Hi
I've just moved into our new house and for the first time ever I have a garden. Which is nice.
The garden is about 70 feet long and 30 feet wide, faces west (so gets the sun from around 11 right through to sunset) and is mainly grass at the moment. The lawn gets quite waterlogged due to a stream that runs along the bottom of the garden.
The previous owner erected the mother of all sheds and whilst I can admire it as an architectural marvel to rival the new Wembley stadium it does look a little 'brutal'. I am keen to soften the edges of the shed (which is roughly 12' x 8') and have already put up some trellis which I intend to use to train some sort of climbing plant up. And therein lies my problem. I know next to nothing about plants or gardening and would therefore really appreciate some advice.
Can anyone suggest a good mixture of climbing plants and or border shrubs (I think I've got those terms correct??) that will offer the following

1. Will soften the look of the shed.
2. Will provide year round colour/interest.
3. Will be fragrant?
4. Will attract insects/wildlife.
5. Will be colourful (I like colour!!)

Any suggestions/advice gratefully received

Cheers

Paul (A newbie with a lot of grass to fill)

The message
from zippo4 contains these words:

Can anyone suggest a good mixture of climbing plants and or border
shrubs (I think I've got those terms correct??) that will offer the
following

Tip from the late Douglas Adams - put a SEP field rund it - paint it
purple with orange spots and no-one will see it...

1. Will soften the look of the shed.

Hops. Golden hops will give some colour. See 2. & 3.

2. Will provide year round colour/interest.

An evergreen clematis, and maybe varigated ivy; passionflower; runner
beans - useful, too; outdoor cucumbers, ditto; jasmine - some varieties
will need help to grow up rather than out; soft fruit such as brambles,
tayberry, boysenberry; grape vine; morning glory; various climing or
rambling roses; wistaria; etc.

3. Will be fragrant?

Hops - if you like beer; I don't know if there is any fragrant evergreen
clematis; honeysuckle;

4. Will attract insects/wildlife.

Many of the above.

5. Will be colourful (I like colour!!)

See 2.

HTH

--
Rusty
Open the creaking gate to make a horrid.squeak, then lower the foobar.
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

The message
from Jaques d'Alltrades contains
these words:

various climing or
rambling roses;

Or even climbing...

--
Rusty
Open the creaking gate to make a horrid.squeak, then lower the foobar.
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

"Jaques d'Alltrades" wrote in message
k...
The message
from Jaques d'Alltrades contains
these words:

various climing or
rambling roses;

Or even climbing...

Depends on the climate.

--
Brian

In article , zippo4 zippo4.1dnpb
writes

1. Will soften the look of the shed.
2. Will provide year round colour/interest.
3. Will be fragrant?
4. Will attract insects/wildlife.
5. Will be colourful (I like colour!!)

Honeysuckle will do 1, 3 and 4. If you put in 2, you could have an early
flowerer and a late flowerer. I'd suggest visiting the nursery/garden
centre in spring and choosing one that is in flower then, which you
like, and which has words like 'robust' and 'free flowering' on its
label. then visit again in September and do the same.

Honeysuckles can give quite a show of berries, but for winter interest
winter jasmine is good - lots of yellow flowers, and green foliage all
year. Don't know how it'd mix with honeysuckle - might look a bit
untidy.

Roses mix well with honeysuckle - try Rosa rugosa - crinkled leaves,
single flowers in white or pink, and, the main purpose, big red hips
that are around all winter. Or Rosa moyesii - taller. more delicate,
elongated but equally large hips. R moyesii 'geranium' has particularly
bright red flowers.

Don't be tempted to go for something too vigorous or you'll spend
forever cutting it back and trying to keep it within bounds. Instead,
grow some annuals for display in the first year or two - sweet peas or
runner beans, for example, or nasturtiums.

Later, if you find you enjoy gardening, you can always grub things out
and replace them with things that take a little more care and attention,
but the things I've suggested should be reasonably robust and not too
expensive.
--
Kay
"Do not insult the crocodile until you have crossed the river"

"zippo4" wrote in message
...

