Transforming a Quarry into a Lush Tropical Paradise: Mark’s Epic Garden Project!

Today’s video is a return to Mark Goodlad’s amazing topical style Tiki garden in North Lincolnshire, England talking about his exciting and ambitious tropical style, exotic and jungle garden plans! We start off sensibly with building, planning and planting a raised bed with shade tolerant plants next to his garden office – hopefully a practical on series looking at small garden / border design, how to choose the right plants and space them out will be helpful. There might be chance for a tropical style plant shopping video or two too! Being a sheltered shady spot, this triangular steel raised bed will be perfect for tree ferns, palms, Fatsias and all kinds of exciting exotic plants. Following, that though, we move into Mark’s huge garden project and look at his plans for three acres of quarry! With a natural spring being developed into a fish-filled pond, a mixed wooded area calling out for some hardy exotic planting (Schefflera, tough evergreens, ferns, bamboo etc,) an oriental style / Japanese garden, a huge expanse of sunny grassland ready for a vegetable growing polytunnel, classic car garage & workshop, bee hives and all kinds of exciting garden projects – this is a huge undertaking and one I’m excited to see develop! Let us know what you’d do with the space in the comments!

If you enjoy my content then any kind donations would be much appreciated and put towards some equipment I’ve been after for creating more exciting videos: https://ko-fi.com/georgesjunglegarden​​

0:00 Intro
1:04 Planting a new raised exotic shady border next to garden office
5:18 A huge quarry garden project – exotic woodland, pond, Japanese garden etc!

Thanks,

George

Hi everyone and welcome back to Mark’s crazy Tiki Garden how are you Mark yeah I’m very good how are you yeah not bad CH not bad yeah not not quite so crazy Ticky on this side no we probably should have said this is an entirely unplanned impromptu video but today we’re sharing

The garden at the other side of Mark’s house this is the East Wing isn’t it Mark really yeah this is the servants quarters indeed and behind us is a massive expans of grass right for potential there’s so much opportunity here hold on a second oh I’m not allowed

To do anything with this side uh apparently my children want to have the lawn um somewhere to play football or something like that I don’t know they don’t need that do they they just need more tropical Vibes I agree yes well today we’re here very quick video and I

Want to share with you two of Max projects one of which answers a lot of your questions about how to design build plant up a border a few of the specific practical questions about space in a plant and really handy under planting choices the second one will absolutely

Blow your mind it really is just such an incredible opportunity let’s show The Mark let’s go so Mark is one of those lucky people who can work from home and this is going to be your office isn’t it it is my office and I’ve been working there for about seven or eight months

And I wanted to landscape around it yeah so that it becomes a bit more part of you know what I enjoy which is the gardening side of things definitely people reach out to me wanting sort of practical you know lowbudget take home tips so definitely having a in the size

Of this yeah with a hot tub for the all the hard work you do absolutely well got got to relax but you do I did contact George with the idea of saying I have this little space next to the office which I want to plant up yeah do you

Want to do something with it and George obviously said oh yeah I suppose so yeah you yeah got the got the tone in so basically the plan is that um where George’s St currently is where we’ll need to be able to reverse cars this is going to be hard stand

And then this is a little strip down to where I’ve got some storage back here yeah but this corner area is righte for being planted up yes there’s going to be a driveway go down the back eventually more of a nod to that in a bit yes but

This area essentially is about 7 m that way 6 M that way 8 m this way I’m sure you can do a bit of Pythagoras Theorem and work out the uh the space but in here is all going to be plantable space yeah we’ve got the conifers behind we’ve

Got the trees it’s a North facing aspect yes so South is directly behind you there is directly behind me yes so and we’ve got quite a bit of tree cover which we’ll address shortly so this space is going to lend itself I think to kind of tree ferns FAS ferns that sort

Of thing but I’m looking for some IDE ideas on what I can do with it whether it’s a really densely packed yes Evergreen space whether we have some Palms in here what you know I think there’ll definitely be Palms in there won’t I think they’ll have to be but

What palms and where do we put them and you know how do we space it out so I had this um this metal frame constructed so it’s raised up I was quite conscious that the conifers and the tree roots are going to suck a lot of moisture out this

Soil so this is going to get built up and then we’re going to fill it full of compost I think I’ve mentioned before I’m very fortunate there’s a guy down the road who basically makes his own compost and he delivers it to me for

Free is it um as much as I want so this is going to get filled up these are 40 cm deep so they’re going to get filled to the brim and then that is going to be the planting depth we’re going to rivate the bottom a bit to allow some drainage

And everything can mix all together so this is definitely by a considerable margin the small of your two projects but I did actually recently ask my YouTube on the the Community page ideas for the channel for this year things that you guys want to see and one of

Them was basically how to plant up a border how to position plant so this is the perfect opportunity to share the Journey of a border from muddy ground to hopefully a lush and overflowing Tropical Paradise yeah you may not be starting off with a steel border you can

Have this I have this made by a local steel Merchant you can get this done and you can create different shapes different textures so it is achievable but what we do with this space I’m looking for some input on yeah definitely and we will be doing a series

