To be totally overwhelmed by the garden?

[flyingtartar]

It defeats me every fucking year. Last year, for obvious reasons, I got on top of it and got some pleasure out of it and thought it would be a turning point. This year I started out with good intentions in the Easter break (I'm a teacher) and mowed the lawn and did some weeding and planting. Then it rained solidly for a month.

This morning I have gone out there and it's just awful. The lawn is massive, there are waist high dandelions and other weeds around the edges. These weird things that I think are comfrey (?) are out of control and shrubs that had been cut to stumps are flourishing in an unattractive way. The lavender I planted last year looks good and can just about be seen, the carpet rose I planted is alive but barely identifiable and the hydrangea I planted at Easter is amazingly alive but only visible if you go right up to it.

It doesn't help that I'm really scared of slugs and snails so won't go out unless it's been dry for a few days. Also a big hebe in the front that had been there for a few years had died for some reason so that needs sorting too.

When I go running literally every garden looks tidy and the majority look lovely yet this seems beyond me. I posted on a million sites and a guy is coming round later so hopefully it will be better by tonight and ds1 has decided to dig up the dead thing, but AIBU to think every other person manages to keep on top of this?

Just cut a couple of paths through your lawn and leave the rest to grow. Voila - wildlife areas.

Comfrey makes amazing fertiliser. You can use it as a mulch and weed suppressant.

If you have some shrubs that are quite old, and don't flower very well, you can cut them right back, and they will eventually have a new lease of life and grow and flower well next time round. Some shrubs, need the right type of soil to plant them in. or they won't do very well at all..
I have a few ground covering plants, where I don't want large flowering plants to go, and these can stop too many weeds coming through.

Your garden sounds perfect for wildlife. Let it go, and if anyone complains tell them you’re rewilding.

Why not turn it to lawn and buy a robotic lawn mower for under 500 quid and have a perfectly cut lawn for a few years with minimal effort (Just take half a day to set it up). Maybe add a few low maintenance shrubs or small trees for interest if you can manage minimal maintenance.

I've never been a gardener and I have the same aversion to creepy crawlies but this year I've stripped back huge areas of overgrown brambles, reopened an overgrown path, mowed immense areas of grass (we do have a huge garden) plus dug out beds and planted potatoes, onions and beetroot. I do have a huge garden though!

If you genuinely don't like it, then hire a gardener.

It sounds like you inherited a garden that already had plants in it?

Maybe starting with some of your own plants might help, plan some out that you know take little maintenance, get to know the garden a bit more?

I love my garden, but it is a lot of hard work. I try and do something most days, even if it's just for 20 mins, that's how l keep on top of mine. I find it l can get to grips with it earlier in in the year it's easier to maintain.

Same! I was upset about it today actually. We got a gardener last year but he stopped doing gardens this year and I haven't found a new one.
It's definitely the answer though. I feel much better when it looks nice but I have no obligation to sort it.

and this year has been so wet, gardens have exploded. I'm a keen regular gardener and even being out all weekend hacking, cutting and weeding there's still loads to do because couldn't do anything for most of May

Large gardens are hard work. After mowing a half acre lawn ourselves twice and taking well over 4 hrs doing a rubbish job, we forked out for a gardener ever since. Strimming & mowing our lawn takes him half the time and we have nice stripes! (Better mower & equipment although I have had thoughts of buying a small ride on mower so it would only take us half an hour. Ha! No stock!) We also have leylandii hedge/borders 28 of them all on one boundary - we bring the big guns in for that - treesurgeons. I maintain 6 longish flowerbeds myself so I spend a couple of hours weeding most weekends to keep on top of it. Also have a small vegetable patch (since lockdown) which I should enlarge but am reluctant because it means more maintenance and I really don't have the time. Large back patios plus paved driveway - a Karcher jetwasher does the job. I'm not weeding that as well. Kiln sand on a dry day to fill in the cracks and it makes a massive difference. Or pay someone else to do it. I do like the nice jobs of planting new stuff in the borders - it's just the mundane weeding/mulching that takes up most of the time. A reliable gardener is worth their weight in gold. I have had the same person for the last decade who comes every fortnight. I don't have a cleaner since I'd rather pay for a gardener.

Does a Karcher jet washer kill weeds?

I just hired a gardener for the first time. I know I will get a huge amount of pleasure out of having a lovely garden but don’t have the expertise, time or stamina to stay on top of it myself. It feels too overwhelming and I don’t know where to start. I can’t wait to have it look nice again and I hope it will inspire me to spend more time in the garden.

