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@ Tenebri I've never had a venus fly trap so I can't offer any tips for looking after it. Succulents are good to try, an interesting one is the stone plant...yep, it looks like a pebble! If you want to try a non succulent plant then an easy one is Spider Grass. Its very easy to look after except you can kill it with over watering....my excuse is that I had 2 young children at the time so didn't pay much attention to my house plants.

29-Sep-2020 09:58:22 - Last edited on 29-Sep-2020 09:58:44 by Megycal

Fifi, your garden is beautiful! I wish mine looked as good. We had a large Mahonia charity cut down last year and we still don't know what to put in the 6ft by 6ft patch we got back. Its in the south west corner and is shaded by 6ft tall fences. The stump from the shrub is still there because its too big for us to dig up (we're also oldies ). Its 10 inches in diameter with large roots spreading out. I have wondered if we should put a small wall around it, put a paving slab on top then stand a statue on it.
I also like your cat in the last picture. Does he/she supervise you when you work in the garden? Lol. When we had a cat she used to watch what I was doing.

30-Sep-2020 10:20:28

30-Sep-2020 12:42:01

FiFi LaFeles said :

We had a huge Mahonia Charity too! I loved the winter flowers but it just got soooo big we had to cut it down - the stump started sprouting again a few years later so every year we have to chop it again. I feel a bit awful doing it, seeing as it's still alive and struggling to grow


Yes, ours grew very big, much bigger than the gardening books said. It must have been at least 8 ft tall because it towered above the top of the fence. We had it shortened a few years ago but that seemed to encourage it to grow even bigger and it bushed out before growing to 8 -9 ft tall again. The leaves are so prickly that trying to do any gardening near it could be rather painful.
Thanks to you mentioning your Mahonia still trying to grow I went and had a look at ours. Its sent up a few leaves so if the weather is OK tomorrow I'll have to cut them off. It was raining today and, like yours, our soil is mainly clay and quite heavy.

Your suggestions for shade plants have given me ideas of what to try next year but I'll give columbines a miss. We used to have some but the self set plants spread like wildfire and had reverted to wild forms which had flowers that were dull purple or dirty looking pink. They never ever prodiced anything more interesting, white would have been nice to brighten up a shady corner. In the past I've tried various "shade loving" plants with limited success. They only survived a year or two.

Your cat sounds like she was quite a character. We have the ashes from our cat buried in the garden, she has a rose bush over her too although we couldn't find one with a suitable name.
edit: @ Tuffty. Nice going getting the chilli seeds to grow. I had no idea parrots would eat a chilli.
A friend gave me 2 tomato plants. They turned out to be a variety that would be ideal for a pot or even a hanging basket as they mostly grew sideways. Had lots of tomatoes, a few ripened but don't taste nice.

30-Sep-2020 19:58:08 - Last edited on 30-Sep-2020 20:04:24 by Megycal