Probably a first part of looking at the area once it’s actually built up and filled with compost planning it out roughly we’ll maybe have a couple of plant shopping trips filmed yes there we go the plant shopping Dance I’m that is the plant shopping dance I have several

Dances I won’t show you the others I won’t see the other I have to be naked for one of them yeah we’re not doing that today later so there will be a series of maybe popping out and Yeah choosing some appropriate plans and some entirely inappropriate plans to give a

Go absolutely and then we’ll also pop back later in the season to see how the beds coming together and really the results you can achieve in a year Well by the end of the season so less than a year yeah but anyway people are asking in the droves Mark what is the big

Project so the big project is down this hill um I should say this is basically like Disney World if you know if you’re into Caron mice this is the equivalent for gness isn’t it I suppose so so this is my little patch of land look at this

Just show people Mark what land’s yours uh all of it all of it everything you can see up to that green fence which is probably about 7 miles away isn’t it yeah it’s it’s a substantial plot it’s three acres um of combined Woodland and grassland we’ve had this created

Eventually this is going to be a driveway I do quite like classic cars as well so we popping down yeah yeah watch you watch your step George I know I know I know you don’t like uh if I fall over it’s definitely staying in the video Don’t Worry well it would certainly make

Good TV I feel in some ways that this a project like this deserves a a higher quality of video for the beginning but I really wanted to show people what things are like at this stage it’s obviously in its infancy um at the moment there’s an

Awful lot of stuff that needs to be done but oh definitely this area is screaming out for shefflers it’s screaming out for bamboos it’s out for grasses and really Lush Evergreen foliage it’s absolutely super isn’t it with a sort of tree overhead cover there yeah nice and damped down

There presumably there’s an awful lot of stuff that needs cutting back um there’s a lot of really spindly trees there’s quite a lot of disease sycamores and the some ash dieback so we really need to get in there and cut a lot back and so so for everyone who thought your main

Garden or the tiki Garden is a big old project this is next level big this is next level this is almost insurmountable big but unfortunately it’s uh my cross to bear is that I just talk about crosses this is amazing opportunity it’s not Easter yet there’s going to be a lot

Of work just involved in getting the site cleared I mean wow so this is kind of a it’s a natural spring um obviously off the back of the house and so we’ve had some trees chopped down already yeah um my natural thought process in here is to try and

Keep it quite easy quite low maintenance japanesey style planting to create a certain effect whilst leaving a lot of the sort of native trees here I mean we SP we spoke about it before I I’m not intending on getting rid of all the trees by any stretch but we do want to

Dig the pond out we do want to get some fish in there some natural you know tench carp just deepen it down get some of the stuff out build the banks up a bit and then we’ll create some Pathways we’ll create a little seat in area we’ll

Fill it with hope y natural ferns um Native ferns sorry yeah um I mean a project this side you can’t go all Exotics you can’t have all sort of high maintenance plans I mean it would be lovely to um it would be lovely to but ultimately if I can get some natural

Stuff divide them start small and then build up then like I say lots of native Ferns and plants like that you can spread around that will just happily do the thing AB these trees that are covered in Ivy they’re going to have to come out yeah um they’re close to your

House aren’t they up there they’re close to the house and they’re also they are diseased anyway so yeah we need to get someone around to come and cut them down I’ll be I’ll have enough firewood until I die probably um and then yeah we we we’re waiting currently for um planning

Permission to be granted the company that used to own the land they are going to level it all for me all of this down the back there’s a tree wow over here and it Banks up a little bit oh yeah yes well that’s that’s that’s the extent of what I own

Wow and it’s a great big triangle it encompasses the Woodland as well um and yeah it’s the the the only this is pretty incredible the only prerequisites so far are we want a poly tunnel to grow some Tomatoes I want a garage to hold some Man toys um we won’t deep into that

We’re going to have yeah no no no well they’d have to be big but and some bees um so you know so far relatively relatively small aspirations obviously um but it seems it seems quite insurmountable at the moment but I think once we get going and filling in with

Small plants and just letting them grow I mean certainly my journey with the um actual Garden from the side of the house yeah has shown me already in the last three or four years just how quickly these plants can grow definitely getting on with it getting some stuff in the

Ground and just seeing how things go obviously we need to sort power we need to sort irrigation um so this isn’t going to be a quick project I I would say it’s going to have to be at least over the next 10 years oh yeah yeah yeah

But this is just a slice of you know the dream isn’t it the aspirations you’re not going to plant everything up but you I like the way you’re sort of working with the space so where it’s already quite Woodland you know tree cover you are going to plant more sort of plants

Enjoy that again over there we’re can have more aelas unusual Asian plants aren’t we Evergreens in there it’s a it’s a perfect example there’s a phrase that I came up with a few years ago did you come up with it did I come up with

It or was it phrase already I think Beth chat’s lawyers are actually on the phone as we speak best be careful um I think it is a case of putting the right PL in the right place something like that and so if you’ve got a natural Woodland that’s there already flipping woodland plants

