Day 16 – Tuesday 12 June 2007: Waiting for my garden to grow back

I have been having big problems with the grass in my garden.

It all started when I I left it too long before cutting it. As a result, when the grass was eventually cut… large parts of it simply died My gardner says it will eventually grow back… but it might take months! So in the mean time there are patches where the grass is growing, and patches where it is not (left picture).

I even applied grass fertiliser, but it didn’t do anything. Then I resorted to putting down grass seeds. The packet said I would definitely see new grass in 10-14 days! So I planted the seeds and waited.

Then one day I noticed strange holes appearing in the garden (middle photo). Couldn’t figure what was causing them. Thought it might be cats or some sort of earthworms. Then I realised that it was actually birds coming along and eating up all my grass seeds (right picture).

So, back to square one

If the lawn doesn’t start behaving I probably end up converting the entire garden into gravel…

Tuesday 12 June 2007 – Day 16 of my Project 365.

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Day 9 – 5 June 2007: Another decorative gravel feature in garden

Yesterday’s photo was my “Decorative Gravel Feature in Garden”. You will know how much I love to use gravel in the garden.

Today I spent most of the day sorting out the overgrown grass in the back garden and just before I was about finish for the day I had the inspiration for this matching pair of gravel features. One is a square, the other is a circle.

How to do this
(1) Get the bricks.
You can get different coloured driveway paving bricks from your local hardware store such as B&Q. They only cost about 25p each. I picked up 15 red ones and 15 grey ones. As you can see, I ran out of red bricks for the top square, so I will have to get some more tomorrow. There will be alternating red/grey bricks in the square.

(2) Get some gravel.
A good hardware store will have a wide range of different types of gravel. Surprisingly, there can be large variations in the price of different types of gravel. Some are more decorative and interesting, others are more mundane. I went for one of the more expensive types this time and got 2 bags each costing about £5.

So altogether this gardening project cost less than £15.

(3) Put down a weed-proof membrane.
If you are interested in preventing weeds growing through from under the gravel, make sure you invest in putting down a good quality weed-proof membrane. This is absolutely vital to eliminating weeds from your gravel feature.

(4) Make it.
Just lay out the bricks in whatever pattern you want, and fill it with gravel. You can construct them on top of paving slabs, patio bricks, lawn grass or even bare soil. The surface requires minimal preparation – just try to make it level if at all possible.

It took about 30 minutes to construct the star and the square shown here.

I will tell you a secret. Underneath each of these gravel features is a sewer inspection chamber. I used to hate looking at the manhole covers, so I thought this would be a nice way to both add some interest to the garden, and get rid of the manhole covers at the same time. I am quite pleased with it so far.

The plan for tomorrow is to get some more bricks and finish off the square.

Tuesday 5 June 2007 – Day 9 of my Project 365.

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Day 8 – 4 June 2007: Decorative gravel feature in garden

I recently constructed a decorative gravel feature in my front garden.

I am a huge fan of gravel, and I really like using lots of gravel in the garden. As long as you put down a good quality weed-resistant membrane beforehand, a gravel feature can give you years of low-maintenance weed-free garden bliss.

Normally I use a weed-resistant membrane that is guaranteed to suppress weed growth for a staggering *15 years*. A brick border (as shown here) provides a smart outline and definition, as well as containing the gravel, preventing it from spilling away.

4 June 2007 – Day 8 of my Project 365.

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