A word of caution about the laurels: once they get going they’re very vigorous. They’ll have trunks and branches thicker than your arm which may well press on the fence and damage it. I’d advise leaving enough distance between the plants and the fence, so that you can do annual pruning at the back and keep them under some kind of control.
Erm, what laurels are you buying? My neighbours laurels have been in for 10 years now and dont have branches as think as your arm... My own laurels were delivered at 1.5m tall, and are super skinny, maybe 2" dia at most.
@@mylocalitguy Prunus laurocerasus - the cherry laurel. It’s the most common laurel because it grows so fast. We inherited a 10’ laurel hedge that had been allowed to run wild, overhanging neighbours’ properties and pushing against fences. Maybe our conditions suit laurels. My main point is that laurel needs regular maintenance to keep it under control.
Oh great, another gardening series that I have to watch. 🙄😁 You make such good videos that even though I don't have a garden, you'll still have me watching! 😂
Oh Stewart I love your channel but as I said before regarding your paddock. Just have amazing real fun with a 22 ton digger and just rip the whole lot of Junk out and scrape the first 3 inches of the ground to get rid of the bramble roots.👍
2nd comment: Washing machine tubs make great smokeless firepits! Build an outer layer with brick or stone. Cap the top, but at the base leave two bricks out so that the air rises up between the brick and the tub. As the tub heats up the holes in it suck in hot air which burns the smoke, leaving a smokeless fire. You know you want to...
Hi Stuart, Maybe a 5 bar gate off the lane into the paddock, then you get plant/machinery in easily plus maybe skip to help you have a good tidy up! Andy
That is a really good idea for occasional future access. I think I need to clear the area and have a look at levels etc but it would be great to have an access for sure - thank you.
Great to see you back Stuart, lots of good content coming by the looks of it. Always enjoy watching a project unfold with yourself, always a smile along the way too.
Great to see an honest assessment of past projects, and `before' shots of future ones. Keeping it real Stuart. Edit: Oh, trim the root tips of bare root plants before planting. The tip (Lt: apical Meristem) will be dead, thus forcing the plant to send out lateral roots which don't always happen. Just take off 1-2 cm and they'll root better.
Just closed on my first ever home this week... think I'm going to need to revisit every video again! It's a bit of a do-er-upper so I'm going to need as much help as I can get I think!!
I haven't even started with any garden work yet, too cold. However, like yourself I have looked round the garden and thought about what areas I want to tackle
Hi, my neighbour acquired a piece of land covered in brambles and wild vegetation just like yours. He was advised to get a couple of pigs to clear the ground an get rid of the roots. Apparently it works a treat. Thank you for your much loved videos and take care.
I don't think of your new property as a complete mess, I think of it as an exciting adventure 😉 Really interested to watch "your vision" come to life step by step. Great motivation for me to get out (once the snow clears) and start my own project of a garden renovation 👍
Regarding your video ' fix timber to brickwork' . I followed your video and it looks great. But with a heavy gate and children the wind caught it and has pulled the top screwbolt loose. In your experience could I simplely remove the screwbolt and fill the hole with proxy resin and screw the bolt back in or drill a new hole. Enjoy your vids 🔨
Stuart did you have to go halves with your neighbour for the new fence? Also do you have a master plan for the back paddock? Do you have a video explaining how you came to live in that property, when did you move there, why? I’m interested in what made you move, your retirement plan etc.
Hi Stuart It's great to see you starting the gardening series! I'm so excited to see your plans come to life. Do you know how I can stop the cats from doing their business on my new gravel driveway? Also, the fence blew down in the high winds at the start of the year. My adjoining neighbour claims the fence is his. The deeds state it's shared. Can I build a fence on my land astride the boundary? I'm really looking forward to more content! Thank you
Great to see the gardening series back, and your plans for the coming year 👍 Regarding clearing the brambles, have you thought of using a brush killer? You'd stand a better chance of killing the entire plant including the roots and minimise regrowth
I see Daniel Clark has suggested a ride on mower. I would up that and get a Kubota with a mid mounted cutter deck and a front loader bucket. After years of struggling I can say from experience you will not regret it.
