Flower borders and a greenhouse in the garden.
I purchased a new house recently, around the end of October 2024. Shortly after I was in and out of hospital a few times, and I am now rebuilding my exercise levels, and oxygen intake etc.
Enough of that. Part of my rehab involved joinig the RHS last summer, and subsequently I have visited three RHS sites in quite a short period of time, and highly recommend this to anybody.
Moving on, it is now early January 2025, and a builder is laying a concrete base in advance of an order and delivery of a new greenhouse to come in a month or so.
As much of interest to me for future reference, here are a number of useful reminders of where I contacted for builders and other supplies.
The builder was through an online company called MyJobQuote. I settled for a local builder who has charged me £600 for a 10 foot by 6 foot 6 inch base, 4 inches thick. He is also doing another job as well. I am very impressed.
I did use checkatrade fairly recently for a tree surgeons who ripped me off by quoting a days work for four poeple which was actually about two hours work with most of them scratching themselves.
The greenhouse I will almost certainly purchase from greenhousestores, who I found online. I rang the company and they were good enough to supply me with the names of some local installers phone numbers. I reckone the total cost which includes installation of a Vitavia Apollo 8 by 6 toughened glass and three staging components inside was about £1500. I liked the Apollo as there is no step to climb over.
I spent quite a lot of time looking for seeds and pots to grow in. The RHS shops are exellent for purchasing plants, and highly recommended.
As regards other stuff, it was Amazon for tools, ebay for bamboo poles and plant stands. Wtach the sizes, read the small print carefully on these selling platforms.
I also decided to build a water feature as suggested by an
RHS email, feature . I gave up on finding an old sink as these are quite desirable in a kitchen these days; but I did opt for a LARGE Watertight 100% GUARANTEED Oak wine half barrel planter patio MINI POND. I am yet to check this is actually 100% watertight, but it is very large and heavy, by my standards anyway. It measures 70 - 73cm x 45cm tall approx - 25kg in weight; and I may order another. Cost was £44.95.
Water is free, but I also purchased 50 of 6 foot bamboo poles. If you shop around you cn get some good deals, and for some weird reason I have purchased another 100 times 6 foot poles and 50 each of 2 foot and 4 foot. The latter I bought from Onbuy.com who are very reasonably priced.
You will need a large roll of twine to lash the pole together, and I use a jigsaw to cut the poles as needed.
I also purchased a cheap roll of chicken wire and 20kg of stones from B&Q, some plants in a pack and a solar powered pump. The water feature is getting quite costly, but it will look good.
The last thing to find, after having had all my trees chopped back, was some cheap / free wood in the local forests! The frogs need to have a slope to climb in and a base to sit on, my first project in bamboo poles
I will add some pictures as these many projects get going.
As regards lashig bamboo poles, I took a step back to my days as a scout when I used to lash staves, and there are some brilliant
online tutorials for scouts to see how to do this.
I also found some "1.9m Outdoor Garden Metal Obelisk Climbing Plant Support Frame Trellis" which you need to assemble yourself, but for less than £9 each, these were a bargain. I am seriously thinking about buying some more of these.
For seeds I purchased a number of packets from a company called Plant Pots Direct who also sell plant pots and similar at a reasonable cost. I later found a fairly close provider, to me, where I could collect these plastics for free. I am yet to purchase anything but these are H Smith plastics Ltd at Batlesbridge in Essex. Their prices seem very competitive.
And Last updated on: Tuesday, 07-Jan-2025 13:48:15 GMT