Restoring a Hampshire Garden – Chapter 2

KEEPING IVY AND HER FRIEND HONEYSUCKLE IN THEIR PLACE

This latest task wasn’t so much a restoration job, but a ‘let’s see what we have here’ job. There are times when this is necessary to help see the bigger picture.

The garage, strangely built at the back of the house taking up some of the garden, is an ugly building. It is no surprise a trellis was built along the wall with climbers to camouflage it.

The planting here consisted of 3 climbing roses, believed to be ‘Albertine’, several ivies, a honeysuckle and a wisteria. The wisteria was well and truly dead so removing it was an easy task. Not surprising it had died, the raised bed was on top of the paving, so only about 6″ deep. I’m amazed anything grew, but ivy doesn’t care where she puts her roots as long as she is allowed to grow.

Everything had been allowed to run wild for a good few years and trying to untangle and remove twisted stems through the solid trellis proved impossible. We had to resort to taking it down, it had been built in situ nailed to batons and solidly made. It took three of us to remove it from the wall and it was extremely heavy, I can assure you! My Son in Law climbed on to the roof with trepidation to attack from above. The ivy and the honeysuckle had made its way across the garage roof and into and around the guttering, which made it a hard job to clear, a bit like untangling knitting wool. My daughter and I tackled the rampant plants from below, ducking at each shower of debris and dust that fell on us as we pulled stuff away from the wall – headscarves or hats should have been the order of the day. My head itched for hours afterwards.

As with all jobs, putting something back together again always proves much harder than dismantling. I mentioned earlier, this framework was very heavy and lining it up again to the correct batons was a feat. In view of its weight my back was beginning to complain so I was given the job of using the electric drill to screw it back into place. A much easier job and quite satisfying in a strange way.

With all the foot traffic and removal of roots, the weakened and somewhat rotting boards eventually collapsed, which is another job to sort out. This will be at a later date, there are other jobs taking priority on the garden to-do list.

We uncovered windows in the garage and the ivy had even crept its way through the window frames. However, at the end of what transpired to be a longer job than anticipated, there is now an area, a bit like a bare wall, asking to be filled up. The roses have been saved, despite not having a good dept of soil for their roots. They’ve been pruned and will be carefully trained to grow to splendid glory.

There are lots of planting ideas, but if any of you gardeners reading this have some suggestions, all ideas will be looked at. I have to remember I can only advise and help, it’s not my garden. Honeysuckle is always pretty as long as it is kept under control, a perfumed variety such as ‘Graham Thomas’ might be a possibility, you can never go wrong with clematis such as Montana ‘Elizabeth’ with its fabulous fragrance. I think ivy had her day, but we will have to keep an eye on any tiny roots left behind – we all know she is difficult to eradicate.