AIBU to complain about DH's gardening obsessions.

Readymeals the honeysuckle should grow back.

We had one which didn't thrive very well because it was in the wrong spot so I dug it up and planted it in the hedge where it has been chopped back once a year, otherwise neglected Now I see the stems waving around above the hedge but I think our neighbours behind us will get the benefit of the flowers!

DH gets nervous when he sees me with the secateurs or long handled shears.
He said he'd clipped back the Montana, but I'm going to take another look at it.

About ten years ago I grew tired of my neighbours 8ft high Leylandii hedge protruding over my fence. I carefully cut it back to fence level. I was then faced with a view of ugly bare branches for many years.
It has finally grown back in, and my neighbour makes sure that it stays within his boundaries now.
I’m not a very knowledgable gardener, and never know which of my clematis need pruning in Spring, and which in Summer, but they seem to survive my ministrations. My DH took little interest in the garden. He would heave pots around or run the mower over the grass, if pressed, but that was his limit
I am looking forward to Thursday, when my mini-forest goes to a new home. I enthusiastically planted lots of conkers in pots two years ago, and have been wondering what to do with the resulting saplings, which are now 2ft tall. A message on our local chat site has resulted in a request for all of them. Their gardening group is going to plant them on a local site, and tend them while they settle in. I love the thought that, long after I am gone, there will be 14 beautiful horse-chestnut trees for the local people to enjoy.

I am serious about this, hide every pair of shears, loppers etc, that was what I had to resort to when I came home one day to find not one branch or leaf on my beautiful twisted willow, just a trunk!?

My late husband loved being in our large garden morning noon and night, he didn’t plant anything (nor did I, an ex city girl with a brown thumb not a green finger?) but liked keeping it tidy. Now it’s a bit out of hand even with a fortnightly gardener to mow the lawn and keep the front tidy.
But I have seen some plants (weeds?) never seen before and like the odd daisy on the lawn.
What I would give to see my darling husband on his knees pulling out the moss he hated on the lawn?

I'm having absolute heeby-jeebies (sp?) reading these tales of ultra-pruning and ivy-clearing. Does no-one consider the birds?

Yes, foxgloves are poisonous but so are lots of others. As for cats -the worst is lilies. Their pollen can be deadly to cats if they rub against it and lick their fur. I'm pretty sure that's what killed my lovely cat Lupin many years ago. Haven't had the damn plants in my garden ever since.

Please can you send him around to our house. My garden is closing in on me and in dire need of a short, back and sides.

We have a small garden which is stuffed with plants so I need to be a very brutal pruner but, as others have said, it is important to prune at the right time or you will lose your flowers for a year.
Its amazing how many people do fiddle about cutting shrubs into rounded shapes rather than getting in there and doing it properly. It really isn't any good to snip round the outside of shrubs to make them a pretty shape, you need to cut out whole branches or shoots to reduce the overall bulk of the plant.
DH is great when it comes to fiddly clipping so does the little hedges rather than being let lose on any real pruning!

This is an alarming experience when you have nurtured shrubs - I have also been close to tears when surveying what a 'helpful ' person has done to my garden. I like plants to look natural and not trimmed into silly shapes that have nothing to do with the hand of nature. However - like a bad haircut, there is always hope, and the shrubs will grow again. As long as your helpful gardener hasn't tinkered with the roots, they mostly spring back quite soon.

DH does the mowing, growing, digging and planting and he's very good at it, our poppies and foxgloves are stunning this year. But I'm the queen of the pruners, clippers and tree loppers. If I'm not sure when/how to prune something I Google it. Each Spring I hard prune the roses, it looks brutal but they always benefit from it. We have a Hazel hedge on one side of our garden which was 25 feet tall when we moved in, after battling with it for several years, last year I cut it down to just 2 feet tall. It's now about 5 feet and really lovely, if it gets too outwardly bushy I just take off the offending branches. The only plants I do struggle with are a dark pink Clematis Montana which grows across the front of the house and meets up with a Virginia creeper, the two of them are intent on covering the guttering and the roof. I don't like heights so next year we'll have to get someone to tame them for us, but I don't want them pruned too much they're so beautiful. Most plants and shrubs will recover from excessive pruning given time and so long as they have a healthy root system. And this year everything seems to be blooming better than ever, perhaps it's the reduced polution of the last few months.

My best/worst tale of pruning shrubs is that of a male rel who moved into a house with his wife, with a garden which gently sloped down to a river. On the left was a well-stocked herbaceous border and there was a spectacular weeping willow in the lawn.
Wife's job was to get inside the border and keep that, and the edges, looking good, her o/h's job was to mow the lawn.

And so, to facilitate this, he chopped the weeping willow to a height he could walk under it without bending or have it touch his head at all. He wasn't a particularly tall man.

Willow looked like one of those sun umbrellas that Japanese ladies have

My foxgloves are lovely this year. So many busy bees!

tattygran14 any chance of putting in a very high wall? Even inside your boundary fence if need be. Your plants would train up it beautifully and probably enjoy the warmth. I speak from experience as our neighbour, without asking, came into my garden while we were out and dug up some of my plants, so he could lay a concrete base to install a shed! If he'd asked we would have moved the plants and accommodated him somehow. Our garden is now inaccessible to anyone but us.

Yes they are looking lovely V3ra

I have a gardener, as neither hubby nor I can bend or get up and down without assistance - but I have to "nag" him to actually "weed" He will do the flower beds, but leaves all the weeds between paving stones (he says that's not gardening - he has diploma's and spent years at College etc.). If I were fitter, I would do it myself, but we have four separate areas of garden, three have lawns as well as flower beds, and we have fruit trees, and a strawberry bed too. I loved the garden when we first saw the house, and it is lovely most of the time. We have changed it quite a bit over the years and enjoy it now.

Tattygran, if a wall is difficult, get a fencing company to put in some wooden panelled fencing. You cannot see through them at all.

My Husband is a pruner and he doesn't listen when I say that's enough. I dread it every time but he isn't going to change dam it.

No don't let him get away with it men get compulsive and do not know when to stop. My husband did nothing in the house or garden before retirement. I let him loose to keep occupied to trim a tree. Now it looks a disgrace it will take years to look half decent again. I usually paint the fence but let him do it now everything around the fence is painted even though I gave him tarpaulin to cover everything. To avoid rows since lockdown I suggest a job he could do but with specific instructions. Men need instructions sorry if there are any grandads reading this but it is true.

Oh Hollysteer-how sad for you ?

Redhead56, in regard to your post-@01:30 today, I see you very much like giving your husband instructions which you state he always carries out wrongly or badly.

However, there is always one simple solution to your above perceived problem, and that would be to carry out those tasks yourself........Simples. ?

CBBL an easy way to deal with weeds in paving is to put boiling water on them. Cheap, easy and no need to bend. You see them turn black before your eyes.

Thanks*rubysong*!

Grandad1943 well I did expect this sort of response after posting so early in the morning, not being able to sleep. With an arthritic knee after working in the garden all day. I have always done the work myself with no complaint. Very heavy work too flagging bricklayering painting decorating you name it I have done it. But after hip replacement hand operations etc because of osteoarthritis it is not so simple. The jobs were not difficult just awkward for me. My husband does offer to help he willingly admits I have saved a fortune in both house and garden. What is wrong with instructions if someone is not naturally used to DIY?

Prunes everything too much
Gets paint everywhere

Oh dear, that sounds like me
I've just checked again and yes, I am a woman.