Topic: I need a bigger Garden

[Wrennie]

I made a new tomato bed behind my veggie garden. I put a bunch of tomatoes in yesterday. Thought I'd have enough room for some pole beans at the end and my 2 hot pepper plants. HA! Wrong. So the new flower bed even farther uphill is probably going to end up being my bean and pepper patch. I still need an herb bed and someplace sunnier for my irises! Anyone want to come and dig and pull out grass on a hill with me?

This gives ya an idea of the hills pitch

See the rocks? On the right side, the "flower" bed is from them to about 6 feet over.


And, see the pile of leaves and stuff behind the veggie bed? (The wood post is supporting the back chicken wire fence) Thats where the tomato bed is.

[Penny]

oooooh i would hate that hill!!!

[Patty S]

Wrennie, it looks like you've been busting your backside out there, & have lots of work ahead of you!  
(Hey! Is that a REAL bird, sitting on your Shepherd's hook?)

I know what a challenge that hillside is, cuz I have one on an angle like that, myself!   It's gunna be a lot of work, but if I can clean mine up (with 2 fake knees), you can do it... & trust me, the results will be SOOO worth the effort, in satisfaction!

I don't mean to hijack your topic, but let me show you the progress I've made on mine over the past 3 years.  I hope it'll provide some encouragement for you, cuz as you work on it, there will be days when that slope will feel like Mount Everest!  

The first year we were here, there was nothing on the hill except tall field grasses & an assortment of invasive weeds, like winter vetch, purslane, mustard plant, wild blue flax & Queen Anne's Lace. The only place on the hill where a good ground cover had been planted by the previous owners, was a 15 foot patch of Winter Creeper.  (All that grass was so tall & thick, we weren't even aware that there was a 70 foot row of Tall Bearded Iris at the bottom of the slope, when we bought the house!)  
     (I had no idea that I'd be landscaping, so there isn't a "before' pic.)

When I found out all that Iris was down there, I was determined to cultivate the hill when my legs were strong enough to navigate the hillside, after my knee surgery.  (I actually started working on it before my knees were really ready, but my stubbornness netted better results than all my physical therapy sessions had... & MY "program" was easier to stick with!)    By 2006, I had most of the weeds conquered, & was at the point where I had to pull the grasses out by hand!
   
April 23, 2006

All the dirt around here is clay, & Keith was worried that taking all the grass & weeds off the hill was going to create an erosion problem, so I moved bunches of "Basket of Gold" (Aurinia saxatilis) from other parts of my yard & brought Periwinkle (Vinca) from LaRelle's yard, to one end of the hill.... but there was still lots of area that still needed plants.  I planted a big section of it with Nigella... which I knew wouldn't be effective for holding the soil, but it sure was pretty when it flowered along side the California Poppies! Keith wasn't real happy with me at that point. (The California Poppies here, won't go away, but they have tap roots & hold the soil pretty well, so I've pretty much stopped fighting them.)
   
May 25, 2007

I knew that I couldn't keep planting annuals there, but I didn't have a clue about what to put there, & Keith kept saying that the hill was getting closer to the house every time it rained!   (If it wasn't so much work, I'd have liked to move the Iris up ON the hill, instead of having it all at the bottom, cuz they're great soil holders.)  Late last summer, I got my hands on a huge bunch of ground cover plants called Sea Thrift, & Sarah-bc gave me loads of Ice Plant to add to my own, & I put those in sections of the hill. (Both these plants should spread out & hold the soil adequately.) I also moved loads of Spearmint plants to another section, just because it has good, trailing roots (invasive as heck) & holds the soil well.  I have one section left to work with, when I find a groundcover that can take full sun, heavy drainage, & look good all year.
    
May 4, 2008

I know that your hillside will look terrific if you keep at it & don't get discouraged.  You can probably whip yours into shape a lot faster than I did mine, if you have some kind of a plan about what you want to put there when you get rid of the grass.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you end up with, so I hope you stick with your plan & update us on your progress!

[Wrennie]

Patty that IS a real bird! He's a rose breasted grosbeak.
The last owner had no real gardens here, all grass. He did plant loads of fruit trees though.
The hill was all grass for me too. I need to terrace it a bit at a time. 'Bad' arms make it a longer process than I'd like.
The dirt here is all clay and rock and part of the hill is steeper than where I'm working now. My highest up the hill garden has black eyed susans, wild daisys & obedient plant in it. I want to add more BES and Iris beds all over it, maybe coneflowers too.

[duh]

Patty you give me hope.  I live on a slope so the front and back yards are all on a hill.  And, I have clay and rock instead of soil also.  At least what I haven't bought and had brought in lol. 

Hope that is here after the first major rain storm.