Dealing with an overgrown garden - help!

[BramblyMess]

We've just moved house, one of the main reasons being to have more garden space. In a rose-tinted glasses kind of way, I'd thought of the garden as being a sort of "blank slate" where I could just dig out some lovely borders and start planting pretty much straight away . However the reality is totally different!

There are loads of brambles, weeds growing among the grass etc, and some random shrubs (possibly blow ins?!) - that I want to cut back or etc rid of altogether.

So my question is: where do I start? I was thinking of getting rid of the bigger brambles etc and strimming the grass first, would that be the way to start? And then weed the lawn? Can I do it in small chunks (like a couple of hours a day) or do we need to blitz it as quick as possible to stop weeds etc coming back?

We only have basic garden tools so I'd need to buy/hire a strimmer etc.

I do want to dig out borders but first I think I need to make it usable overall IYSWIM.

My DH was suggesting just getting a mini digger and digging the whole thing up, then putting turf down. That seems a bit drastic to me but I would appreciate any thoughts!

Is it doable or do we need to get the professionals involved?!

TIA

Interesting question. What do you think the garden was like before you had it?

If fairly basic - mostly lawn, hedges, one or two small beds, I'd be inclined to your DH's approach.

If there are bigger beds and borders, I'd try yours. So, strim the grass and start mowing regularly and have a good look. There may be many plants hidden amongst the weeds that should be there and, as you start weeding, you may find treasures Planting a big garden will be pricey if you start completely from scratch and bigger overgrown shrubs are often recoverable and will give maturity to the garden.

Good luck!

Thanks cwg

We've just moved in a week ago - and the people who had it before us had been here 20+ years. I think they must have mowed the grass a bit but there aren't really any plants other than maybe 4-5 straggly shrubs. But yes as you say they could come back with a bit of TLC couldn't they?

In answer to your question, there aren't really any beds/borders to speak of - it's all just grass/weeds really. And some paved areas/path which we want to get rid of (and which are also full of weeds!).

Hmm. Maybe the digger is the way to go!

Our garden when we moved in was a cottage garden, totally not my style! It was also incredibly overgrown as the lady 'only' had a gardener for 1 day a week :/
It really would have been a full time job weeding, deadheading and cutting the grass/hedges so we took everything out. There we're loads of usable plants so neighbours helped themselves, I then got a rotavator (spelling?!) and levelled it and turfed. Now after 2 years as I'm getting used to where the sun is and how we want to use the garden am adding my own beds filled with plants. My biggest issue is blummin bulbs - we clearly didn't dig deep enough because the buggers are still coming up!
We also used Green Thumb for the first 18 months to get the turf that was there in good condition.
I'd say rip out the shrubs, strim back all the brambles so it looks presentable and slow time dig out where its bad. They are persistent weeds so digger may cut through it but you'd either have to dispose of the mud (skips = expensive) because if you used a digger to just churn it all up you'd have all the weeds come back, but more so as the roots would be chopped into a billion pieces.
Do it a small bit at a time, get rid of the weeds/roots and put turf or grass seed down as you go

Thos is a serious answer...you need goats.
The eat everything and tear it up by the roots so the plant is dead. Forever.
See if there are any online. The goats co e for about a week. Eat their. Leave lots of manure and you have a lank slate.
I'm serious

If you have a lot of weeds in the grass, then I agree with your DH - get it grubbed up and relay some nice new turf. However, bear in mind that you shouldn't really walk around on it for about 6 weeks ... so if you want to do other stuff to your garden I would do that last.

As for the brambles - OMG those things are bastards. You have to dig out the whole root otherwise they come back.

In all honesty, if you can afford it, I'd get a team of gardeners to come in and clear it all out for you - all the weeds and invasive plants and brambles and everything. Then a load of top soil and new grass. We did that when we bought out house and had a very neglected garden. it was drastic and not cheap, but five years on I can you it was worth every penny!

@lolaflores Who knew you could hire goats!!! I've just googled it, what a fab idea.

Yea! No poisons. No back breaking work and lots of poo for your garden
How much does it cost?

I'm intrigued by the notion of a goat.

Wow, lola!! I've not heard of that before, but it sounds interesting [grin and a really green solution to the problem! In desperation, I've used glyphosate one or twice in the past but, like lots of folk, am very perturbed at the sad state of the planet, and that really is a different approach. At one point, our local allotments had a carthorse helping to clear overgrown plots, so I believe you.

Definitely worth investing in a mini digger. Otherwise you will do hours of back breaking work only for the weeds and brambles to reappear in your new lawn and flower beds. They will come back with a vengeance because, as you hand dig , you will break up the roots and the weeds and bramble and those little bastard bits will go “yippee, lots of new soil for us all to play in”.

Once it is cleared leave it for a couple of weeks to see what reappears and either treat with weed and bramble killer or lay down a strong membrane. Time and money spent at this early stage will save you a fortune in the long run.

