"Keith (Dorset)" wrote in message

What IS this total obsession that many gardeners seem to have with
junk?

One man's junk is another man's treasure.

I'm talking about: old baths and tyres,

Old baths make ideal worm farms (and they even have a drainage hole
under which to put a bucket for worm liquid) and tyres are very good
containers in which to grow potatoes. They can be stacked as the
potatoes grow and thus take into account the ability of spuds to keep
sending out roots right up the stem as they are buried.

half rotten roof battens,

encourages microflora in the breakdaown process.

plastic bottles

Hmmph! Have you never seen the water spikes that are stuck into the
ground and then have an inverted plastic bottle full of water stuck
into the water spike?

Probably not, but it can make the difference between having a live
plant or a dead one. You must live in a climate where it still rains.

and discarded carpet

Wonderful material for putting under mulched paths as it stops weeds
in their tracks (but it must be either a pure wool carpet or an old
fashioned underfelt that is of the real felt variety)

.... then there's the 'Blue Peter' greenhouse?

Don't know what this thing is.

Does incorporating neatly laid paths and raised beds - (and trying
out new
and colourful vegatable varieties make me a gardening snob)?

Gardens that incorporate old baths, old carpet, rotting roof battens
and plastic bottles can be just as neat in appearance as any other.
It's probably more to do with design and size than any real claim to
being neat. Any tiny garden can be as neat as a cutlery drawer as can
any garden that is properly designed with designated work areas for
all tasks. What is harder to achieve is to have a neat garden when it
is still in the development phase or that is struggling for some
reason.

My garden couldn't currently be descrided as "neat" as it's in full
blown drought and the dead grass where there once was a lawn is not a
pretty sight for neatnicks. Others who are also gardening in drought
would know just how good my garden currently is, given the conditions.

Well, I'm, not - nor am I made of money......

Perhaps you just need to look at some things in a different way? For
example, having had cancer treatment last year, my veg garden got
right on top of me. I had a huge pile of weeds that needed to be got
rid of, but then I realised that if I could grow spuds under straw, I
could grow spuds under weeds. I now have a thriving extra patch of
spuds under weeds (in addition to the spuds under straw).

By doing this I'm effectively turning the weeds into compost by sheet
mulching. It works and works well, but then I have a big garden and
another garden on another farm and I have to do things that work
within the time constraints. Live is too short for me to run anal
gardens.