Hello and welcome back to my blog! I also wish you all a belated Happy Christmas for 2024.
I took some time away from blogging over the last few weeks, but I am now back and will continue posting every Sunday morning. The Mr and I also visited RHS Rosemoor and The Eden Project this month to see the Christmas lights and I went back to Rosemoor for a very nice walk during the day on Boxing Day. I will be putting up an additional post about that in the next few days.
Today’s post shows you the start of the changes I have made in the right-hand side of The Wild Borders.
Introduction
I first introduced The Wild Borders here. The borders are made up of two borders on either side, that are accessed by a small set of stairs:
Left-side border (2023):
Right-side border (2023):
Over the last year, the Mr and I focused our efforts on the left-side border, creating a rose arch walkway, leading to an arbour seat, surrounded by a variety of self-seeded plants and roses:
I still love the left-side border and therefore started work this Winter on the right-side border, to help unite both borders.
A brief look back at the right-side border
As a reminder, the right-side border originally looked like this not long after we moved in:
In January 2023, I weeded all of the couch grass from the front of the border and discovered the crocosmia crammed underneath the Japanese honeysuckle (pictured in the back). I previously dug the crocosmia up in March 2023 and planted it throughout the bed:
Although I love the crocosmia due to how many bees it attracts, I haven’t ever liked the bright orange colour mixed with the rest of the flowers in The Wild Borders. It just doesn’t fit the colour palette I want for the borders:
I also disliked how the two borders did not link well together due to the contrast in planting and colours.
As the crocosmia naturally wanes, the foliage droops and starts to look messy later in the year:
We view the above border from our living room window, so improving how it looks throughout the seasons is important.
The big dig begins…
I therefore set to work this month digging up the crocosmia and the honeysuckle. This was a very muddy day! The pictures speak for themselves:
I have put all of the crocosmia into dry storage in cardboard boxes to dry out. I plan to possibly keep some to replant in another area of the garden and then give the rest of it away.
Before and after
(January 2023 to December 2024):
Conclusion and further plans
Overall I am really happy with how the border has changed already. It was surprisingly not such hard work digging up the honeysuckle and crocosmia because I worked steadily on the bed over a number of days.
The right-side border houses our bird feeders, which are regularly visited by blue tits, green and gold finches, robins and blackbirds, along with collared doves and some rooks and starlings. The Mr and I love watching the birds from the living room window throughout the day. Before I removed the crocosmia and the honeysuckle, the Mr and I (mostly the Mr) had to wade through all the planting to get to the feeders, which was really dangerous due to the sheer drop. We have both been surprised how wide the right-hand side bed is; it is actually slightly wider than the left-side border! That means more space for plants 🙂
Yesterday the Mr and I spent about an hour building another metal archway and we installed that in the right-side border. I will provide an update on that soon. I have other plans for the area; clearing the border has created another really nice viewing point in the garden.
I hope you enjoyed seeing what I have been getting up to this month in the garden. More updates to follow! Happy gardening 🙂
The Charming Nook 
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