follow ups please!

Fire

We discuss so many gardening questions and problems and developments but rarely get to find out what happened next. I would love to hear how the advice landed - was it useful? Did the plant or project die? What tree was planted? Which rose was chosen in the end? Did you build the pond? Did you buy the house?

If you've started a problem solving thread - follow up may be best there. There's as much learning to be had from what didn't work as from what did.

🌱

Woodgreen

A good reminder @Fire, as results are often only measured long after the posts appear.
Apologies, but here's a late one.

I didn't start a thread to enquire whether compost/leaves etc would rot down successfully on concrete, ( I was new to posting, recently widowed so feeling a bit sensitive, had been reading the forum for quite a long time.) So I private messaged a forum member who had touched on the concrete issue.
They kindly responded saying it works well, and there was no shortage of beneficial creatures and worms, encouraged me to try it, so I built a flagged base for my leaf mould bulk bags.
It works. 
The  reasons for wanting to do it was because my ground is very wet in winter but mainly because compost heaps, leafmould cages etc touching the soil rapidly get infected with honey fungus rhizomorophs (even when I had plastic 'daleks' inside a greenhouse) and although the books say they are harmless when severed from their source, it is sickening to deal with.
I left no space under the flags, so the rhizomorophs can't get in via the joints and it's worked a treat.
So thank you, (I think it was @Topbird) and to anyone else who has wondered about this, it does work, there must presumably be enough life, eggs etc on the material to continue an ecosystem.
My concrete block compost bins have suspended weldmesh bases for the same reason and this helps when the ground floods or is waterlogged.

Sorry for the long post but maybe it could help anyone who has similar issues.

Fire

Thanks @Woodgreen I too do composting mostly in closed bins (off the ground) and it works wonderfully well. I'm so sorry for all your losses.

Uff

A thread to remind us to let members know how and if their problem has been solved by a follow up post, a good idea Fire because I often wonder what the outcome was.

pansyface

Tui gave us this advice

Expression for today:  A la Sainte Simone, il faut avoir rentre ses pommes

And I ignored it.

The same night each and every one of the Lane’s Prince Albert and Keswick Codlin apples fell off their branches and landed in the mud.

Pay attention!

puschkinia

What a nice thread - everyone's advice here has been amazing for me.

Here I asked about whether/how to pot up thunbergia alata grown from seed. I took @Dovefromabove's advice and now they're looking great & still going strong  


I got lots of advice on how to train a climbing rose here. It's looking so healthy in its second season. I'll work on shaping it (and redoing the wires properly) this winter.



I asked about my peach tree here and @BobTheGardener gave great advice & reassurance. The sap seems to be back but it's grown so well and, despite trying to remove the fruits so the tree could concentrate on getting strong, gave us 4 perfect & extremely tasty peaches year. 

The v. bod that was recommended to me (again by @Dovefromabove!) is about to burst into flower  



I asked about what could take over from alliums here. Took the advice from @plantminded, @nollie and @GardenerSuze, widened the border a little and planted v. bon (+ cosmos)



Thanks so much for all of your incredible help  

GardenerSuze

@puschkinia I thought of you and your garden the other day and hoped things were going well, you are always so keen and interested.  White cosmos underplanted with Erigeron karvinskianus [same shape flower but a different size] always works. The V bonariensis makes the look complete. Three plants all long flowering perfect for a small border so much better than lots of different things dotted about. Thank you

I have found posts on 'Garden Design' can be time consuming and stretch my knowledge. I hope what I say is helpful, sometimes there is no reply and I wonder if I have got it wrong and they are not interested in my thoughts. On the positive lots of people read the posts and maybe it is of interest to someone else. 

I would like to thank @Marlorena who helped me choose a rose called Rushing Stream.It was planted in February and has flowered on and off since May. Still a few flowers today the subtle perfume was lovely on the warm air.

Fire

Gosh, yes, thanks to @Marlorena and the rose crew for all the help - too many points to count.

Songbird-2

@woodgreen. I wonder if it would be possible for you to post a pic of your concrete based leaf compost please? I have had an  inkling to collect leaves for a while now to  try to get something from them but we only have a small garden with no spare space to put a big bin in. However we do have space behind the shed and wondered if I could construct  something there and I rather liked the sound of your idea of slabs and leaf mould bags. ( are those the bags that are used to deliver heavy loads ? ) Would it work in a darkish damp area that doesn’t get much sunlight? Many thanks in advance of any advice you can give. 

Woodgreen

I'll have a look to see if I still have  photos later @Songbird-2, and can take one tomorrow of the state of play just now. I think it will be ideal in the spot you describe.
When I asked originally I was intending to stand my plastic 'dalek' compost bins on paving slabs in the greenhouse, to evade honey fungus, but time constraints meant I've had to change to a slower, colder composting method ( you can imagine how the plastic bins heated up under glass! They were turned weekly and transferred to the concrete block bins. It was hard work, but very productive. I mulch mow more of my grass now, so don't have the volume of clippings to compost, but it was a great system at the time.)
I'll post photos for you as soon as I can.

B3

A really interesting thread @ fire. I have updated some of my successes in the past but not my failures. A good point about updating on the failures too.