[jambutty]

Originally Posted by Retlaw

Hi Jambutty.

Never mind the critics, you should have seen our garden when we got it, we filled three 6 ton skips with rubbish before we could even start to grow any thing.

Just dig in plenty of compost in the flower beds before planting.
Poppies be careful they are very invasive and can soon take over.
Snow drops can be critical as to the depth they are planted.

Just remember plants like human beings require food. We have 3 big compost bins going full time.

Retlaw

I’m far too long in the tooth for puerile criticism to cause me any concern. There are people on here who respond to a post, not for its content, but who wrote it and in general I treat them with the contempt that they deserve. Although I have been known to respond in kind when my better nature deserts me.

As you can see from the photo below my back garden is raised above the building floor level and as near as I can gather half the depth is a mixture of rubble and what laughingly passes for soil. The top half isn’t too bad though although it was ‘root bound’ with grass roots after lying fallow for at least 6 years that I know of.

I’m looking for a controlled wilderness instead of a lawn because it would need mowing, so the whole garden is a flowerbed as I have already described.

Come March some time, whatever grasses are showing will be nuked with Weedol, and a week or so later my personal slave will spread a few hundred litres of general compost around so that the seeds will have a good start. After that it is up to nature to do its stuff, although I will help out with anti-slug stuff and a general fertiliser.

By Veterans Day on the 27th June 2008 the poppies should be in bloom so my personal Remembrance Garden will become a symbol for those who made the ultimate sacrifice so that we could live in a free world. Not just the armed forces but also the hundreds of thousands of civilians.

The flowers in the centre will have died back by then and they will represent the fallen.
The red poppies will be symbolic of remembering the fallen of the European war and the yellow poppies for the Far East war.
The wild meadow flowers will be symbolic of the aftermath as life sprung from the ruins of war.
The cultivated flowers will represent progress since then.

It would be a nice gesture if other people set aside a small patch to grow the red poppy. Just a yard square would be enough.