Be careful of planting a banana plant in the ground. They have runners and they are aggressive. I had one that slapped visitors approaching my front door in the face with it’s gigantic leaves so I had to get rid of it. I had a terrible time after chopping down the main plant chasing down all the runners under the sidewalk and the rest of the yard. And I never got one banana out of the deal! 😂
When I see your paddock I keep expecting John Gater and Stewart Ainsworth from Time Team to be out there trying to find Roman or medeival ruins! Looking forward to the Garden Series!
Brilliant Stuart new vids coming. You have some amount of work in front of you. Once you get rid of all the junk the blank canvas will be awesome. I cant wait, your vids are very helpful and informative. Roll on the next few months.
Dear Stuart - if I were a bit closer I would offer to help you - with the skip filling that is, not with the bramble root digging - I don't do bramble root digging. Look forward to seeing what you discover under that mound.
Great video today Stuart, I noticed a couple of what looked like milk urns in your skip pile. I've seen Henry Cole & Simon O'Brien restore a few of these on their tv program Find It Fix It Flog It.
Hi sir we had our front garden re’ levelled and seeded , the existing area was approximately 400 square meters In total not including driveways and parking . Over a hundred tons of rubble and sub soil was removed , followed by 80 tons of top medium grade topsoil . This all took place in the spring of last year , now the grass is doing very well but it’s amazing how many weeds are still present . Obviously I will in the near future be applying weed and feed as the grass is now capable of being treated . So with regards your plot I wonder have you a contingency plan to get rid of the more invasive species within your soil . Best wishes and kind regards 😀👍👍👍
Hi Stuart looking forwards to the Gardening series of videos with regards to the gravel and a different colour could I suggest Black Ice its not pea gravel shaped but it is rather nice :)
Given that your garden - being a big lawn with hedge around it - is a perfect canvas för garden design, it eould be really cool if you could make an episode on garden design. Showing what a miracle gardening is and how clever a design can be as a base for a long term transformation. Just a suggestion, given that you are amazing at explaining complicated things.
Galvanised containers will poison fish over time Stuart, unless of course you line it. Looking forward to the garden content. Take care and have a great weekend.
Hi Stuart. Regarding the galvanised metal pond, bear in mind that anything living that you attract, like newts and frogs, will want to be able to get out of the pond at night, to hunt, and then get back in during the day, so its often the reason why nature ponds are level with the ground, and have sloping sides inside. The shape of the tank looks ideal for a blade-based water feature, if you want to lose a height difference somewhere. Regarding bringing seedlings on over the winter, and you do have a large field to fill, I see a large greenhouse in your future.
@A B Yeah - I said often, not always. However, a galvanised tank half sticking out of the ground "often" looks pretty ugly too. I should know, I have a cubic metre water tank down one end of my garden catching rain off my garage roof. No hosepipe bans for me.
Can't wait for the summer series Stuart Would love one day for you to do a short video of your house history,it's looks lovely all the land and space you have.Did you build the house?Cheers.
Great to see the gardening series back, thank you! I think a common mistake made with "ponds" is that people never go big enough, and even though you think the trough is huge, its actually a small volume of water that will struggle to maintain an ecosystem. Generally, you need depth (3 feet plus) and a flow of water. It would make a great water feature though, a tall waterfall would look and sound great, and be really good for aerating the water. Plenty of shade will help keep the temperature down, and you may get away without sinking it. I see a big problem with burying it is corrosion and being able to check for holes etc.
You need a sit on lawn mower. Once you get the brambles low enough to mow over, the grass will outcompete the brambles if you keep mowing. Also get a tow ball on the back of the mower and you can pull a small trailer around. I have done this and use the trailer almost daily for moving tools and materials about. (As far as I can tell, most gardening involves moving heavy things from one place to another). I'm really looking forward to your future projects on both your channels. Thanks.
I have both a ride on mower and brambles. A word of caution - brambles are more than capable of puncturing the tyres of the mower - I know this from bitter experience.
Would suggest you install access gates to your horticultural land so you can take bigger machinery onto it to maintain the paddock properly. As time goes on it could become unmanageably overgrown otherwise and that would be disappointing.
Get yourself some pigs,they'll make short work of all those bramble roots and give the ground a good turning over and make it easier to level afterwards. Check out the restoration couple's channel and see what their pigs achieved. Keep up the good work.
