Hannah shares design tips and tricks to maximise abundance and beauty in a new productive garden. Subscribe 🔔 http://ab.co/GA-subscribe
Creating a garden from scratch can be daunting. No matter what size or shape your space is, it’s worth considering a few key aspects before you start planting to get on the right path. Hannah takes us through the layout of a new suburban garden that makes the most of its limitations and resources.
Water:
Water is essential to your plants! Start by researching how much rainfall you receive in your area, to get an idea of what plants are suitable. Observe how rain moves across the site too – steep slopes may benefit from terracing, to slow the flow of water, passively watering your plants.
In this garden, retaining walls were built using large boulders that double as seating and space for rockery plantings.
Plants that require a lot of water such as annual vegies, are best closest to the water source for maximum efficiency.
Microclimates:
There can be different amounts of water, sun, and shelter throughout the garden, so you need to get creative with different solutions.
In the winter shade cast by this house, they have planted deciduous fruit trees and shrubs as they only need the summer sun to flourish. Winter flowering perennials and bulbs are used underneath ensure there’s colour at all times.
Further up the back there is no shelter from the sun, so a creative pergola was built. Grape vines and kiwi fruit will eventually create a green ceiling to protect both plants and people during the heat of summer.
To provide privacy and protection from strong southerly winds, evergreen fruit trees and native shrubs will create a lush border around the fence line once established.
Multi-functionality:
An essential design principle is creating spaces and structures that have multiple functions.
Chickens do a lot more than laying eggs! They eat food scraps and green waste, eat weeds before they take over, and a deep litter compost is created from straw and chicken poo that will eventually feed the vegie patch.
A worm farm can be multi-functional too – here an old bathtub inside a timber frame double as a seat and workbench.
Waste:
In a well-planned garden, there is no such thing as waste – everything has value and is put back into the system. No garden is complete without compost. This garden has accessible paths so you can get a wheelbarrow of waste right up to the compost bays that are next to the main vegie beds – where you’ll use it most. There are also in-ground worm buckets.
Before you head to the nursery for plants, pick up a pen and paper to do some quick sketches and spend time observing and dreaming up your perfect garden.
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12 Comments
Love the reobar to give strength to the trellis. Looks lovely.
I really love that 💞 thank you for sharing 🌻
You don't have to go full-on like this garden. Even doing some of these activities can no only help the environment but also your health (physical & mental). Most of these activities can be done for low cost but still get good results. Keep it simple and reuse & recycle!! Thanks for such an informative vid.
Have loved G.A. for many, many years. Pete's well that's your bloomin lot was a staple every Friday night on the ABC for me and mine. Politics has driven me from MSM so a popup on YouTube has reintroduced me to an old friend. Although North Queensland didn't get much of a mention back in the day. People live up the top you know. Have subscribed, but will watch what interestes me.Cheers from North Queensland 👍
wow th e average family could not afford a set up like that! it is lovely but the costs when you do not have a friend who is an expert is probhibitve for most people starting out as are getting huge machines in to do the ground works.
so awesome!
That is the beginning of a beautiful space for human, animals and plants. I love the idea of a worm tower. I dont think i have dver heard of that before. I'm truly impressed. Thank you, Anna i would like to echo another person, G.A. is a great group of ppl infront and behind the cameras.
A nice reminder to make some worm farm in the veggie patch.
Beautiful & bountiful garden.
Glad I am not the only one to realise that deciduous fruit trees only need full sun when they are awake.
Our front is mostly in the shade during winter, so we planted fruit trees and Berry bushes that slept during winter. Around the side of the front that keeps the sun, citrus. We now basically get fruit all year from the front.
Nice video
Super👍👍👍👍