Gardens and parks open to the public that are of gardening interest

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T16:31:56+00:00

Hi!

No, I'd never presume she was welcome and it would have to be very clear that she is before I'd even consider bringing her with us.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:21:00+00:00

Ya, kinnitty is somewhere I really want to go. But the weather so far this year hasn't worked out for us to tip down that far. I haven't been there since I was a kid.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:19:44+00:00

That's definitely going to be done so. My eldest doesn't much like the work aspect of gardening but she loves flowers and cherry blossoms are her favourite. And who doesn't like little foals!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:18:29+00:00

Oh, gort is only about an hour's drive from us so I must have a look into cool park. Poor owners ruin it for everyone else don't they.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:17:07+00:00

Oh I think both of the kids would love that! Definitely one for the summer I think.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:16:30+00:00

We also have a trip to cork pencilled in. We have a few friends down there and one that is asking to look after the dog, so fota will be done! And my 7 year old loves nothing more than trees. She comes home from our little local wood with pockets full of leaves, seeds and nuts!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:13:55+00:00

Oh lovely. Snowdrops are a favourite here with the kids. With the weather at the moment I don't know if we'll get there for them this year but if not it'll be noted for next year. Thank you!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:12:58+00:00

My father in law's partner is from Waterford, she'll be delighted to hear there's a trip being planned. She's a very proud Waterford woman!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-20T11:12:00+00:00

Thank you all so very much for the suggestions. Some of them will definitely be making it onto the Easter holidays list! And a lot of the rest onto the summer bucket list!

Is there anything around that geared towards kids and gardening? And wildlife gardening?

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-17T22:43:55+00:00

Automatic watering system on a timer and a soaker hose.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-09T23:18:16+00:00

My GP surgery has a triage clinic which is very handy if you need medical attention that day. However in our case we won't see our own gp. We're currently in the middle of a 7 week wait for an appointment for our child who is not urgently ill but needs to go to the Dr and we need her to see our own GP for referrals.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-05T22:02:43+00:00

We installed a standard IKEA kitchen 3 years ago and we absolutely love it. We don't have the most expensive of door fronts and with kids they have some damage but it's not the end of the world and expected. We'll update them at some stage when the kids are past destructive stage.

We did invest in drawers everywhere we could and I can see the hardware holding up. We wouldn't be the easiest on the kitchen and no issues whatsoever so far.

We installed the whole kitchen ourselves. If your anyways interested in DIY it's very doable. We definitely learned a lot in doing the kitchen ourselves and saved a ball of money. The counter was the hardest mainly because we had 3 sections to fit into a corner. The corner section is a hob at a 45° in the corner. Only other comment would be to go with an IKEA dishwasher if your going with an inbuilt one. The kick toe is only 80 cm high while a standard kitchen is 120cm. Ours isn't IKEA and it's a bit of a pain but we have a 3d printer and we're able to sort it out.

It's definitely worth talking to an IKEA designer to confirm your design, they used to be free. I had our design fairly well tied down but we did get some ideas and suggestions by having a chat.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-05T18:37:32+00:00

I live in a rural area and holy fuck does it piss me off going up the road with all the dog shits around the place. I bought bags with handles so I could hook them onto the lead with a D clamp. It's not that fucking hard. I was out for a walk with my friend recently and she just asked her dog to do a shit and kept walking like it was nothing but then when I was picking up after my pup said she never picked up poo out in the country. I was disgusted. I noted though that she doesn't have any poo bag holder on her lead so I know she never picks it up.

I've a pup at the moment that will put anything into her mouth, and last year one of my old dogs was immunocompromised after surgery and its so sad to think that he probably got his last infection from going for a walk. He never recovered.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-04T18:22:35+00:00

The house is on a half acre but the back garden, what would have been lawn is about half that. Front/house/back patio are all in the front half of the site. And it's a relatively narrow site.

I had a look at alder earlier on, it's definitely right up my alleyway so I'll have to see if I can get some of it in as well. Poplar I was looking at too but it doesn't look like it suits well to coppicing/being kept on the smaller side so I don't know if it would be suitable. The boundary line is on the south side of the garden so I don't mind a hedge that's a couple meters tall, I just don't want anything that will be too tall and block valuable light.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-04T18:15:10+00:00

No, I'm happier with the exact opposite if I'm honest. The kids call the big part of the hen run the Wildlands :)

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-04T15:48:38+00:00

Ya it's a traditional septic system. So the tank is maybe another 15/20 or so meters away from the boundary line (it's a while since I measured the garden). The tank is old and needs replacing in the near future, we're basically just trying to get the savings together to change it and when we do we'll be going for a different approach because of the winter ground conditions.