Would love to see how you prevent those brambles growing back, I have a bunch of stuff in my garden that grows stupidly high every year it's a royal pain in the backside so would be nice to get rid of it finally but the area is probably about the same size as the area you're dealing with so individually derooting them sounds like hell
When cutting the tank please put water in it because I know someone who was cutting a barrel and although it seemed empty there was still some residue and it blew up and did serious damage to himself
In my (albeit limited) experience you're going to have a fight on your hands with those brambles.. I have tried digging them out but unless you get all the roots they will forever be coming back. Late autumn last year I started a first go at them with a brush wood weed killer.. I'm really hoping for success with it.
Excited for this series, enjoyed last years, so definitely get some of these videos started! 😀 this is a side shoot but what did you do as a living before doing this now? I am assuming you are retired of some sort maybe if you’d be interested in sharing as a video maybe or something, others might be interested, If not, no problem I can appreciate privacy 👍
Can you provide a link or point in the direction of where you purchased your bare root Laurel plants? I have looked on the web but can't them anywhere near the price you've paid.
Can you spray some sort of herbicide on the brambles? When I have cut trees that were living, I spray a plant killer on the stump and they die off without new sprouts appearing. Is that stuff legal in the UK?
A word of caution about the laurels: once they get going they’re very vigorous. They’ll have trunks and branches thicker than your arm which may well press on the fence and damage it. I’d advise leaving enough distance between the plants and the fence, so that you can do annual pruning at the back and keep them under some kind of control.
Erm, what laurels are you buying? My neighbours laurels have been in for 10 years now and dont have branches as think as your arm... My own laurels were delivered at 1.5m tall, and are super skinny, maybe 2" dia at most.
@@mylocalitguy Prunus laurocerasus - the cherry laurel. It’s the most common laurel because it grows so fast. We inherited a 10’ laurel hedge that had been allowed to run wild, overhanging neighbours’ properties and pushing against fences. Maybe our conditions suit laurels. My main point is that laurel needs regular maintenance to keep it under control.
Oh great, another gardening series that I have to watch. 🙄😁 You make such good videos that even though I don't have a garden, you'll still have me watching! 😂
That is a huge compliment and very nice of you to say that.
Oh Stewart I love your channel but as I said before regarding your paddock. Just have amazing real fun with a 22 ton digger and just rip the whole lot of Junk out and scrape the first 3 inches of the ground to get rid of the bramble roots.👍
Oh boy have you got your work cut out for you Shall be be watching with interest Good Luck !!
All the metal is easy to get rid of, pile it up and leave it for a jolly fellow in a transit tipper to take it away!
2nd comment: Washing machine tubs make great smokeless firepits! Build an outer layer with brick or stone. Cap the top, but at the base leave two bricks out so that the air rises up between the brick and the tub. As the tub heats up the holes in it suck in hot air which burns the smoke, leaving a smokeless fire. You know you want to...
Taking on that paddock looks like a nightmare! Great space to have though in this day of postage stamp gardens
Try black bamboo as it doesn’t spread quickly and is clump forming but gets very tall
Hi Stuart, Maybe a 5 bar gate off the lane into the paddock, then you get plant/machinery in easily plus maybe skip to help you have a good tidy up! Andy
That is a really good idea for occasional future access. I think I need to clear the area and have a look at levels etc but it would be great to have an access for sure - thank you.
Great to see you back Stuart, lots of good content coming by the looks of it.
Always enjoy watching a project unfold with yourself, always a smile along the way too.
Great to see an honest assessment of past projects, and `before' shots of future ones. Keeping it real Stuart. Edit: Oh, trim the root tips of bare root plants before planting. The tip (Lt: apical Meristem) will be dead, thus forcing the plant to send out lateral roots which don't always happen. Just take off 1-2 cm and they'll root better.
When you cut the Laurel to encourage side growth and stop it from getting too leggy, you have a good supply of cuttings for new plants.
Looking forward to the 2023 videos!
Good luck digging up those bramble roots. That is a world of pain!
I tried one - and gave up! Mechanical help needed!
Just closed on my first ever home this week... think I'm going to need to revisit every video again! It's a bit of a do-er-upper so I'm going to need as much help as I can get I think!!
