The Giant Phormium has gone!

The phormium which has been in my garden since 2015 so not that long really, but boy had it grown.

last year it went mad and flowered and since then it has started to look a right mess. After much discussion between hubby and me, he wanted it to stay!  I wanted it gone. He agreed and did understand why it needed to come out, it did used to look beautiful and structural but since last year it seemed to be dieing from the middle out.

I was fortunate that a lady from a facebook group I'm in, offered to help remove it. She came with her partner today, I went inside to make a cuppa, came back out and her partner had got it out.

I could not believe it.  The roots where relatively shallow, I was surprised. Only once it was out did we realised just how much it dominated the garden.

Just a few roots to dig out and a bit of tidying up to do.

Then we need to decide what to do with this space.

I would like to plant something else in here but the problem is we have  Verticillium Wilt. Prior to planting the phormium I used to have a Catalpa bignoniodes (Indian Bean Tree) planted here, it was stunning. But one year it started to leaf curl and basically die. At the same time the neighbours hedge the other side of the fence started to die back too. This disease is in the soil and sadly cannot be removed or treated.

There is a massive list of plants you can't plant here but on the plus side there are a number of plants you can plant, this includes Bananas and bamboos. I have always wanted a bamboo but have always been too scared to plant one incase it escaped into the neighbours garden. Why I should worry when I battle plants that invade my garden from the neighbours I have no idea, maybe its because I'm a considerate gardener.

Watch this space!