Hi
I've just moved into our new house and for the first time ever I have a
garden. Which is nice.
The garden is about 70 feet long and 30 feet wide, faces west (so gets
the sun from around 11 right through to sunset) and is mainly grass at
the moment. The lawn gets quite waterlogged due to a stream that runs
along the bottom of the garden.
The previous owner erected the mother of all sheds and whilst I can
admire it as an architectural marvel to rival the new Wembley stadium
it does look a little 'brutal'. I am keen to soften the edges of the
shed (which is roughly 12' x 8') and have already put up some trellis
which I intend to use to train some sort of climbing plant up. And
therein lies my problem. I know next to nothing about plants or
gardening and would therefore really appreciate some advice.
Can anyone suggest a good mixture of climbing plants and or border
shrubs (I think I've got those terms correct??) that will offer the
following

1. Will soften the look of the shed.
2. Will provide year round colour/interest.
3. Will be fragrant?
4. Will attract insects/wildlife.
5. Will be colourful (I like colour!!)

Any suggestions/advice gratefully received

Cheers

Before you attach anything I want to warn you. If the shed is wood, you
will need to be able to get to the wood to treat with timber treatment every
couple of years so make sure that the trelliss is removable and whatever you
plant will not suffer from being detatched while on the trellis and placed
on the ground while you do what you need to do.
Depending what sort of thing you like to see growing, I have japanese ivy
over a pergola. It is very vigourous indeed, no flowers to speak of but the
leaves turn a glorious red this time of year. Perhaps you could intersperse
it with some kind of clematis?

[snip]
Before you attach anything I want to warn you. If the shed is wood, you
will need to be able to get to the wood to treat with timber treatment
every
couple of years so make sure that the trelliss is removable and whatever
you
plant will not suffer from being detatched while on the trellis and placed
on the ground while you do what you need to do.
Depending what sort of thing you like to see growing, I have japanese ivy
over a pergola. It is very vigourous indeed, no flowers to speak of but
the
leaves turn a glorious red this time of year. Perhaps you could
intersperse
it with some kind of clematis?


Good point. I've seen systems where the trellis is hinged low down and the
top hooks onto the shed. Painting then involves gentle lowering the trellis
and painting or spraying behind it. Done carefully, you can avoid damaging
most plants this way.

Paul DS.

The message
from "Paul D.Smith" contains these words:

Before you attach anything I want to warn you. If the shed is wood, you
will need to be able to get to the wood to treat with timber treatment
every
couple of years so make sure that the trelliss is removable and whatever
you
plant will not suffer from being detatched while on the trellis and placed
on the ground while you do what you need to do.
Depending what sort of thing you like to see growing, I have japanese ivy
over a pergola. It is very vigourous indeed, no flowers to speak of but
the
leaves turn a glorious red this time of year. Perhaps you could
intersperse
it with some kind of clematis?


Good point. I've seen systems where the trellis is hinged low down and the
top hooks onto the shed. Painting then involves gentle lowering the trellis
and painting or spraying behind it. Done carefully, you can avoid damaging
most plants this way.

You don't even have to drop it to the horizontal, but can prop it at an
angle, or hang it from the top of the shed wall.

--
Rusty
Open the creaking gate to make a horrid.squeak, then lower the foobar.
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

Jaques d'Alltrades wrote:
The message
from "Paul D.Smith" contains these
words:

Before you attach anything I want to warn you. If the shed is
wood, you will need to be able to get to the wood to treat with
timber treatment every couple of years so make sure that the
trelliss is removable and whatever you plant will not suffer from
being detatched while on the trellis and placed on the ground
while
you do what you need to do. Depending what sort of thing you
like
to see growing, I have japanese ivy over a pergola. It is very
vigourous indeed, no flowers to speak of but the leaves turn a
glorious red this time of year. Perhaps you could intersperse it
with some kind of clematis?


Good point. I've seen systems where the trellis is hinged low
down
and the top hooks onto the shed. Painting then involves gentle
lowering the trellis and painting or spraying behind it. Done
carefully, you can avoid damaging most plants this way.

