To pour weed killer over the fence to next doors garden?

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I live in a mid-terrace house and get on well with neighbours 4 houses in each direction.
Except the house next door, which is semi-derelict and uninhabited, save for a visit once or twice a year. We've lived here for 4 years and in that time, all the curtains have been closed and an upstairs sash window has been open 24/7.

Next door but one (empty house's other next door neighbour) has lived there for 30 years and doesn't know the name of the person who owns it and why they only appear occasionally. The house appears abandoned.

We have a fairly new 6 foot panel fence between us and empty house, and there are now nettles and other weeds standing 2 feet above the top of our fence. All sorts is growing under the fence and through gaps, and it's starting to damage the fence.

WIBU to pour some weed killer over the fence into the garden?

Those leaves look a bit big and wide for buddleia, and wouldn't the heads be showing by now, surely? Mind, we only have cultivated ourselves, so I wouldn't know.

Did you buy my old house? Our neighbour was exactly like this, the place was a dump, you could barely see through the windows they were that grimy not that they ever opened the curtains. I saw them perhaps once a week and never once did they say hello etc.

We had a wire link fence. Next to our house we had a small section of hedge which blocked some of the view of theres from our garden. They said they were going to put up a nice new 6ft fence, so we allowed them to cut down hedge - they put one panel in and did no more. Their garden was like a jungle and their neighbour got fed up of it spilling into his and cut the back the lot for them and removed a trailer full of rubbish -by the end of the summer it looked exactly the same. We moved - not for that reason but we did check out the state of the neighbours gardens when doing viewings!

I would def chuck over some weedkiller - i doubt they would notice and i would deny all knowledge!

I would be more concerned about the state of the house and the potential structural impact on my property if it's falling in to disrepair because windows are left open. 30 years worth of neglect is pretty concerning.

If it's any consolation it will be a wildlife haven, I'd be loathe to use weed killer. Maybe let the council know to see if they can do anything. You would be unlikely to kill rampant nettles with the weed killer you can buy for domestic use.

The Land Registry will have details about who the owners are. Also put a note through the door to try and make some form of contact when they next visit the property.

You probably aren't being unreasonable but you probably are being a bit illegal.....

Honestly, just get in there and sort the weeds.

Who on earth is going to care?

And even if by some bizarre chance they did care, no-one's going to convict you of anything.

Protect your fence. Spray underneath where possible and over the top. The rest of the garden remains as is.

I'd get a back-pack type weed killer sprayer with a long reach

Worra,
Would it be on to put down a weed membrane, or is that passive aggressive?
I'm guessing it would be a quick job with a strimmer (can you hire them?) but they will just keep coming back all the time, and I don't want to get caught and therefore in trouble for being in the garden!

Just try to think of it as a wildlife haven :-) and chill.

oh and I wouldn't touch it without asking the owner.

I live very rurally and weeds from the adjoining fields are everywhere. Some are quite pretty :-)

Can't you just weed it? Weed killer isn;t great for animals and the environment. What if there were some hedgehogs there?

Hewl, I can't chill when I see bits snapping off my year old, several thousand pound fence!
I'm not hugely concerned about what it looks like, because I have a high fence between us, and don't spend too much time gazing out of the bathroom window into that garden but it's annoying to have weeds coming through

Could the owner be a skeleton on a sofa there?

Then go round and ask him/them/it.

Poison it! Now is the best time as it's growing season, so the plants will quickly take to poison to their roots and do the job. get a pump sprayer, and if you pump it up enoug you can get on a step ladder and spray his whole garden. I honestly don't think he'd mind, really, why would he?

We're in a very similar situation but the house is in fact occupied, despite appearing derelict. Several of the front windows have been smashed for over a year, the back garden is utterly overgrown, mainly with buddleia (which is great for bees and butterflies but otherwise an absolute pest, self-seeds rampantly and will get into and destroy walls if left unchecked), and the front garden is overgrown with bramble. I've genuinely no idea what to do, the chap who lives there has issues (mental health and/or alcohol/drug?) issues but he inherited the house so owns it outright. The council and the police have been round and I think he's had a few quotes for the windows judging by the vans, but nothing's happened. If he can't or won't fix the smashed windows I can't really expect any progress with the gardens. There were some rats over the winter and because he's on benefits the council would have treated them for free but it didn't go ahead for whatever reason (I paid for bait and traps in my garden - the problem was actually several houses down).

Is it worth contacting the council again? I really don't know what to do.

Weedkiller kills animals - that overgrown site is probably home to a lot of wild animals you don't see. It would have been fine to trim it back, but not put toxic chemicals down

Another photo to try and show what I'm up against!

The nettles are really, really dense. For me to weed the garden, there would have to be somewhere for me to stand with a strimmer or shears, and that place doesn't exist unless I want to get really stung.

I don't know how easy it would be to remove a panel and access from my garden, because I have raised vegetable beds running alongside the fence and I don't know if they could stand themselves up without the fence for support if that makes sense?

The weeds look a lot lower on the other side of his garden so I suspect my next door but one neighbour ha already been throwing weed killer over

ha! Someone doesn't give a shit!

Tbh you are fighting a losing battle with that lot.

Can't you speak to them??

I'd definitely take PPs advice re: council, empty houses attract cannabis farms...

Hewl, the house is abandoned! No one lives there and hasn't for somewhere between 4 and 30 years.
Once or twice a year, we see a light on or see someone entering or leaving, but there are never bins left out, never any noises through the walls, no signs of life at all.
Every winter, the upstairs window remains open.
There is no one to talk to or reason with. It is a derelict house which is now starting to affect mine...

read this about reporting it to your local council. In some cases they have the ability to take possession of a property.

I'd push it with the council. This happened to someone I know. Their neighbours house had been occupied for decades by a single man (surprise surprise) who had let the wooden windows, doors and guttering rot to almost nothing, the chimney and roof were a mess and the garden massively overgrown. The net curtains had never been washed in nearly 40 years and were grey.

Eventually after a couple of years of the council going through their derelict land procedures, he got all the repairs sorted, but the weeds and dirt are probably back by now.

In this case, it wasn't even a money issue - he bought the house decades ago for less than £5k and had a full time professional job. If he didn't have any ridiculous expensive hobbies, or an army of unseen relatives to support, he must have had thousands in the bank too.

Bloody hell! You could film I'm a celebrity in there!

If it was me, I might consider SBK or lawn weedkiller. They kill most weeds but not grass, so the area would not turn into a suspicious-looking desert.

Ivy is quite difficult to kill, but glyphosate gel, dabbed on the stumps after cutting it back, seems to work.