I think its more in the US, but I've just seen two nanny goats for sale, £40 on gumtree!!! Unfortunately I'm nowhere near Somerset and my garden is tiny. :(

Thanks so much for all your replies!

I love the goat idea! I Googled but the only goats I could find were goat who appear in films/TV - there was a goat rental site but sadly for me it was in the US.

It's starting to sound like the digger is the way to go, but I am a bit worried about redistributing the weeds that way.

I've attached some pics - part of the lawn is ok but a lot of it is v brambly

Second pic

Maybe I'll create my own goat herd. In my tiny London garden
Goat millionaire

lola you should! There's clearly a gap in the market.

Before you do anything with a digger, what is it you want to use the garden for?

You really need to design it in advance, and prepare the ground to accommodate the design, before you buy a digger. And have the time after the digger has been to do something with it. Otherwise you hire a digger, end up with a huge pile of scraped off weedy soil, and whilst you faff about trying to get rid of that, the weeds all grow back.

The weekend after we bought this place, we hired a rotavator, rotavated the grass, bought a load of long logs to map out the beds, bought weed fabric for the paths, ordered 2 tonnes of woodchip and barrowed that onto the paths edged by the logs. We did all that over an Easter weekend. Luckily I had a company car/nissan navara which meant that I could go to the woodchip people, get a tonne bag winched onto the back and then we shovelled it into the brown wheelie bin to barrow it to the garden. The weekend after, we were planting out. We had veg beds in the middle and borders on the edge. We've changed the actual layout many times since but the initial basic design of veg beds, borders and walk way through the garden hasn't changed since we started. That was 11 years ago.

You have to start with the end in mind, so many gardens get left once the first heavy work is done. And you need to know what you are after and when you are after it.

Goats would be OK but pigs would be better.
Those fuckers would root every thing out.
When they’ve cleared it they would be lovely with apple sauce, win win.

sackrifice thank you, yes - that's a good point about what we want it to be in the longer term. I have a vague idea of what I want but haven't really thought about it in too much detail because... well, I'm a bit scared of the challenge tbh!!

It sounds like you made brilliant progress with yours, really appreciate your ideas. I feel like I'm a bit in the dark and don't really know how to go forward... I just panic whenever I look out there!

I think it depends how much money you have to throw at it and how quickly you want it sorted .... if you’ve got the money, razing it and returning is probably the way to go but it is the expensive option

Otherwise I’d probably try to get to the bottom of what you’ve actually got there before making any longer term decisions - as you’ve said above, cut the ‘grass’ treat it with a weed and feed and keep it cropped TIL it starts to sort itself out. Then clear the brambles and weeds around the edges and see what plants you have - in the pictures above it looks like a rhododendron, what was else is lurking underneath the weeds?

Returfing not returning 😳

You are right about the redistribution. That is why it is essential to wait a couple of weeks then treat or lay the membrane, I think that looking at a blank canvas, once the garden is cleared is much easier than when then brambles and weeds cloud your vision.

This is a slow process. I would not expect you to accomplish a new garden quickly. It is important to take your time, walk around it, see where the sun settles etc. Sit in different parts for morning and evening. Get a cheap can do spray paint and mark out some areas for your plant beds, Barbi , sun chairs and tables.

Could you show a picture of the whole garden? From upstairs, to give posters a sense of size and what could be done?

I feel like I'm a bit in the dark and don't really know how to go forward... I just panic whenever I look out there

My suggestion would be first to draw it out on paper. Think about which way the garden faces. Where does the sun hit? What is the drainage like? Does it get really wet and take ages to dry off after a storm? Is it sandy and drains away fast in which case it will be much easier to dig and you'd be better off spending your cash on soil improvers. Is it clay in which case you might struggle to get a lawn if you do it yourself in which case spend the cash on some turf where you want it. Do you enjoy mowing (I do I love it) if not why put alot of grass down at all? Do you love flowers in which case use your cash to put raised beds in and put the soil improvers just where you need it.

I'd go out, put some really thick gardening gloves on and after the next heavy rain, go and dig out the brambles and put them in the garden waste bin. Then once the brambles are (or mostly) out see what you already have and what you can live with.

Much excellent advice above. Another tip I've found very useful is to consider the STYLE of garden you like. I'm an old gimmer and would leaf through books or mags and make a note of what really appeals. These days, of course, there's lots available online.

As others have said, it also helps to understand your soil type and so on, but if you have a particular style you love, you can tweak things in various ways to achieve the look you want.

Thank you all for your comments. Yes good idea to do a bit more planning first - and looking out from upstairs was good too - I realised the paved area takes up more of the space than I'd thought. (Which is ok as we were always going to break that up anyway.)

I agree it was never going to happen quickly - I think what's floored me is that I was thinking I'd be able to just start digging borders/planting/raised beds etc - but there is a lot to do to even get to that stage!! I told you I was naive!

Also I've just ordered a book called Old Garden New Gardener which sounds like it will be v useful...

I'm trying to post a photo from upstairs but it won't let me for some reason... Will try again later.