Boat Area/Future Herb Garden

The first place we really tackled last year was what we referred to as ‘the boat area’, thanks to the play boat that stood in the middle of it. The boat was made of wood, and built on top of some paving slabs. The area surrounding the paving slabs had become completely overgrown with weeds and grass. 

In this photo you can see that I'd already done a lot of work - you can see the boat though, which is the main purpose of the picture.

I was overjoyed, however, to discover last spring that between all of the weeds, there were crocuses and grape hyacinths, as well as a couple of snowdrops. 

My intention for this area was to turn it into a herb garden. That first meant clearing the area, including the bulbs. This is still very much a work in progress. I spent a lot of time weeding the area, and trying to remove the grassy bits, as well as cutting back plants. We already had a rosemary bush and and some chives, so I took the chives out and split them, putting them into some plant pots. With the help of my mother-in-law, I took some cuttings from the rosemary plant and potted them, so that we could remove the overgrown bush.

My husband and brother-in-law were in charge of removing the boat. As soon as destruction is involved in gardening, they’re all over it. The boat was quickly a thing of the past. 

I pulled out a few more plants that I didn’t want to keep, and weeded, weeded, weeded. I pulled out the bulbs and left them on some newspaper in the shed to dry out, ready to be planted in the autumn. Especially with the grassy bits, the progress was so slow. Removing grass is a complete pain. You should be able to just turn it upside down and it should die, but somehow it doesn’t seem to be that easy.

As it turned out, I hadn’t managed to remove all of the bulbs at all! Vast numbers of grape hyacinths popped up again this spring. I think I’ve more or less confined them to one side of the bed now, although I guess we’ll see next spring. In any case, the bed is quite big for just herbs, so I’m happy to keep them there at the moment. The herbs will go in next year - I’m putting some sweet peas in this year, as I’m not sure where else to put them. I’m hoping by next year I’ll have found another space for flowers, or maybe I’ll just put them behind the herbs in the same bed.

I don't actually have a photo of the full area, but you can see from this one below how much clearer it is along the right-hand side. It's more or less like that all over now, aside from where the bulbs are. I've been pretty good at keeping on top of the weeds though, so it is just actual plants growing there (for the most part), and plants that I want to keep at that.

The next steps for this bed are to lift the paving slabs, use my in-laws’ spit to remove the reed-like plant (I can’t remember exactly what it is), and more weeding. The grape hyacinths will die back and then that area will be quite bare. I need to decide at some point whether I want to move them or leave them there. If I decide to leave them there, I’ll need to work out whether to do anything else with the area so that it’s not bare for two thirds of the year. My husband is already planning to have a crazy golf course hole in the middle of this area. To be honest, it might be fun, as long as it can be properly incorporated in to the garden. I'd definitely like some more plants around in that area as it needs some colour.

One thing that drives me nuts about our garden is the gravel. The previous owners must have decided it would help prevent weeds or something, as there’s a lot of it about, and it’s all mixed in the flower beds. I end up picking loads out every time I plant or weed!