Help! Newbie to plants/gardening etc

[claireybeary]

Hello everybody. Im new to the forum and Would like a bit of help as I want to start getting my garden border and lawn looking pretty. I dont have a clue with gardening terms etc etc so to anyone replying, please talk as if you are talking to a child haha.

Right, i have a smallish rectangular lawn at the front of my house which has an approx. Half metre border around the whole lawn. The top end of the border is a big bigger than the sides and bottom. The border has a slight slope from top to bottom so the bottom can get quite waterlogged from the rain if there is a heavy downpour. My front path and my next door neighbours path runs either side of the border sides, I currently have fuschia plants in a propogator which have just started to germinate. These will be used to fill up the bottom of the border (my next door neighbour has these so i know they thrive in the waterlogged soil). I would just like to know what other flowers i can maybe grow from seed that will look good in my border? And how many different species of plant/flower i should have. How would i space out all my different plants? Are ground covering plants a good choice to fill space while im waiting for my fuschias to grow to a good size before planting?

Im just so confused when it comes to gardening and choosing the right types of plants.

[gardening_guru]

Hello Claire,

I think the best way for you to learn about different plants and which are best for different soils and sites etc. is to use ourplant finder.

Just tick the relevant boxes, in your case I would tick 'moist' or 'boggy' in the soil moisture field. When you have ticked the relevant boxes that meet your requirements, just click the 'search for plants' button and it will draw up a list of plants that meet your requirements.

When deciding how much space to leave between plants note the spread measurement entries on all our plant entries. These tell you how wide the plants will grow, giving you a good indication of how much space you should leave either side before you plant the next plant.

You could consider some Primroses to fill the space temporarily where the Fuchsias are to go, you can grow them from seed and they will love the moist soil.

These would be suitable: Primula 'Wanda Supreme'

[claireybeary]

Thats great! Thank you very much . The flowers you have recommended are gorgeous so i will be purchasing seeds asap to grow myself and get these planted as soon as i can. I do have one more question. We replaced all the soil in the border last year with top soil. This has now settled and we now need to top the soil up before we start planting. I have seen treated compost and compost with manure or should we just use regular compost or top soil? What would you recommend to help my plants grow better?

Thank you

[gardening_guru]

Hello Claire,

It sounds like you already have some decent soil there, if you want to improve it still further, add some well rotted horse manure or garden compost. This will not only improve the soil fertility, it will also improve the moisture holding capacity of the soil.