Why do people want to rip every plant out of their gardens?!

[Turnedtochaos]

Just that.

My NDN have spent the past 2 days pulling up every mature tree, shrub and plant from the fence lines at the back and sides of their garden. Now instead of a view of lovely trees I can see all the houses behind and get a view of 3 families who now have no privacy. I can now see NDN wandering around in wheras before I could see nothing at all!

The plants weren’t shading their massive garden either and were covered in beautiful flowers. Just why?

Before anyone says…I have my own plants but due to the angle it won’t offer any privacy for those behind NDN.

Some twat [he's a known twat] complained about my front garden needing pruning, now some shrubs have finished flowering to 'tidy it up it looks scruffy', to their companion as they walked past my house this morning.
I mentally told him to fuck off.
They have a heap of shit in their front garden which has been there for months.🙄

I've just moved my lounge to the back of my house so I overlook the garden and can open french doors late into the evening in lovely weather.

My view at the front was of tarmac/block paved drives, multiple cars and not a blade of greenery to be seen. Was like looking at a retail car park.

Not even pots of plants or a small corner with plants or shrubs in. Don't get me started on the torrents of rain that stream off them into the gutters. All that wasted water ... 🙄

Can anyone recommend a lovely but low maintenance climbing plant for a pot and trellis with a south westerly aspect please? Preferably something with a long flowering season.

Star jasmine.

No idea about the aspect or whether they're supposed to be low maintenance... or even whether they have a long flowering season! 😄🙈

But I've got two in pots by a trellises and I do nothing to them. They look after themselves and are very impressive! And smell beautiful on a warm evening... the leaves change colour through the seasons too so it looks beautiful even when not in flower.

I'm a rubbish gardener so I plant what I like and hope for the best. One was little more than a stick when I bought it 3 years ago and it's huge now!

Because they don’t want them. Their garden, their choice.

Don’t know, but a dd was very upset to see that the new owners of her first house had ripped out so much, including a cherry tree she’d planted, that was doing so well, and some lovely flowering shrubs.

I’d guess it’s largely down to laziness, they just CBA with any sort of gardening.

Dd’s was a very small garden, too.

Thank you, I love the smell of Jasmine and have one in a small pot on the windowsill so will give it another go in the trellis!

I think it's against the law to do this during nesting season???

Some people are so weird. They'd rather have concrete than trees. They disgust me.

It's our environment, so we have a say too. A ruined garden heats up the nearby homes and increases flooding risk.

For us it’s because our child has severe hayfever, asthma, multiple allergies and a rare autoimmune disorder that gets worse when allergy symptoms are triggered. So our entire garden is paved or has plastic grass to minimise allergen exposure and allow my child to actually use the garden. I don’t really care what people think, worry about your own garden and I’ll worry about mine.

We are probably going to pave our front garden, it's true. We don't actually want to pave it entirely but parking has become so difficlt that anyone visiting us struggles. Plus, it's south facing so maintaining it is really hard, even more so as we don't have an outside tap that can be accessed from the front garden for watering. I've actually started researching what plants will grow well in full sun, with little water, in pots for after we do it. We do have lovely hedges around 2 sides which we'll keep. The 3rd one had to be removed because of subsidence unfortunately so again, I'm researching what we can put along that fence.

I've even been thinking about whether I can install a medium sized water butt for rain water to use for watering at the front. But that' sprobably a longer term plan!

My next door neighbour did this after she moved in. The previous owner had been a keen gardener and the garden looked beautiful with mature bushes planted along the joint fences which I enjoyed looking at when they flowered. The fence was a bit old but we both grew things against it so you could not really see it.

The new owner got some young inexperienced lads in to clear all the plants and bushes so she could have a new fence put up, one with thin slats parallel to the ground, individually nailed to posts. It’s a real mess, some of the slats have warped, they have not been evenly spaced and I get to see the rough side with nails poking through the wooden posts. In addition the lads attached the upright posts to the existing concrete posts so now I’ll have issues if my old fence, which still stands on my side, needs replacing.

She wanted the fence 8 ft high right the way round her property including the front garden with high electric gates but I pointed out our local planning laws which states fences can be no more than 6 ft high and only 3 ft high along the front on a public road. I pointed this out to her and to the lads building the fence.

i was having my drive replaced at the time so decided to have a low fence installed at the front and side passage at my expense, I discussed it with her and she was happy, even offering to pay half.

