Anyone earn a living as a Gardener?

[BetteDavis01]

If so, can you tell me what qualifications you have? Do you make a good living from it? Thank you

Re Rhubarbgarden and pokes in the eye- do be careful. I had a cataract early, and garden pokes in the eye were initially considered the most likely cause. They were not the cause, in fact, but it is a very common reason for one cataract earlier in life, according to the eye hospital.

Gosh, I didn't know that. Thanks for pointing that out.

I did a national diploma in horticulture which was a 2 year course. I started my business 6 years ago and ive seen things since then whih have been inbelivable!! I'm on £14 an hour which is still too low and I would suggest getting your pricing right when you first start out. I do garden maintenance, I found garden design too difficult and took me away from my regular customers. In my experience you can't do both even in winter! There are aspects of the job that I don't like and surprisingly it's not the paperwork. Customers do appreciate you and understand the work but I've found relatives don't! I've taken on customers which I've known haven't been right (far too rich and superior in their minds so they are always right!!) and has always ended badly. However, keep it simple and the job is good and you will enjoy yourself. I've found gardening on a Friday afternoon in the sunshine with radio 2 on my iPod is the best feeling in the world!!

I sat RHS Level 2 in June this year, passed with commendation, did it from the reading list (ie not via distance learning college, sat as an external candidate). It's definitely an entry-level qualification only.
I do some voluntary work at a good local garden, where I can take the littlie. I'm looking at a career change, intend to sit part of RHS Level 3 in Feb and start job hunting in earnest in the spring. I don't want to be self-employed initially as I think would be better to learn from working with others first (I do some consultancy work from previous career anyway).

wow I cant believe people are charging £15 an hour for gardening work... that sounds a lot to me. we have a gardener who comes in 6 hours a week and charges £7 an hour. I cut the grass so he only does the borders and looks after fruit trees for us but its too much for us to do on our own as we have quite a big garden. I know a couple of other people who do gardening work too and at most charge £10 an hour - both of them have been in the game for 20 years and have 4 or 5 people working for each of them.

Oh, I am marking my place on this thread. I will come back tomorrow with a picture of something that suddenly started growing from my rock garden. My friend thought it was sweetcorn, but it looks like it isnt. But odd, oh yeah.

If anyone who works as a gardener would like some muscles for poorly paid or even voluntary work, can I offer Flyingboy who is doing gardening at college. He is very willing and brill at mowing, digging, clearing, strimming, hacking, general garden maintenance. Local jobs are few and far between and as an aspie he's not got the confidence to knock on doors. We sre in the SE. Pm me if you could use him even if tempirarily.

Peggypants, I was surprised by £15 too, I guess though that repeat/regular work will be cheaper than one offs, esp if you're a nice person to work for!
Though round our way (rural Scotland) cleaners charge about £12 an hr and gardeners have higher overheads and a more seasonal business, so really £15 would be comparable to that.

Sorry to drag up an old thread but found it whilst looking for something else... I retrained as a gardener when my children were small with the WFGA's 'Work and Retrain As a Gardener Scheme', over two days per week in a large garden for a year, in addition to studying for RHS L2 and then L3 and the practical skills I learnt in the garden helped me understand the theory at college..... [smile}

Hi, sorry to bring up an old thread. Just wondering if the OP decided to try to earn a living/gain qualifications as a gardener in the end and if so, how is it going?! Found the replies to this thread very constructive, as currently exploring this as an option for myself. Tia.