New fence and landscaping part 1

Part of our side fence blew down in a winter storm and since then we have been working on getting it replaced.

First we removed the 4m high hedge that was down in the back half of the fenceline (which revealed a much more broken fence that we realised... in fact the hedge was pretty much all that was holding the fence up).

Jason and his Dad then worked on removing all the other plants and very deeply embedded roots from the hedge. We don't have a very beginning before photo, but here we are halfway through the job!

The three boys worked hard digging up all the tree roots!

But some of them proved far too hard for man power alone... so Betty was put to work!!! While Ethan and his Grandad Papps supervised!

Ethan showing the boys how its done!

Sheesh after all that hard work Ethan needs some sultanas and some milk!

After the plant removal the fence repair stalled for a few months as we submitted (and waited) for our insurance claim. Then we had to negotiate with the owner of the vacant block next door over the colour of the fence, the height of the fence and whether she would pay now or later (the law states that if there  is a vacant lot next door they only need to pay for their share of the fence when they erect a substantial building on the site). Lucky for us she agreed to pay her half, and agreed to the full height fence along the whole fence line. We did need to negotiate on the colour, but all in all it wasn't too difficult to get a satisfactory outcome.

So we were onto phase two! The fencing contractors came in and demolished the old fence (and old garden bed). This was not without drama as they broke a sewerage pipe and cut our internet cable. The sewerage pipe was fixed that day but it took around 10 days to get internet back!.

Look at the big hole we have with the old fence and garden bed gone.

You will see in the original photos above that there was a garden on the inside of the old fence, it was about a metre wide and slightly raised. We have decided to widen this garden and will eventually plant two citrus trees, herbs and a small vegie patch as well as a more established tree (or two) - that is phase 3 of our project.

Here is the new fence from the outside.

Here is the new fence from the back courtyard. We are now waiting on the fencing contractor to come back and put our new limestone wall in for the new, bigger garden. This should be done in the next week or two.

Watch this space for more developments as we finish the landscaping off! Is anyone free in the next month or so to come and help us move a couple of trailer loads of dirt into the new garden beds???