure you get one of the disease resistant hybrids. The species (Lagerstroemia indica) gets powdery mildew and looks pretty bad.

Easiest way to see where trees fit:
Draw your house and yard to scale in plan view (what it would look like flying over it). Google Map, satellite view.
Add a large circle to represent a tree. I usually draw Crape Myrtles as a 12' to 16' diameter circle (Depending on variety). This represents about 75% of the mature size. Larger trees of course would be drawn with larger circles.
It is OK to overlap the circles by about 10%, but more than that and the trees will be too crowded.
Note where north is. Think about how the sun will rise and set over the trees.
The goal I would think of is to shade the house to make it cooler, and make part of the front shaded, too, so it is cooler when you open the door. This would mean keeping the trees closer to the house, perhaps selecting taller, but narrower varieties.

Hi Wifeygirl, you have done really well, my advice is, Stop putting yourself under so much pressure with regards what you have done or not done, a garden should be an enjoyment, not a race, not a threat of life or death IF you have not managed a task, we all live very busy lives either with work, family, kids, health problems or just everything happening at the same time preventing the garden chores ALL being done to the strict timetable.

I wanted to give you advice re your tree falling over AND the planting of any new tree's.

Remember any tree's we buy, grow from seed or whatever, they do take several years before they are mature enough to be self supportive, and most planted trees are grown in pots over several years, they are in the same pot.

I like to prepare the planting area well in advance by digging the hole many times as wide as the pot size and as much deeper.

make sure you add as much humus to the planting area as you can get your hands on, remember your exchanging a pot for a hole in the ground that the tree will be in for years and years.

Plant any tree's at the coolest season and at the coolest time of day, water the plant-pot well in advance (I sink the pots into a large container filled with water and leave overnight or very lease several hours, this allows the tree / shrub to take up as much water as it possibly can, the water drains out while your preparing to plant.
Add some humus (horse manure well rotted or home made compost, or store purchased bags of ready mixed Multi purpose compost, to this scatter some Feed into the hole as well as scattered and mixed into the soil you are placing back into the hole.

when you add the tree, loosen the roots growing in a circle around the rootball, do this gently by hand and try NOT break the roots, all your tying to do is STOP the roots from continuing to grow around in circles, they need to quickly spread out into the soil to give support to the top growth AND search out for water as the tree gets bigger.
As you back fill the hole, tread the soil using your toe of your boot around the rootbal to remove any air pockets, do this as you go along.
As you go along back filling the large hole, I place an empty clear plastic juice container into the hole, remove the bottom and insert the cap end down into the hole leaving an inch or 2 above the soil level, when watering, you fill the container up several times and this method allows the water to get way down to the roots where it is most needed, it also helps give any feed needed BUT tree's don't require as much feeding as flowering perennials, especially after the first few years.
As regards any staking, this needs to be done properly right from the planting stage, there are several methods that are suitable.
1. hammer the good strong stake into the soil way deeper than the root-ball, this needs to be placed about 6 inches from the tree trunk, give a good shake to make sure it CANT move about especially is in a windy area. use proper tree ties specially made for the job, place this tie onto the tree trunk about 6-8 inches under the lower branches, then add the spacer that comes with the store bought ties, this spacer prevents the tree rubbing against the stake, this rubbing would break the bark and allow disease into the soft tissue of the trunk, pull the tie tight BUT not so tight it strangles the trunk. Every so often you need to check and loosen the ties to allow the trunk to expand and also then check the stake is still holding firm.

2, do the same as method 1, but instead of having the stake upright, you hammer it into the soil at an angle, about 45 % degrees is OK, then use the same ties BUT, place the tie about a foot up from the ground, this method it has been discovered, allows the tree to sway in the breeze and makes it stronger against real high winds IF / WHEN they do arrive when tree is older and no longer being supported.

3. Use 2 stout poles and hammer into the soil a foot either side of the trunk, make sure they are NOT able to move about, next take a 2 1/2 foot wood strip 1 X 2 inches, nail this across the top of the 2 poles about 6-8 inches below the top of poles, use the tree ties to fix the trunk to the 1X2 inch wood and this will prevent the tree rocking about, always check the ties every few months and loosen if required, Never use rope or anything that will cut into the bark, IF I need to remove any ties that are now too small or disintegrated by weather, I use my old hosery tights as they are soft, stretchy and don't rot or cut into the bark.

The more care you take and the bigger the hole you dig and add humus, proper staking, the tree's will pay you back a thousand fold by never toppling over and grow strong and mighty, what better reward than that.

Lastly, the points being mentioned regarding your home style, don't let that put you off any type / style of gardening, I've seen some handsome homes and honestly wonders when the owners would do some gardening so dont be put off, the house is YOUR home for many years so just garden to your own style.
As foir a true cottage garden, do remember these gardens wear a history of UK / English country gardens, because they were places where food AND flowers grew side by side because space was limited, we have a very green and lush environment here in UK, Rain is something we DON'T want, we get inches of it every month in most places, so true cottage gardening is NOT something you can copy, BUT you can use that method of long borders filled with lovely flowering plants BUT choose ones like lavender, Nepeta (cat mint) Iris, there are loads of flowering plants that can be packed close together to give you the cottage look.
Your blank house walls, these can be dressed with wooden trellis and climbers growing up them, this softens the harsh new look we all have with new property BUT as I said before, just do one project at a time, do it well and then you get a buzz when setting out the next project.

I hope you dont get down hearted about having little money for the gardening project, believe me, we ALL began that way, It's amazing what bits and pieces we can find or reuse just because we cant go buy the same thing from the garden store, I was brought up as a WW11 baby and believe me, there was never any money and even food was on ration BUT we learned to reuse loads of stuff. grew all our own veg and chickens were the norm for the eggs etc.
Hope everything goes well for the rest of the season and remember, there's still next year WINTER'S are for dreaming of the garden you want and sending off for all the plant catalogues you can get, they are full of info and pictures.
Enough for another week.
Stay well, keep dreaming, have fun and just enjoy YOUR garden as we all like different things.

Best Regards.
WeeNel.

I think the term 'blank slate' is a gardeners dream! I don't see any images though.... or maybe it's just me that can't see them. Can you send images?

Your garden looks interesting. Ornamental grasses would be good in the corner. We have them in our garden too.