Nice one - and how exciting! Take things one step at a time and in no time you will be looking back surprised about what you have done. Good luck.
Congratulations!
We are hoping to close in a month or too also, so congratulations and wish me luck. I'll also be watching all the videos lol
I haven't even started with any garden work yet, too cold. However, like yourself I have looked round the garden and thought about what areas I want to tackle
It is still a bit early to really get going but planning and getting people thinking about it is definitely the right time.
Black Ice stones would look great there especially when wet
Great video and you're going to be a very busy man 😊. Looking forward to the spring!
Lucky you! I have to wait that 5-6 feet of snow finally melt... Thank you for your videos!
That is a lot of snow for sure
Hi, my neighbour acquired a piece of land covered in brambles and wild vegetation just like yours. He was advised to get a couple of pigs to clear the ground an get rid of the roots. Apparently it works a treat. Thank you for your much loved videos and take care.
I've heard that before - I'm sure it works well but not sure if I can handle pigs!
Hey Stuart love your work keep up the good work
The great thing about laurels is how hardy they are.
I don't think of your new property as a complete mess, I think of it as an exciting adventure 😉 Really interested to watch "your vision" come to life step by step. Great motivation for me to get out (once the snow clears) and start my own project of a garden renovation 👍
Thank you. I like the idea I help with a bit of motivation - but yes, snow needs to clear first!
Regarding your video ' fix timber to brickwork' . I followed your video and it looks great. But with a heavy gate and children the wind caught it and has pulled the top screwbolt loose. In your experience could I simplely remove the screwbolt and fill the hole with proxy resin and screw the bolt back in or drill a new hole.
Enjoy your vids 🔨
Stuart did you have to go halves with your neighbour for the new fence? Also do you have a master plan for the back paddock? Do you have a video explaining how you came to live in that property, when did you move there, why? I’m interested in what made you move, your retirement plan etc.
Hi Stuart, you are mounting up so many jobs. I do hope you can achieve your goals. But in the gardening world nothing is ever set in stone. Cheers ✌️🏡
A Australian tree fern will addan instant exotic look. Buy a two ft trunk, the fronts are 6ft long instant height then as wel
living the dream!
If you don’t plan on growing anything blast those brambles with salt & weed burner / roofing torch
GLYPHOSATE for your brambles problem in the paddock. No need to cover or dig, just spray when it's starting to grow back in Spring.
Sounds like your summer is going to be super busy!
Looking forward to the up coming videos
Thanks Mark
Hi Stuart
It's great to see you starting the gardening series! I'm so excited to see your plans come to life. Do you know how I can stop the cats from doing their business on my new gravel driveway?
Also, the fence blew down in the high winds at the start of the year. My adjoining neighbour claims the fence is his. The deeds state it's shared. Can I build a fence on my land astride the boundary?
I'm really looking forward to more content!
Thank you
Wow, what a brilliant plot of land. I'm looking forward to more content.
Great intro to the year ahead
Thank you
Thanks for the tour Stuart.
Thanks Larry
Great to see you back Stuart. Looking forward to seeing more of your videos 👍👏👏👏👏👏
Thanks Frank
Great to see the gardening series back, and your plans for the coming year 👍 Regarding clearing the brambles, have you thought of using a brush killer? You'd stand a better chance of killing the entire plant including the roots and minimise regrowth
Hey! Thanks for putting so much effort in your videos. Could you please tell me from where can I buy those barrels? 3:58
I see Daniel Clark has suggested a ride on mower. I would up that and get a Kubota with a mid mounted cutter deck and a front loader bucket. After years of struggling I can say from experience you will not regret it.
Look forward to more video’s
Thanks Ian
Good to see you back at it. I feel well exercised just watching you work! 😂get to it buddy. 👍🏼
Be careful of planting a banana plant in the ground. They have runners and they are aggressive. I had one that slapped visitors approaching my front door in the face with it’s gigantic leaves so I had to get rid of it. I had a terrible time after chopping down the main plant chasing down all the runners under the sidewalk and the rest of the yard. And I never got one banana out of the deal! 😂
Looking forward to progress on your gravel area, Will you be building raised beds with sleepers?
Looking forward to the coming years video’s Stuart.👍👍
Thanks Terry
When I see your paddock I keep expecting John Gater and Stewart Ainsworth from Time Team to be out there trying to find Roman or medeival ruins! Looking forward to the Garden Series!