You don't even have to drop it to the horizontal, but can prop it
at
an angle, or hang it from the top of the shed wall.

Another point made by many gardening writers is that you don't want
to work so hard at covering up your shed or whatever that you end up
drawing attention to it. A specimen tree near a telegraph pole
distracts a lot better than the most attractive climber in the world
scrambling _up_ it. One beginner's book says if you've got a
beautiful enough garden, nobody will even notice the zillion-gigawatt
nuclear power station next door, and I reckon that's good psychology.

Mike.

In message
"ex WGS Hamm" wrote:


"zippo4" wrote in message
...

Can anyone suggest a good mixture of climbing plants and or border
shrubs (I think I've got those terms correct??) that will offer the
following

1. Will soften the look of the shed.
2. Will provide year round colour/interest.
3. Will be fragrant?
4. Will attract insects/wildlife.
5. Will be colourful (I like colour!!)

Pyracantha planted round the shed can be pruned back against it and will
have flowers in the spring and berries followed by blackbirds in the
winter. Honeysuckle will climb through.


Before you attach anything I want to warn you. If the shed is wood, you
will need to be able to get to the wood to treat with timber treatment every
couple of years

Our timber shed has been untreated for 15 years apart from refelting the
roof and is still sound.

Regards

Paul Luton

--
CTC Right to Ride Representative for Richmond upon Thames

In article ,
Paul Luton wrote:

Pyracantha planted round the shed can be pruned back against it and will
have flowers in the spring and berries followed by blackbirds in the
winter. Honeysuckle will climb through.

The question is whether you will be able to. Anna Pavord was writing
nonsense in the Independent, and claiming that Pyracantha doesn't
have vicious thorns. Well, I got rid of mine because I wasn't
prepared to put up with the biannual injury - and I don't worry
about minor cuts etc.

Go for clematis, honeysuckle etc. Annuals are good, too.

Before you attach anything I want to warn you. If the shed is wood, you
will need to be able to get to the wood to treat with timber treatment every
couple of years

Our timber shed has been untreated for 15 years apart from refelting the
roof and is still sound.

You are lucky. Mine is much older, but has been well creosoted
once every decade or so.

Pyracantha next to it is likely to make any form of timber treatment
or refelting a foul job.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

The message
from Paul Luton contains these words:

Our timber shed has been untreated for 15 years apart from refelting the
roof and is still sound.

The shed I'm assembling anew (as distinct from re-assembling) has
elements which are six years old, around fifty years old and well over a
hundred years old, and until now, none had been treated in that time.

It's not pretty, it's not even convincing as a shed, but it might
reassure those who have little - er, no wish to tie themselves to a
regular régime of performing the creomite ceremony.

http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/cobble/cobble.htm

A lot more has been done since I threw the page together, and it will be
updated as soon as the right-shaped tuits can be found. The roof is
covered in felt and the gap above the doors in the gable is filled -
albeit temporarily - with thick black polythene sheet.

I do have the tongue and groove boards to use, but I need to get my
hands on a circular saw to rip some six foot lengths of wood on the
diagonal - I'm blowed if I'm going to do it with a panel saw. (Not
having a ripsaw at present.)

As for hiding it - it's much too picturesque...

--
Rusty
Open the creaking gate to make a horrid.squeak, then lower the foobar.
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/

Many thansk to all for their replies. It's been a great help and I am now going to start the shed transformation (shedeffication??)

I may even post soem pics

and spell 'some' corectly

"zippo4" wrote in message
...
The previous owner erected the mother of all sheds and whilst I can
admire it as an architectural marvel to rival the new Wembley stadium
it does look a little 'brutal'. I am keen to soften the edges of the
shed (which is roughly 12' x 8') and have already put up some trellis
which I intend to use to train some sort of climbing plant up. And
therein lies my problem. I know next to nothing about plants or
gardening and would therefore really appreciate some advice.
Can anyone suggest a good mixture of climbing plants and or border
shrubs (I think I've got those terms correct??) that will offer the
following

Paint a picture of an old person living on his/her own on the side.

Chances are that no-one will never see the shed again.
--
Brian