I then went away for a week, when I left the back garden fence was 6 ft high, when I got back the lads had added, very badly, an additional 2 ft to the height!
I wasn’t sure what to do, she seemed a nice person to me and I think she had been misled by the project manager of the renovations, he’d taken the final payment but then not spent it on finishing her house so she had to move in with no kitchen and loads of jobs unfinished. It was a very stressful time for her, she had to fight to get the work finished and even now, a year later, there are still jobs unfinished.

i didn’t want to add to her stress as I’ve always got on with my neighbours so I decided to leave the fence issue and let my bushes grow higher to hide the fence. I have a lovely acer tree close to her boundary which I’ve previously pruned each year to keep it a neat shape and not too tall but I might stop pruning her side ( just out of petty spite) as it will then grow and obscure the windows of her extension.

Ironically, she popped round recently to look at my new glass verandah and greatly admired my mature garden with its bushes and thick ground cover - like hers had looked until she had everything dug up! I do wonder if that was actually her decision or if the rogue foreman had done it without her knowledge.

Such a shame - I always feel sad when I hear the dreaded sound of a chainsaw round here, wondering which lovely tree is about to be chopped down! I also think that house developers have no vision when it comes to providing gardens - in a 10 mile radius from where I live there are currently 3 huge housing estates being built. They all have the same dull and boring square shaped houses with tiny windows and no proper garden - just a patch of concrete and the gravel in front. Truly awful.

I thought you couldn’t cut them down during the nesting season?

@IwanttobeafraserIt’s very easy to add an outside tap. Ask a plumber for a quote.

NOTHING is easy when it comes to water around here. We have about 50 weird things with our water supply that are all slightly odd, but never quite get to the "this will force the water company to fix it" level! Admittedly, I've never asked about a new outside tap at the front of the house, but every other water-related thing we've ever done or tried to do has been a huge issue so my confidence levels are low.

Don't agree with ripping trees out etc if they're not blocking all of the light or interfering with foundations.

Flower wise, what if you're just not good at gardening?

Bet they shop at temu😛

I don’t know but it makes me so upset. Why people want to have concrete gardens as well? It’s insane and really bad for the environment.

Feel everyone’s pain.
NDN 1 have removed all grass and plants and put down Astro turf. Even the decking is plastic. Their front garden tarmac.
NDN 2 front is concrete, good or bad they don’t touch the back so all over grown. But they have dogs and it smells in the summer , iykwim.
we have hedges as borders, wonky grass, wonky borders full of flowers, tubs, wildlife area , water areas. I put a lot of hard work in to make it a pleasant area. Grandkids love it especially when all the fruit bushes and strawberries are ready.

Were there any birds nesting in the trees? If so I believe you’re not allowed to chop them down until all chicks have fledged.

I agree, my neighbour has patio and fake plants. She cuts the climber I put on our adjoining fence, she also cut the climbers I put on my back fence, it's nothing to do with her. I despair when I see astro turf in gardens. People buy beautiful old houses and replace them with modern grey cubes, what a waste.

I feel like growing a massive thug of a plant on my side out of spite.

That's just pathetic. And I doubt she gives a single shit what you have in your garden. Just because you like something, it doesn't mean everyone else does, and we don't all have the same amount of time or energy, etc to put into gardens as you.

Having seen the photos of your garden, I'd hate that. It just looks messy to me.

I admire a full, busy (well kept) garden. My NDN have a beautiful garden with all sorts of things going on, but they're also retired and able to spend the time looking after it. Whereas me and DH have full time jobs, 2 kids and a load of other commitments to take up our time. The garden is at the bottom of the list of priorities right now and needs to be functional over attractive.

I’m the same. I find that if you rebrand weeds as “Wildflowers” then it makes life so much easier. I love my overgrown garden. We back onto a railway line so also have lovely mature native trees all along the back. Means that when I look out of my back windows I just see a beautiful wall of green. I love hearing the birdsong in the mornings.

We did take out alot of bushes etc when we moved in. I was sad about it, but it's a small garden and we wanted the garden to be a play area for the kids so we needed the space. There was no room for a swing and a slide, or to play ball before.
Now they're older we are gradually putting things back in around the borders which I'm enjoying. Sometimes it's just practicality