Brilliant Stuart new vids coming. You have some amount of work in front of you. Once you get rid of all the junk the blank canvas will be awesome. I cant wait, your vids are very helpful and informative. Roll on the next few months.
Great plans and great inspiration
Thank you Tahir
Looking forward to the series and the season!
Thoroughly looking forward to the garden updates!
Excellent Stuart, good luck with all the projects 👍 I reckon you've got 3 year's worth of youtube content there, looking forward to the videos
Nice to tag along on your projects, Stuart, looking forward to spring and summer!
You and me both!
Dear Stuart - if I were a bit closer I would offer to help you - with the skip filling that is, not with the bramble root digging - I don't do bramble root digging. Look forward to seeing what you discover under that mound.
Looking forward to the future videos especially the one on levelling between slabs and fence because I’ve got exactly the same issue.
Great video today Stuart, I noticed a couple of what looked like milk urns in your skip pile. I've seen Henry Cole & Simon O'Brien restore a few of these on their tv program Find It Fix It Flog It.
A lot of work to come apparently, good luck Stuart!
Aways busy!
I believe laurels are also allopathic
Hi sir we had our front garden re’ levelled and seeded , the existing area was approximately 400 square meters In total not including driveways and parking . Over a hundred tons of rubble and sub soil was removed , followed by 80 tons of top medium grade topsoil . This all took place in the spring of last year , now the grass is doing very well but it’s amazing how many weeds are still present . Obviously I will in the near future be applying weed and feed as the grass is now capable of being treated . So with regards your plot I wonder have you a contingency plan to get rid of the more invasive species within your soil . Best wishes and kind regards 😀👍👍👍
Hi Stuart looking forwards to the Gardening series of videos with regards to the gravel and a different colour could I suggest Black Ice its not pea gravel shaped but it is rather nice :)
Great video! Just a thought, washing machine drums make excellent smokeless fire pits...
Good tip and one that I will be trying
Use some glyphosate on the brambles as they start growing, paint it or spray it on
Alternate the direction with each cutting , might get rid of the lines .
Given that your garden - being a big lawn with hedge around it - is a perfect canvas för garden design, it eould be really cool if you could make an episode on garden design. Showing what a miracle gardening is and how clever a design can be as a base for a long term transformation. Just a suggestion, given that you are amazing at explaining complicated things.
That is very kind of you to say that. Good suggestion and something I would like to do for sure.
Galvanised containers will poison fish over time Stuart, unless of course you line it. Looking forward to the garden content. Take care and have a great weekend.
Hi Stuart. Regarding the galvanised metal pond, bear in mind that anything living that you attract, like newts and frogs, will want to be able to get out of the pond at night, to hunt, and then get back in during the day, so its often the reason why nature ponds are level with the ground, and have sloping sides inside. The shape of the tank looks ideal for a blade-based water feature, if you want to lose a height difference somewhere.
Regarding bringing seedlings on over the winter, and you do have a large field to fill, I see a large greenhouse in your future.
I will have to plan the pond a bit more for sure. Yes a greenhouse is on the cards
@A B Yeah - I said often, not always. However, a galvanised tank half sticking out of the ground "often" looks pretty ugly too. I should know, I have a cubic metre water tank down one end of my garden catching rain off my garage roof. No hosepipe bans for me.
Great to have you back!!! Love your content. I'd love to see more DIY projects
Cornus Alba " Siberica" would be a good choice
Get in
When are you going to sit on the bench, and what are you going to look at? Looks like a good spot for a nice wood shed and some extra planting.
It will be planted but I also have a plan to spend summer evenings out there drinking with the neighbours
Turf time beckons!! Great to see this series back Stuart, must be Spring now! 😉
Thank you
Wouldn't you want a slight slope going away from the house? That helps with drainage, if you level it off, that could change, wouldn't it?
Can't wait for the summer series Stuart Would love one day for you to do a short video of your house history,it's looks lovely all the land and space you have.Did you build the house?Cheers.