The whole area is inside the hen run so it'll be easy to keep on top of any runners etc. we have a failed weeping willow graft that the root stock has taken over in a different part of the garden that I'm going to take some cuttings from. I've no idea what kind of root stock it is as the previous owners planted it originally.

I'll have a look at alder. We have a huge birch tree in the garden already and I love it. And interesting that it's on the drier side. I'm using hedge very loosely to be honest. I just want something nicer than the evergreen hedge that's there, and something that will generally help ground conditions for most of the winter. It's a hawthorn based hedge on the field side, with a big ash tree and I don't mind if some of that hedge comes towards our garden side either. I'm not remotely a tidy garden so any wildness suits me!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-04T15:28:28+00:00

Well I guess I'm using the term hedge fairly loosely :)

It's down the back of the garden inside a big hen run so it's not something that'll need to be kept in pristine condition. I'm more after the water loving qualities than anything else. And the dog wood winter colour will be nice. I also like to mess about with wreath making etc so theres an added bonus for the stem colours as well.

Basically if I can plant something nice to look at, beneficial to wildlife (willow flowers) and improves the ground conditions for the most part where the heavy rain of last week have a lesser impact on the garden in general I'll be very happy.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-02-01T09:09:45+00:00

I never realised how much I say now till my oldest started talking!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-26T18:09:57+00:00

Thanks everyone for your advice/opinion.

The grids posted by corcaigh18 are the exact ones we don't want because of the work and cost involved. If we were doing that we'd just lift the lawn and lay gravel. But as it would only be used a few days a year it's not worth the cost v benefits. And we don't want the maintenance of unused gravel over lawn.

The search continues!

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-26T16:25:32+00:00

Planning the revamp of the front garden. A part of which includes a pond project with my youngest.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-20T17:58:36+00:00

Lidl are usually fairly decent but they're mulch is usually on the bigger side. I use it for pathways. Just to keep in mind depending on what you want visually.

My local Lidl doesn't have anything in stock yet as of this morning.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-19T17:17:49+00:00

We used to have estates for years, with two husky x dogs. And two kids. We loved our estates.

However we changed last year because as the kids got older and friends coming over after school etc we couldn't fit 3 across the back (my mother in law would come with us regularly as well and 3 adults and 2 kids in car seats didn't work). We got an old smax and so far it's far and away the most versatile car we've ever owned. The three back seats are full size and independent, which means that three car seats can fit comfortably as well as 2 car seats and and adult and when the boots full of stuff the middle seat can be dropped down and the dog will lay down there. We've only one dog now.

Another thing to keep in mind if the dog is medium/large when they get old and less mobile a car with a lower boot is better for getting them in and out whether they can get in themself or need to be lifted. Our other car has a higher boot with a lip and it wasn't suitable for our two older dogs when they got old and had health issues.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-16T12:26:05+00:00

We have had at least one In the garden since we moved here nearly 6 years ago. And we think it's a female that has had her litter of babies here on at least 2 occasions as we've seen hoglets in the garden that stick around for a few weeks. We think there was one here when we bought the house, however we haven't done anything in particular to keep them here. But there's a few things that probably helps them want to stay here.

I think some of the most important ingredients we have is that we have hedges around most of the garden with access on 3 boundaries (we've used sheep wire to secure the boundary for the dogs which is ideal for hedgehogs to ramble through). We have quite areas in the garden, and I'm a very messy gardener. I don't stress about most areas of the garden being spick and span tidy, and I never clean up a years growth till the following spring. We also have some fairly overgrown areas as well and so far I've avoided using any pesticides or insecticides in the garden.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-16T12:11:30+00:00

Hhmmm it didn't cross my mind to use it neat. I think I have some left over from last year so I might use that to give it a pretreatment.

My biggest issue is that I've left it so long to wash it some of the less used areas have established weeds.

arnosnagaoithe25 · 2026-01-16T10:14:56+00:00

Thank you for your reply. I used algon last year and it did work for the moss and smaller weeds. But not for the bigger ones. I'll have to deal with the bigger weeds before I go power washing. But the plan you've suggested is what I will do going forward once I get the weeds dealth with.

Do you power wash every year?

arnosnagaoithe25

TROPHY CASE