Hello there
I am just after a bit of advice.....
I live in a mid terraced house with wife and two lovely young daughters who like to play out in our little garden as much as possible. The only this is that our new neighbours have got 4 kittens and one cat which keep coming into our garden (i won't go into detail about what they do). I have spoke to them about it but they do not seem to be bothered
I have got a cat infra red alarm but that is costing a small fortune in batteries, so I was thinking of putting some trellis on top of the 4ft fence that separates our gardens and growing a rose or two through it.
Its better than those cat spikes and will be better for the bees!! Just not sure what is the best to grow, the trellis will be about 5 metres long so not sure whether to grow a mixture of roses or roses plus another kind of climber?
Any help would be greatly appreciated
Dave
How keen are you for pruning and tidying plants up?
There is roses that just one would easily fill the available space you've got...BUT...they also grow side ways and not only the thorns attempt take over your side of the garden, it will try to claim your neighbours side for itself too. :icon_cheers: The more vigorous sort tend to be rambler type roses and the monstrous ones more of 'wild' type cultivars.
If you go for more behaved climbers, they will take few years before the trellis gets covered and even then you need lots of training and pruning to get branches at the right places..but you never block the access for you garden for the cats. They won't have any trouble sneeking through.
Getting much better coverage...you could grow couple of climbers and one or two bush roses in between. Bush rose being bushier from lower down will nicely fill the gap as climbers tend to have the growth much higher up. Some bush roses are very strong growers and they can be used and trained like shorter growing climbers..again..some pruning for those outwards growing branches is needed.
You will need to make decision about the number and type of roses in one planting. Once the plants get their feet in, they start producing chemicals into soil that prevent any later planted roses getting establish. Later ones amongst established plants will be always more sickly looking and don't tend to do as well. There is ways to prevent it but it is lot of hard work...much easier to get it right in first time. As for adding clematis or other possible climbers...well..you can always add those into border later date as/if needed or you fancy a little change.
If you have a look at some of the rose nurseries sites...they will have excellent info and ideas for what to choose....they do colour selection etc. You just have to give them options for what your needs are and they will short list possible candidates for you.
Couple of my favourite sites to get you started..
http://www.classicroses.co.uk/
http://www.davidaustinroses.com/english/advanced.asp
Don't know if this will help but I used to have probs with cats leaving me little pressies. I laid bits of old green hosepipe in garden. Heard that cats think they are snakes (how the heck cats know what a snake looks like in Britain beats me) and that seemed to work quite well. Other posters have laid oven shelving or such on soil and grown through the holes thus preventing cats digging.
Get yourself a gat gun, it fires spud, but sounds like an air pistol going off. Just firing in the general direction of the cats is enough, it scares them off and the cat owners soon get 'bothered' enough to stop them coming your way.
I have Mega Sonic scarer http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B000NZPK5W/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_3?pf_rd_p=103612307&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B000NR8Q1U&pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_r=1JVBSP923A8YNAGBYBJ7 and the cat next door does not hang about when I point that at it.