OP it's like any other household job;

You either do it yourself
or you pay someone else to do it
or it doesn't get done.

I agree with whoever said that people with lovely gardens are generally either retired, garden as a hobby or have a gardener (or sometimes all three). I fall into the second category so spend a lot of time in my garden because I love it. Little and often is often a great way of keeping on top of it but it would very easily become out of control if I didn't do this.

If you don't enjoy gardening and can afford to buy in help then just get a gardener.

I am not on top of it OP, not at all! The garden is simply too big and unruly. Even just trying to keep the weeds down on the driveway and flower beds at the front tidy-ish seems beyond me.

It doesn't help that I dislike gardening - to me it's simply outdoor housework. And while I might enjoy looking at a pretty garden somewhere else, it would only be for a short time and I wouldn't want to spend lots and lots of time in it. My garden just needs to be a functional space for DC, dog, BBQ-ing. I have no enthusiasm for trying to make and keep it manicured.

Gardening is a really good way of keeping fit. maybe the people who aren’t keen could look at like a way of working out which has the benefit of resulting in a lovely green.

I'm a gardener and am currently working 7 days a week firstly because the wet May made mowing anything a no-no and secondly because I keep getting messages from new customers essentially saying "I am overwhelmed, for the love of all things holy please help me" so you are definitely not in a minority here!

How do you find a good gardener though? I have tried many years ago to being someone in to sort the garden in other houses. They were invariably not that great.

No mow May is actually a thing so you've been doing lots of good for insects and pollinators.
The key to having a really nice but lowish maintenance garden is planning. If you look at the type of soil you have, how much sun you get, create beds and borders with plants that suit and maybe have an area with a pond or greenhouse or whatever you like, these things all add colour and interest and well established plants and shrubs will eventually just stop weeds from growing really because they won't have room, apart from the odd dandelion here and there.
Big lawns quite often just get overgrown with a load of shitty brambly stuff and that's no use to anybody. Much nicer to have a couple of large rhododendrons or hydrangeas in those spots, suppressing weeds hopefully too. Plan it all out and invest in some good tools to make it easier for you.

@lidoshuffle

Gardening - outdoor housework

Yes, this. I'd rather do the indoor housework, at least it stays "done" for longer. No cash for a gardener so it gets a very grudging occasional hour of my life to keep it below knee-level.

Oh and I'm sure your neighbours don't hate you. My neighbours garden is totally neglected, but it's his garden so he can do what he wants with it. There's probably loads of wee hedgehogs and birds living in his big overgrown shrubs and hedges and they benefit my garden too.

I love busy gardens with lots of pots and plants and neat grass however I don’t have time for it at all. The back garden is tiered. Lawn at the bottom. Patio in the middle and patio at the top. I’ve just got pots with trees and bedding plants in. Takes an hour maximum at the weekend to mow the lawn and sort the pots out. The front is 99% driveway with one border which is all shrubs, mostly azaleas which look beautiful in the summer and just green in the winter. Again it only take about an hour to pull out the weeds and keep the shrubs trimmed back.

That comfrey is a gift! It's a wonder plant that taps into minerals deep in the soil and stores the goodness in its leaves. Chop them down (you can do this several times in a season) and either use it in your compost bin or make your own 'compost tea' fertiliser by adding water. You can even use chopped leaves directly as a mulch around plants.
www.gardenorganic.org.uk/comfrey

I completely understand, OP. YANBU. I loathe gardening and find it a monumental chore. If I wasn't so frugal I would have a gardener!

I love my garden since we moved house, there are huge raised beds at knee height around two sides of the garden, so really easy to keep tidy. I only ever plant evergreen shrubs and plants so there is year round structure and colour. Colour from different kinds of foliage rather than flowers. I paid extra at the start to get big established plants so that they would survive the first winter, and it had instant impact and I didn't have to wait for them to grow.
We lifted our lawn a couple of months ago due to voles and field mice ruining it, it looked awful, so we have had it laid with plum slate (gorgeous colour especially when it rains) with contrasting areas of white polar marble. Because I have large evergreens in the raised beds and large trees in pots, it doesn't look artificial or barren not having a lawn as there is plenty of greenery.
Good evergreens are cordylines, fatsia japonica, hebes, ivy, holly, ornamental grasses like carex, laurel, photinia, heather, heucheras, ferns, phormium, cotoneaster, lavender.
These come in so many colours just from foliage alone. Some may need winter protection with fleece, but I have a lot of the above plants and they all survived a bad Scottish winter last year with very few losses. And in clay soil.
Hanging baskets are great too if you like seasonal colour and bedding plants.