Does anyone know anything about gardening?

National Trust think of everything...

#dadjokes

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I need to replace the wood on the slightly raised beds in my garden and also the planters on my terrace as they are all rotting/falling apart.

What wood/screws/fixings should I be using and should I also make the beds a bit deeper at the same time?

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I'm loving these little fellows. I'd never heard of Hepatica, ordered on a whim from Ashwood. They seem to be liking their new home

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We haz cucumber.

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a raised sleeper bed

nice

Finally got this damned thing finished having lost two weeks to overnight frosts. It's not entirely to my personal taste, but it's in keeping with the house and came out rather well (smug self-congratulatory pat on back).

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Move your table.
I used to fit pigeon spikes to trees for clients occasionally despite our protestations. At the end of the day most birds can perch on far smaller branches than you can fit a spike. Plus the obvious shittiness of sticking plastic up trees. It never works.
The sparkly things and fake owls rarely help either.
If it’s ones limb they mostly chill on and it’s not detrimental to the trees health consider removing the branch. Chances are they’ll just move to the next one though.

Birds give zero fucks so just roll with it!

What wood/screws/fixings should I be using and should I also make the beds a bit deeper at the same time?

I use cedar 1x6 inch deck boards for their longevity without toxic crap. I used cedar 4x4 sections at the inside corners. I use outdoor deck screws and a driver to fix the the boards to the 4x4.

I was able to find the cedar for a reasonable price thankfully, but if you're not careful it can feel like robbery.

It looks like you might need something a bit more robust than 1 inch deck boards, and for cedar than can be extremely (!) expensive and in many cases unavailable.

Douglas Fir has a good reputation also.

You can use pressure treated boards if you aren't growing vegetables, but some say this is up for debate. I wouldn't do it.

Finally, assuming there's nothing buried under your existing beds, I'd just turn the soil over (going deeper into the earth) after fixing them. if you build them taller you'll have to find soil which is harder and more expensive than it should be.

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That looks great! Whereabouts in the country do you work?

wee magpie xunt swanning about my yard this morning having a crap of me. they go in our gutters and fish out all the loot and throw the detritus on top of our skylights... wee fuds

Sussex based, work a lot in Kent, have been known to travel as far as SE without getting a nosebleed.

If I lose my rag with this retaining wall nonsense, would you accept a premium to come to CR7?

Is that marked 'here be dragons'? Doable, but persevere, you know you want to...

sir do u live in ronaldo's back yard

Is this a football reference? If so, it is totally lost on me.

Cristiano Ronaldo wears the number 7 and is often referenced as CR7.

Every day's a school day.

I hated school

School hated me, I count that as a win.

This "lawn".
Original plan was to rake and re-seed. But I've started digging. The soil is a bit compacted. It has lots of roots, rubble and moss in it. But it's hard work. Keep digging or go back to plan A?

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Another not-gardening question. I have a very steeply sloped garden, with a raised decking area that predates me buying the house. It is pretty rotten now and needs replacing - I would love to do it more or less like-for-like, since it turns what would be a near-subterranean damp shade cave into a beautiful sunny patio-type thing. But I'm concerned it would need planning permission and don't want to throw money at something that would fail, or draw attention to the fact it doesn't currently have permission.

I can see the law says decking does not need planning permission if it is no more than 30cm above the ground level. The issue for me is that, due to the slope, my decking is currently at 0cm above ground level at the rear, but about 1.5m above ground level at the front. So it depends where you measure from - I've seen something saying it's from the highest point (so mine would be fine) but I'm not sure if that's official.

If needed, could I just fill the void underneath with soil to raise the ground level? Seems unlikely but I can't see why that wouldn't be allowed.

Picture tells a thousand words

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I wouldn't have the slightest hesitation in replacing your decking, regardless of bylaws. The only way there could be any consequences is if the neighbours object, which as that has been there for a while is unlikely. If you're feeling nervous, talk to the neighbours.

For sheds it's measure from the highest point - i.e. the bits where it's 0cm from the ground, not sure if the same applies for decking.

That's encouraging. I didn't want to open Pandora's box but I did ask one neighbour about it gently, who didn't sound best pleased - the previous owner apparently didn't mention it before building it, 'it just appeared overnight'. I wonder if us redoing it could be a catalyst for them to complain.

On the side most overlooked by our decking, the neighbour literally never goes into his garden - he has allowed his only access to it to be swamped with metres and metres of brambles. But if he ever sold the house I bet the new owners would immediately want to either get rid of our decking, or do something similar on their side - which would be odd. I guess we'd then need a fence between the two.

This is what I'm hoping. Our case seems to test the limits of how sensible that rule is though.