Another inspiring video. Where is a good place to buy Bare Root hedging.. struggling to find a similar deal. Thanks
Great to see the gardening series back, thank you! I think a common mistake made with "ponds" is that people never go big enough, and even though you think the trough is huge, its actually a small volume of water that will struggle to maintain an ecosystem. Generally, you need depth (3 feet plus) and a flow of water. It would make a great water feature though, a tall waterfall would look and sound great, and be really good for aerating the water. Plenty of shade will help keep the temperature down, and you may get away without sinking it. I see a big problem with burying it is corrosion and being able to check for holes etc.
OK - good points and I have stuff to learn. I think I need to do some RUclips research!
You need a sit on lawn mower. Once you get the brambles low enough to mow over, the grass will outcompete the brambles if you keep mowing. Also get a tow ball on the back of the mower and you can pull a small trailer around. I have done this and use the trailer almost daily for moving tools and materials about. (As far as I can tell, most gardening involves moving heavy things from one place to another).
I'm really looking forward to your future projects on both your channels.
Thanks.
Daniel, good advice and something I have already been looking into - I might well be in that market later in the season.
I have both a ride on mower and brambles. A word of caution - brambles are more than capable of puncturing the tyres of the mower - I know this from bitter experience.
Can’t wait for new content!
Thanks Simon
Do you have a link for the laurels please? Another great video 👍🏼
Would suggest you install access gates to your horticultural land so you can take bigger machinery onto it to maintain the paddock properly. As time goes on it could become unmanageably overgrown otherwise and that would be disappointing.
Get yourself some pigs,they'll make short work of all those bramble roots and give the ground a good turning over and make it easier to level afterwards. Check out the restoration couple's channel and see what their pigs achieved. Keep up the good work.
I'm sure they do - not sure if I can handle keepng pigs on top of everything I'm doing though.
It's brilliant to see your plans, can't wait to see the paddock get sorted! Where did you get your laurel from please?
Hi Stuart. Where did you get the Laurel from? Please could you send me a link. Thanks
Love it. Where did you get your bare root laurels from?
Would love to see how you prevent those brambles growing back, I have a bunch of stuff in my garden that grows stupidly high every year it's a royal pain in the backside so would be nice to get rid of it finally but the area is probably about the same size as the area you're dealing with so individually derooting them sounds like hell
Evening Stu, you ever considered doing any car based DIY videos?
Like chance brakes or how to check tyres?
When cutting the tank please put water in it because I know someone who was cutting a barrel and although it seemed empty there was still some residue and it blew up and did serious damage to himself
I've heard of that before with petrol tanks - I will make sure that doesn't happen
Great video, as usual. Can you supply a link for the bare rooted laurels. I can't seem to find any at that price. Thanks.
Try Ebay. I bought mine from a seller in Dereham.
@@ProperDIY Thanks, found it on eBay. Weirdly I live in Dereham!
I think hiring some sort of excavator is required for the paddock Stuart. Just a thought. Regards Jim.
In my (albeit limited) experience you're going to have a fight on your hands with those brambles.. I have tried digging them out but unless you get all the roots they will forever be coming back. Late autumn last year I started a first go at them with a brush wood weed killer.. I'm really hoping for success with it.
Hi can I ask where you went for your bare root plants
Excited for this series, enjoyed last years, so definitely get some of these videos started! 😀 this is a side shoot but what did you do as a living before doing this now? I am assuming you are retired of some sort maybe if you’d be interested in sharing as a video maybe or something, others might be interested, If not, no problem I can appreciate privacy 👍
Can you provide a link or point in the direction of where you purchased your bare root Laurel plants?
I have looked on the web but can't them anywhere near the price you've paid.
Looking forward to seeing your garden ideas .
How much property is around your house ?
Thanks. A reasonably big garden plus half an acre in the paddock.
You need to buy some Gallop XL weed killer.
looking forward to seeing the front garden being sorted!
Thanks Madge!
Fingers crossed for some Laurel and Hardy action with Keith Brown!
Can you spray some sort of herbicide on the brambles? When I have cut trees that were living, I spray a plant killer on the stump and they die off without new sprouts appearing. Is that stuff legal in the UK?
How is Speedy doing or has he emigrated?
Stu, rip the drum out of the washing machine and make a firepit from it 👌
I'm going to try that!
Nooice!
Can you advise where you got your laurels from please
i see from another comment he got them from eBay