Overgrown flower beds and I'm a beginner!

[Whereohwhereohwhere]

We are fortunate to have a lovely and well established garden. Sadly due to some health concerns it's been very neglected over the last few years. I'm an absolute novice with gardening but want to make small steps to make it tidy again. The borders are a mix of weeds, trees, shrubs and the occasional plant. I just don't know where to begin. Can anyone recommend and resources for a keen novice to guide me to make this manageable?

Instagram might help, or a website like this one. https://www.budgetdumpster.com/blog/how-to-redo-flower-bed

I don’t have a massive garden The garden was literally full of weeds including growing through slabs, litter, and a dead tree, the ground was uneven and grass was a mess, all clumpy. There were stones down one side and weeds growing through. I made a list of tasks I needed to do over time to get it sorted. I spent a long time shovelling it into bags then gave it away. I then needed to pull out a lot of plastic lining, I kept unearthing more layers under several layers of soil. it took me so long that because I’d lifted off the plastic more weeds appeared creating more jobs for me.
I’ve had to dig out the boarders myself. My garden is only small so I’m using it to grow vegetables and don’t fancy a lawn so I’m covering it all up with raised beds and a vegetable patch apart from a grass path around it.
I don’t know the size of your garden, But even if it’s small, unless you’re willing to pay someone to do it all. It will probably be years of back breaking work. You need to create a list. Start with removing any litter, then get gardening gloves and start pulling out weeds. And so on

Any shrubs which don’t have flowers at the moment can be cut back now. You can cut out completely to the ground up to a third of the older branches. Otherwise, cut out any dead wood and branches which are crossing another branch, and cut back everything else. Look on the RHS website for good pruning guides.

As to the plants, use your judgement. If you’re not sure what they are, leave them until they flower. Don’t worry about the purely artificial distinction between “plants” and “weeds”. Grow what you like and be happy to clear out things you don’t like.

I certainly wouldn’t be “re-doing” borders before I knew what was there. And I don’t think it will be “years of back breaking work”. Don’t try to do it all at once, start on a small area and do it completely, then keep it ticking over. Having a small area looking good will keep you motivated for the rest.

you can buy cheap bedding plants for splashes of colour in bare bits while you get your ideas together

A tip - keeping the edges of the lawn trimmed makes everything look tidier.

The OP describes a well established garden with trees (plural, which suggests more than one tree, trees are big), shrubs (which are also big), and weeds, and the garden hasn’t been looked after in years. So I imagine it will take a long time to sort and a lot of physical effort

As Meredint says, keeping the lawn neat and tidy disguises a multitude of sins elsewhere!

My advice would be 'little and often' and to start with, remove only those plants which you know to be weeds and anything that is blindingly obviously dead as a dodo. Bide your time with all the rest, as at this time of year it is particularly difficult to identify anything. As soon as things wake up in spring, you can start to find out what it all is, and then learn what to do with it if you want to keep it, or get rid. That way, you can wait until things flower and identify them.

There are plant apps around, but they can be staggeringly wrong sometimes. The best way to learn is to go to garden centres, walk round, and look at everything. You will start to recognise things you already have and you can then put a name to them and read the label for care instructions.😂

I know. It won’t be quick, but it will be rewarding in not too long, and unless the whole area is covered with roots to be dug out, or large stones to be dug out, it won’t be back-breaking. If the trees are big, she won’t be dealing with them herself.

it’s been neglected,but she can still identify the borders. So it’s not that bad.

I follow good advice I overheard - take a hedge-cutter (smaller, shorter, compact versions available e.g. from B&Q) and walk right along the border cutting level at a height of about 4 or 5 inches, or even closer and then just rake it hard and get all the residue out. It’s quick, it looks neat and then re-grows well.

Pruning back all the shrubs is a lot of effort in year 1, but you only have to do it once. DH and I are v much looking forward to this year (we are on year 2) without the insane pruning.

If there are just too many trees, the garden may be happier without them. I had an v overgrown garden with too many trees - they take all the water and nutrients, so the plants you do want can't grow and you get millions of weeds instead. Best thing we did was get a tree surgeon in and remove half our trees.

Any area that looks too bad, I just cut down to the ground and covered in weedproof membrane and left for the year. I am quietly confident I've killed my feral snowberry doing this.

In terms of weeds, I am probably too picky to be a proper gardener, but over the course of a year I got a lot better at weed identification and being prepared to leave things alone.

Mulch everywhere that you have weeded immediately - it makes a massive difference in the amount of weeding. I didn't get round to one area and felt extremely bitter when I was weeding the second time and it was just as bad as the first.

Really appreciate all these comments and wise words. Thank you. Definitely some food for thought and is certainly going to keep me busy.

Winter is a good time to cut back overgrown shrubs - if anything flowers in early spring then you might not get flowers this year, but in general they respond well.

Do you have any friends into gardening? If you’re not sure what might be weeds then they can advise on the things that you really want to get rid of (brambles, nettles, young self-seeding sycamore trees, that kind of thing!)