Half an acre of neglected lawn

[Tooearlyforsquats]

We’re hoping to buy our dream house which currently looks like Miss Havisham just left it.

We’re going to have to concentrate money and professional resources on the house itself, plus removing sycamores, conifers and other wildly overgrown shrubs.

How do I resuscitate the lawn? Currently shaggy L shaped meadow. Current house we have two medium sized lawns front and back that a man comes and does for £25 ... I expect it would be a hundred a time if I paid for the new house’s lawn.

Should I just buy a ride on and be done with it?? In ireland so needs done every two weeks April- late Oct. aiming for relaxed, nature friendly, children running about kind of vibe, not lawn bowls!

Don't.

Close cut lawns are great and often necessary in small gardens.
In large gardens, they look rough if they are not flat, and if they are are flat they look like you're trying to make a bowling green. They take huge amounts of expensive and fossil fueled upkeep.

And, this expensive lawn is green concrete as far as wildlife is concerned.

Mow the edges, and areas close by house, and let the rest grow longer, adding wildflowers to make a meadow. Then mow paths into the longer meadow grass.
Result?
if the edge paths are kept mowed neat, it will look kempt, for minimal input. The DC will have winding paths and 'secret' play clearings, where they'll see numerous butterflies and other wildlife.

Robot Lawn mower is the job for that size of a lawn :)

Now you'll need someone to come in with a ride-on to cut it just before you install, but after that, mowing the lawn is no longer a job you need to worry about.

They're pretty much the same price as a new ride-on too, in or around 2K

I'm in Ireland too, if you happen to be in the Cork area, PM me and I'll tell you where we got ours ;)

Walk round and pick up any debris, rubbish, random bricks and branches etc first.

Then go over it a few times with the blades on the mower set as high as they will go. Don't leave the clippings on it though, the light needs to get through to the lower layers.

Then gradually reduce the height of the cut. It should sort itself out that way, and you will get rid of most weeds by regular cutting.

You could always just cut paths through it, and leave some bits for wild flowers to grow.

Our local Council has introduced a "relaxed mowing"regime - allowing the grass to grow and mowing paths through it. An early result has been an increasing patch of marsh orchids.

I am definitely really interested in ultimately having more of a meadow effect, maybe with some fruit trees in it. Very committed to taking out old dying non native things and adding native trees and hedgerow.

However, right now what the kids want to do is play football and after the shitshow that is the last year for them, I’m inclined to let them for a bit.

Also. I think the grass planting might have to be changed to encourage a diverse meadow. I need to plan that properly, but the site is almost an acre, I will be doing Piet oudolf inspired planting on other bits to compromise. Also will leave verges. I guess what I’m saying is that it already has been left for a couple of years, and it is not currently an inspiring space of biodiversity, it’s a bit sad and tragic and full of overgrown versions of one of those hedging plants that developers like because they grow fast.

So. @FieldOverFence do you really think the robot ones are worth it? Can you set borders in the lawn if you wanted to leave verges?

Even the meadow bits should get cut once a year, no?

Oh and I’m in de nort so have found what looks like a great local supplier, but VERY interested to know how robot copes with Irish grass!

You can set it up to cut wherever you like really - they come along and bury a tiny wire to create the boundary of where you want it to cut, so it would be no bother to leave verges.

Local handyman/teenager/farmer once a year to cut the meadow bit, and you're sorted

The only thing it would potentially struggle with would be a lot of rocks/stones, the blades are small and that would damage them (but they're easy to change and not expensive)

The robots are a good environmental choice too - no diesel to run them and they use about as much electricity as a mobile phone

Our one is a Husquavarna (or however you spell that) and its brilliant

I don’t think there would be too many rocks or anything, it was obviously a well loved lawn at some point, just very unloved now. Brilliant, that’s the brand I was looking at, thanks so much.

