Are we allowed to prune/cut back council’s overgrown weeds/bushes/prickles to add fence out of our garden onto public land?

[SpikyButt]

Our back garden is quite small and very shaded due to lots of tree, but at the side of our fence is a lovely, large, grassy public area with footpaths, no roads. Between our fence and the footpath/grass is a wildish strip of overgrown bushes/weeds/prickly things.

I’d love to add a gate to our fence so that the children can go straight from our garden into the grassy bit and back again, and I can sit in our garden and watch them play/ride their bikes around Etc.

I’m not positive that even this is legal, though my googling leads me to think it would be, the worst that could happen is we’re told to remove the fence/not used it?

But we’d have to cut back/prune/make a path through the chunk of overgrowth in order to get through. My OH thinks that we might get fined by the council for touching their stuff/bushes/weeds?

We recently had a long drawn out planning permission issue because there was a tree very close to our boundary, I can see why they were concerned about the tree but surely no one cares if we cut back the weeds? They’re just weeds - those crazy things that grow and grow taller, and spiky bits. The council do come around once or twice a year and cut them back a bit, when they start to grow over the footpath, so at some point it’s likely they’d notice. But I really don’t think it’s doing any harm and we’d get into trouble for it? Or would we?

We did briefly enquire about purchasing the strip of land, but when we finally got a reply, they seemed to suggest that it would be a very long and expensive process. It’s something we’d still like to do eventually if funds allow, but for now we’d just love to be able to open a garden gate and let the kids venture out easily in the lovely grassy area.

AIBU and are there likely to be repercussions?

Diagram of where I'd like to put a gate!

(ignore the tiny house to the left, that was from my first attempt)

You make your property more easily accessible, the garden is no longer 'secure' for insurance purposes. That said, lots do have back gates that lead directly onto public areas.

Easier to ask for forgiveness than permission!

it is rarely a requirement that you actually have to fence your garden but most do to stop randoms wandering on to it
if the land is not fenced you can almost certainly walk on it and of course walking on it regularly would trample the grass down aided by your strimmer
if the fence belongs to you you can within reason do what you like with it provided not over 6'6" and not in a conservation area etc a gate only openable from inside with a good lock not just a bolt ( don't want to invalidate house insurance against theft)

Putting a gate in your fence is fine however cutting a path through the shrubbery is not ok and could get you prosecuted for criminal damage and would make you a cf

We have just done this. Spent ages clearing a dumping ground and planting a wild flower meadow. I don't think anyone will notice what we have done though

We recently added a gate to provide access to a council-owned swing park directly from our back-garden. We just ensured that there is 2 heavy locks with padlocks for when it is not in use along with CCTV for the security aspect as a PP mentioned, but the council do not give 2 hoots. Realistically how could they prove it was you who damaged their weeds rather than any random passer-by?

Just here to compliment the lovely diagram!

If you walk over it enough once the council have been along and trimmed it, it should keep the growth down. No major trimming required.

Realistically how could they prove it was you who damaged their weeds rather than any random passer-by?

The fact that it was done in a direct line to a new gate would be a giveaway really.

I don't actually think they would care about some weeds though.

Legally I'm not sure but I think as long as your gate opens onto land that is freely accessible to the public or us a right of way its not too much of a problem, so I suppose it depends on whether the council think the overgrown strip is private property belonging to them or part of the public space at the other side of it.

Technically cutting a path through would be criminal damage even if it is just weeds. The likelihood of anyone doing anything about it though is slim.

You might also want to wait until after bird nesting season if you are cutting down bushes and brambles because if you disturb nesting birds you will be breaking the law.

if it is weeds all good to mow those down, if it is planting, maybe dig up and replace a little further along the row, so at least you haven't killed any plants, other than that i doubt they would worry... as long as you don't kill any actual shrubs, bushes or actual plantings

oh and tall grassy weeds that dry out could be considered a fire danger? so giving then a tidy up along a fence line could be a good thing too

Some people did this near where I live. There is a council-owned recreation area and a lot of houses have gardens which back onto it. Several families put a gate in their back fence and were thoroughly told off by the council as there is no right of way, and they've been told that they are not allowed to use the gates for access.

It appears to be a right-of-way issue.

I bought a similar strip of land from a builder, many years ago. All the neighbours were doing it. It was neither long, nor drawn out. Certainly no longer than a house sale.

On closer inspection, there's all sorts of different stuff growing there, I'm not a gardener so I don't know what it all is, maybe some privets and a load of ivy on the ground, some are definite weeds, others are various looking overgrown somethings. (I'll add a pic, there's a slight clearing where it's been walked on to our fence a few times already which is where we'd like to put the gate) I just know they hurt when you walk past along the path and get a face full, or even worse when the kids try to cycle past and get their arms and legs scratched.

They're not at their most overgrown yet. But they are denser and higher than my diagram shows.

That's a good point about nesting birds, we wouldn't be doing anything for a good while yet anyway.

Maybe it's worth noting that there's a house further down the path that has put a gate in their fence, but there was nothing growing behind their gate, so I'm inclined to think the gate thing is doable at least.

Bushy

Try again

Are you able to maintain your fence as this could be a way of getting the council to trim them right back/create an access for you and gets around the criminal damage issue?

The point about the birds is an important one but also depends on whether you care about the environment in general, these wild spaces or edgelands can be very important in the local ecosystem, food sources and havens for small wild creatures, hedgehogs and similar as well as insects and butterflies. All very important in terms of the environment. One of the reasons why a number of people are now rewilding their gardens or stretches of their gardens.

There's a tree that's actually pushing our fence down, the council came out to look at it and just told us to move our fence - so making our garden smaller. Then declined our application for planning permission in case we damaged the tree roots. It was later decided the tree would be fine..

We do care about wildlife, Dottie, I just want to basically cut a path up to the fence/ chop the pokey bit from the sides. It'd be nice to lop a lot off, especially the spiky bits, and grow wildflowers instead, but we wouldn't actually do that.

Our garden is an overgrown mess, I'd like to say that's in consideration of the wildlife, but really I'm just lazy. We do get the occasional hedgehog though, so I'm all for leaving it wild..

Councils sometimes let spiky stuff grow up against people’s fences bordering green spaces to deter local children from kicking balls against the fences or climbing on them. We were told this when we requested they cut down the overgrown stuff against our fence. The compromise we reached was that they tidied it up but didn’t cut it all down.

That could be an issue. I know it's keeping you in at the moment but it also keeps people out.

We'd definitely have a lock on the gate!