A compost bin is another must.' Photograph: PA 'Essential tools? My must-have list would include a wheelbarrow, garden fork, spade, rake, secateurs and trowel. A good garden centre will have knowledgeable staff to put a name to them as well as to give advice on local growing conditions. Also take some general photos for reference and some quick portrait shots of any plants you can’t identify. For most gardens, a scale of 1:20 or 1:50 works well. If paying for some expert advice is too much of a stretch financially in a world already stretched by the cost-of-living crisis, take some measurements yourself and draw it out on some tracing paper using a scale ruler, marking in any significant established plants. A great alternative is to focus your attention on one area.' Photograph: iStock 'Taking on an established garden in its entirety can be overwhelming as well as expensive.
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For a super-fast model that can be used for all food and garden waste, the portable Hotbin is a great choice ( quickcrop.ie)
If budget allows, go for a brand that will last you a lifetime such as Sneeboer. Essential tools? My must-have list would include a wheelbarrow, garden fork, spade, rake, secateurs and trowel. Along with a written “To Do” list to guide you, ideally they’d provide a roughly to-scale drawing of the garden identifying any existing important plants and some site-appropriate planting suggestions that will save you time and money in the long run.
Becoming a member of your local gardening club, the RHSI (Royal Horticultural Society of Ireland, rhsi.ie ) and GIY (Grow It Yourself, giy.ie) are other great ways to tap into the knowledge of experienced gardeners.įailing that, ask your local garden centre to recommend someone that you could pay for a few hours’ worth of expert advice. If you love the idea of taking the entire plot on but haven’t a clue where to start, then try enlisting the advice of a friend or family member with some gardening experience under their belt. South- and west-facing areas of the garden are your friends in this regard, especially if they have walls to provide additional shelter, while east- and north-facing areas are naturally cool and shady. Ideally, this should be a sunny, sheltered spot with room for seating and some large pots to fill with colourful annuals, hardworking woody evergreens and deciduous perennials and shrubs for year-round-interest. A great alternative is to focus your attention on one area.
The same goes for planting trees that might cause problems with shade or damage to built-structures down the line, or bamboos with running root systems that could be problematic in the years to come (grow these in large containers instead).Īlso bear in mind that if you’re completely new to gardening, then taking on an established garden in its entirety can be overwhelming as well as expensive. Big no-nos include doing any of the following without permission: hard-pruning established trees or shrubs, using pesticides, fungicides and herbicides, or making any irreversible changes to garden structures and hard landscaping. But when it comes to gardening a rented property, my advice is to go carefully and only with the consent of your landlord. So how best to navigate that fine line? As someone who counts my age in growing seasons, I believe life’s too short to forego the joy of gardening. Not only that, you miss out on the thousand and one humdrum, dirt-under-the-fingernails experiences that are the making of all good gardeners. Do nothing, however, and you find yourself having to constantly suppress the nagging itch to sow and grow, to plant and harvest. Invest too much passion, time, hard work and money in a rented plot, and you run the risk of having your heart broken when you eventually have to leave it all behind.
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For gardeners who are tenants, not having a patch of ground to call your own is a peculiarly painful conundrum.
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