We have a bigger garden (1.5acres) so a ride on was a no brainer for us and robot mowers couldn't at that point cope with that big a plot (although we are eyeing them up now)
We bought a second hand one whilst we got to grips with the plot and after a few years upgraded it as we knew by then what we wanted (this one also has a trailer) . We even managed to sell on the old one again.
I would say it takes a least a few years to get to grips with a garden especially if it needs some love so what you think you want right now may change quite considerably. We are now 7years down the line and our garden is unrecognisable (in a good way) but not necessarily anything like I thought we'd do and that includes the lawn.

Yes, @wonkylegs, I think that’s true, and as we have medium-small kids, what we want will change as they grow. The house is so bad that it will take a year to repair, in that time we will be doing a bit of sleeping beauty hacking to make the garden manageable, then as long as it’s green and healthy we’ll probably take a while to get to know the site etc. We have a strange mild microclimate where we are but it’s very rainy! We planted a lot of sustainable perennials where we are now, but it’s fascinating to see what doesn’t do well compared to where in the U.K. we lived before. I am excited!

@Tooearlyforsquats ahh yes the kids factor definitely has an impact. We now have football goals that I hadn't planned for but also a secret pathway and several dens including one in the centre of a giant bamboo patch (which we haven't managed to control, that stuff is bombproof but learn to live with and just about stop it going too far. )

Yes I can see football goals in our future! Bit muddy much of the year though.

Even the meadow bits should get cut once a year, no? Yes. But you do that when the grass is at its peak (to remove as much nutrient as possible), so you're doing it with a scythe or a strimmer.

We have quite a large grassed area to one side of our house with about 10-15 trees on. It get very mossy because of the trees and is a pain to mow.
There is a ' thing ' called no mow May ' which encourages people to leave off mowing early to help wildlife / insects. We had no mow May , June, July. By then we had mowed a few walk throughs in it .
We thought we'd cracked it in making the grass pretty stress free , in reality the grass just folded over itself , got lots of ants nests in and looked a right mess once it was mowed.

I have a ride on John Deere. Totally transformed an overgrown 3/4 plot and grass came back from stinging nettles and brambles. Couple of hours every couple of weeks spring to autumn. We keep a small section for wild flowers. That's the most labour intensive part.

I’d get a ride on (and a trailer) and save the robot for the inside

@MereDintofPandiculation

Even the meadow bits should get cut once a year, no? Yes. But you do that when the grass is at its peak (to remove as much nutrient as possible), so you're doing it with a scythe or a strimmer.

I was looking up scything workshops last night!

@RuthTopp

We have quite a large grassed area to one side of our house with about 10-15 trees on. It get very mossy because of the trees and is a pain to mow. There is a ' thing ' called no mow May ' which encourages people to leave off mowing early to help wildlife / insects. We had no mow May , June, July. By then we had mowed a few walk throughs in it . We thought we'd cracked it in making the grass pretty stress free , in reality the grass just folded over itself , got lots of ants nests in and looked a right mess once it was mowed.

The folding over sad tuffets is what it has now. Not as many ants here, but I think we’d do better with leaving a no-mow section that I scythe and plant Irish wildflower seeds in.

@5zeds

I’d get a ride on (and a trailer) and save the robot for the inside

Oh yeah, we have the robot for inside already. Switching it upstairs to get a vacuum/mop combo for downstairs ASAP! Robots for the win.

If you mow it regularly it will turn back to lawn very quickly. I go with a mulching mower so no

What’s a mulching mower? DH not the handy/ energetic type (works vvvvvvv hard and long hours in the week, travels a lot and needs weekends to relax) and I historically take too much on, plus take care of kids and also work so the robot sounds fab to me, esp as the local retailer has a fab reputation for solving problems.

Basically it’s a big ride on that minces the grass and then blasts it into the lawn. That way you don’t have to go and unload you just drive round in the lawn. I was fairly dubious but it works beautifully and I quite enjoy 15 mins of whirling around. It won’t give you a bowling green but looks smooth and well kept.

Make a wildflower meadow. Lawns are horrible for the environment.

I think the main negative is fertiliser, and weed killers and watering. I don’t think a flower meadow is very football compatible. I don’t put chemicals on my lawn and don’t water it, so it’s impact is much less and my large family have somewhere to play.