The beginning stages of my garden.

[Black Dahlia]

I know it's a little later in the season to be starting a garden but I never thought to ask my landlord's permission until now. lol Here are a few pics of the beginning stages. I've got a ways to go still but it's a good start. The pictures are backwards to how I meant to load them but there's too many to change it now. Maybe start at the bottom and work your way up? lol

[B_BQ]

What a great start. You must be very excited.
~BBQ

[Heidi S]

I don't think the thrill ever goes away!

[Scrapinthehat]

I agree...always thrilling. You've got a great start there!

[Millie]

It sure is a good start and you are amending the soil which is very important.

[Countryboy]

A lot of work . . but such fun, eh?! lol

But Mandevilla? . . in Peterborough? Will probably not last thru a Canadian Winter. But u can bury its pot in that garden, to have the plant come up with the others, and then dig it up and bring it inside for the Winter.

It looks like there will be a dramatic red and white theme to the bed.

[CdnChelsea]

Great beginnings! I love white flowers in a garden so I must say, your white lilies and Tree Mallow are spectacular Black Dahlia. Simply beautiful. : )

Are you going to mulch your garden?
Me, I'm a mulch freak. Yup. There is lots of mulch in my gardens 'cause I'm cheap. There are way too many gardens here to water every day so I pile the mulch on the soil to conserve moisture. Plus mulch tidies up the gardens making the plants stand out more in contrast.

I like mulch Can you tell?

[Black Dahlia]

Thanks all. There's a lot of red and white at the moment but I'm adding more colors as well, the daylily's provided they survive the transplant from my boyfriend's mom's garden to mine will be Gentle Shepherd, and the others don't know the names for but they're supposed to be red, purple, redish orange and coral, as well as the purple Iris. I'd like to get more Irises in different colors as well. Still figuring out what all I want in it, and loving every minute of it! I'm going to put a couple of tomato plants and a couple of pepper plants in the back row on the right as well. I'd dig another garden for veggies but I'm not sure my landlord would let me, he liked the idea of a flower garden to spruce the place up a bit but not sure how he'd feel about a veggie garden. Going plant shopping again tomorrow morning to see what I can find. My neighbor offered me a couple of Hosta's today, not really fond of Hosta's in a flower garden, I like them in rock gardens though. I didn't have the heart to tell her no though as she loves them so much. lol So in being a nice neighbor I will end up with a couple of Hostas. Oh well, you win some you loose some.

I did know that the Mandevilla won't survive outside in the winter, unfortunately neither will my Flowering Maple (Abutilon), I'm probably going to bring them to my mom's and have her winter them for me as my apartment doesn't get enough light to keep anything besides a Lucky Bamboo alive. lol Everything else I've brought in here has died. The Mandevilla isn't supposed to like full sun either but until the plants get bigger that's what it's getting, morning sun until about 4pm, and it's the one that's thriving the most so far. Hopefully the rest of the garden will start to grow fairly quickly and it will get a little more filtered light.

I'm supposed to be picking up some horse poo this weekend, gonna make some poo-tea which is supposed to work wonders according to a few of my friends who use it. One had tomato and pepper plants that had not produced anything as of June 9th, she used poo-tea on them and as of yesterday they had fairly good sized tomatoes and peppers, another used some on Morning Glory's with the same results so now they've got quite a few people using it. Through the grapevine I heard so I figure if everyone in town is getting amazing results I want some of this horse poo too! lol

I'm not planning to mulch the garden, I'm a photographer and I love the look of the color contrast between the flowers and the dark soil after a good watering.