In it you know you don’t have to you know you’re not going to put sun loving uh palm trees in there if it’s really deep heavy shade um in exactly the same way that if you have what I would say is a really Oriental looking japanesey moss

Covered Woodland then you keep it quite simple and straightforward and you put some stuff in there that can that can live with that no this this is really incredible and I’m very aware this is a very amateurish video with me just basically going wow and this is amazing

But it really is so just to summarize for people your house is up there the Ticky Garden is that side you’re gonna have an entrance down this ramp here yeah that side there you’re thinking a pond and then we’ll say more damp boggy planting what with a uh Oriental Asian

Edge lot gunar and manac Carter if I can find it on the black market well I definitely don’t have any for you Mark you wouldn’t recommend that no I definitely wouldn’t no your face has gone out of focus cuz it I think it detects that there’s illegal content

Being made got to blur me out quickly yes yes so um definitely don’t have any gun for you but looking over that side there that’s going to be like sort of mixed Woodland we’ll say with an exciting Edge that’s a good way of put it we’ll call it that that’s a tagline

For the video it is indeed we’ll see and then this area here you’ve got all sorts of plan you say poly tunnel growing some Pals a bit of everything but I can tell by you know this is obviously hardcore and uh Crush gravel isn’t it so there’s

A lot of work getting everything ready oh a lot of work yeah wow this really is amazing and if people aren’t truly sort of taken over by this idea yet let’s have a look at that pond from the top and really show them the view that you’re going to create here sounds good

Let’s have a look down here this is going to be the view isn’t it yeah so this little area at the top here this needs to be some low Ling ground cover type things to make the most of of that to make the most of the view yeah I mean

That is it’s going to be just insane isn’t it I I hope so like I say the plan is to get it all dug out so it’s a bit deeper yeah clear up all the Builder mess and what have you that was you know um kind of thoughtlessly throw down

There before we bought the house 10 years ago unfortunately I mean to me this this almost has that sort of you know Coral Vibe at helan treea they’re all in valleys you know you’re looking down all the time plants at tree ferns gun R just looks so incredible from

Above don’t they yeah and and as much as I’d love to have as many tree ferns as they have yeah with modern prices I think probably unlikely um even large ground ferns like the North American ferns there some Himalayan ferns that would look you know as impressive from

Up here I’d love to be able to put two or three really big chunky tree ferns down there and lots of lots of underplanting to just give even just the vibe a few really poignantly planted bamboos poignant poignant yeah I I struggling plant them I was crying

Do that I mean I will be crying with the amount of uh work it’s going to be but putting some you know really key specimen plants in the right place yeah just to get the vibe but I’m I mean I’m already crying at the amount of walking

Going have to up and up and down that flipping slope just to get everything where you are looking lean and mean already so by the time you’ve done this it’ll be full on eight pack on mean anyway but um yeah no I think it’s I’ve been thinking about it for years like I

Say we’ve we’ve we’ve had the house for 10 years and I’ve you know I’ve always wanted to do something with it and I’ve got more time now suddenly getting to the stage where we are able to do something with it and this really is a I

Don’t want use Legacy but this is a big project isn’t it I think my kids are going to hate me for it when they have to look after it one day yeah when they have to get about 100 contracts in to remove the bamboo cut everything down

Yeah as long as my wife doesn’t sell my P my plants for what I told her they cost I’ll be happy oh your PS even pants even so so really today’s video is just pretty much you know I’m here for about an hour just got the camera out showing

People this amazing opportunity but to me I mean there’s just so much potential here isn’t there so much and I know you spoke about having a Oriental Edge you know a lot of the bamboos and things over here but you really could grow anything this place you’ve got the damp

Areas you got the full-on wet areas you’ve got the dry Sunny areas out there I mean there must just be ideas buzzing around your head it’s it I mean I struggle to sleep at the best of times but well that’s just because of the things that you’ve done well yeah

Absolutely yes there a lot of IDE going around as well when you consider like I mean I one of the reasons I think I’ve touched on it before one of the reasons that I do the tropical garden and one of the reasons I like to be outside is cu I

Do have a relatively anxious brain and so if you coincide an anxious brain with the untapped potential of this space and what I could possibly do with it yeah it’s uh yeah it it it needs a little bit of harnessing and bringing back it needs an outlet doesn’t it and you’re not

Going to get a better Outlet than this my mind is absolutely blown I suppose the next thing is Mark’s crazy Ticky Garden as much as people see that name and they like the videos we’re going to have to come up with a different title aren’t we for this project yeah well I

Think that’s going to have to be something suggested in the comments really well everyone get commenting this this honestly is just amazing and thank you for this quick look around at this early stage so like we said there’s not be any quick progress there’s a a lot of

Work getting things cleared get things ready and there’s going to be tons and tons of M like hundreds of tons of materials isn’t there well just make sure next time you come you bring your shovel J CU it’ll be good to see you do some work yeah I’ll bring oh oh I’ll

Bring Harriet with her she can get on with it CI um but this wow I mean I’m I’m excited to come back I’m excited to see what it’s going to like soon but for now mark thank you very much for giving us a little glimpse into your privileged future thanks very much you’re

Welcome