What Is Decking?
Decking is fairly new to the UK but in America and other parts of the world it has been big for years. It is very contemporary and yet very natural because it is made of wood. It looks a bit like having a dance floor in your garden, wonderful for walking on barefoot but sudden death to stilettos because of the gaps. It is very adaptable and brilliant for a sloping garden, where you can make several timber terraces linked with steps but on level ground you can build up decking on two levels to make it look more interesting.
You can also cut bits out, plant through holes, build on stilts and do all sorts of things you cound not do with a couple of tons of paving slabs if you had chosen to have a patio instead. For the fashion follower, decking is the hottest must have garden ingredient and usually can be purchased at places like Homebase garden furniture if you cannot make it for yourself.
A brand new deck looks a bit stark and it wants a few touches to make it sit happily with the house and garden but don’t be tempted to start cluttering it up too much. Decks look much better with just a couple of things on them. For a totally maintenance free look I like to plant through a gap in the deck. That way the plants are growing in properly prepared soil and virtually look after themselves. Depending on the layout of your particular deck you could make a small sunken gardn packed with plants in the middle, or banks of evergreens set in beds round the table. But my first choice would be a single tree or shrub growing through a cut out square.
Gardening Year - July
July is when your garden is likely to be looking at its best with wonderfully colourful displays in flower borders, pots and containers. If you have managed to squeeze in a few vegetables, many of these should now be cropping heavily. As the weather is generally a good deal warmer now and days are longer there are many opportunities to enjoy your garden, sitting out on your garden furniture with a glass of wine and relaxing in the late afternoons and early evenings.
You might think this to mean that there is also a lot of work to do but to be honest this is not one of the most time consuming months in the garden, which is great because it means you have all the more time to enjoy the fruits of your labours. However, if you want to keep the garden looking as good as it can for as long as possible, you still need to carry out a fair amount of maintenance work and to keep your eye on plants and their problems, just in case anything tries to get out of hand.
Space Outside Our Homes
Most of us have a space outside our homes and most of us attempt to keep it tidy, if not easy to look at. Whether it consists of bare soil or whether it is covered with paving, bricks, concrete along with some fancy garden furniture and a barbecue, if left untouched a variety of different plants will start to grow on it. Most of these plants will be weeds, tangled, living and dying and not particularly ornamental.
With only a little help this space can still have a variety of plants growing in it but it can be a chosen variety, colourful, healthy and frangrant. Going a step further it can provide food: potatoes, lettuces and tomatoes, strawberries, apples or melons, flavourings such as parsley, mint and garlic.
However, a good many home owners faced with this space perhaps for the first time in their lives either decide that growing plants on purpose needs too much technical knowledge or that it is going to take more time and work than they can supply.
Nothing could be further from the truth. There is a great deal of unnecessary fuss made about cultivating plants i.e. gardening so that it is surrounded with an aura of green fingers and double digging. But if you remember that plants are alive, as you are and need food and drink and air, as you do, you are halfway to being a successful and enthusiastic gardener. One way in which plants eat is by absorbing particles of minerals, potassium, sulphur and iron dissolved in water through their roots. Another way in which they obtain the fuel they need to go on living is by making other foods and oxygen out of the air with the help of the energy provided by the sun. Much of your garden is aimed at providing the best possible conditions for both these activities.
Types Of Garden Lights
Globe Lights - Glass globes on short stems, good low lights for lighting up patio and barbecue areas as the soft light glows out evenly all round.
Shaded Lights - Lamps with a mushroom shape that throws a soft light down to make a circle of light, useful in low planted borders.
Pathway Markers - Short squat lights that shine to one side, good for low lighting steps or use small tiered lights on short stems for outlining paths.
Feature Lights - Low power spotlights that give subtle rather than striking effects, the low voltage versions are particular soft. They can be bought on brackets to mount on walls or on spikes to push into the ground.
Floodlights - Strong lights that need mains current for flooding large areas or for dramatic directional effects. Dramatic floodlighting can make a contemporary garden look incredibly theatrical at night. Use it to accentuate the shapes of striking plants, like a group of spiky yuccas, a twisted tree or a large leaved shrub like a fatsia. Floodlights work well with bold architectural shapes too, used along a balustrade or at one side of a group of standing stones in a gravel garden. The sci-fi effects are all due to the contrasts between the bright light on the leaves or stone and the long dark jagged shadows they cast. Dont fall out with the neighbours though, adjust your floodlights so they are not shining in through their windows.
Outdoor Fairy Lights - In my garden I have put up fairy lights inside the pergola. Mine are the all white version of outdoor Christmas lights which I have dotted around in the roof where the foliage is thickest, so they look like stars twinkling through the leaves.
You can find many different styles of garden lighting at B&Q Furniture or Homebase Furniture.
