Garden - reducing the work

Also the roots come over into my flower beds

We moved to a bungalow but it has quite a large back garden. We have just had a large patio laid right across the back which has cut down the lawn area considerably. I am digging a shrub border along one side to add some colour and soften the look. We will have an outdoor sofa and table next summer and also a table and chairs. Some pots of summer flowers are easy too. I'm glad we did it, looks great too.

I would think about putting decorative stones down,lots of choice and colours and easy to maintain.

I’ve got pots for colour which I keep small conifers and a touch of Ivy in them just add winter pansies and in summer add whatever is colourful, I’ve invested in 4 beautiful large contemporary statues and a very small patch of grass for the dog. Pretty painted fences, it’s low maintenance because husband puts pots on a table for me to change the plants and he cuts the small patch of grass which literally takes 10 minutes. Added 4 nice lanterns which are stuck in 4 of the pots and it looks pretty, peaceful (shame the neighbours are noisy) but it’s easy to manage and calm

I want to get rid of my lawn eventually and have a mix of cobbles and gravel with low-growing ground cover. Hardy perennials come back each year without much effort. I never put in bedding plants as they're 'here today gone tomorrow' so not worth the effort.

I rarely dig unless I'm planting something new. I'm a lazy gardener - I enjoy looking at it but no longer wish to put in the effort.

We have just got our front garden block paved. it means we can parks both cars on the driveway and not in the road as can visitors. No weeding and no cutting grass which was playing havoc with my back. We have the back garden fairly up together with little weeding and just grass to cut. Maybe this year we can sit and enjoy it rather than worrying about getting it all done

We re-landscaped our last garden for just this reason. It was quite expensive to do but meant that the garden always looked lovely with relatively little effort.
We had raised beds with wide walls at the edges so that I could sit and weed them easily, and replaced the grass with gravel. If gravel is laid properly it will have a compacted base and then landscaping fabric underneath it so weeds can't grow well but rain can still soak through. A quick going over with a rake will pull weeds out and if you do it often enough the weeds are tiny and just shrivel away. Of course you can choose to grow plants in the gravel if that is the kind of garden that you like.
I chose to have some beds for herbaceous plants which obviously could need weeding, but you can plant through landscaping fabric and put bark or other mulch on top - you need to use the coarser bark not the composted stuff which can support weed growth. We didn't use the fabric and found that there were few weeds which we kept down with a long-handled hoe.
You can grow many plants up walls which makes the garden look lush and green but doesn't need much flower bed underneath to grow from.
Sadly we no longer have that garden and I really miss it.

pat9

Hetty58 your neighbour's hedge should not be higher than 2 metres. I have them on both sides - one at the front and one at the back and it annoys me that I have to trim other people's hedges!

This is absolutely true and they are obliged by law to keep the height down

Had a look at finances a few months ago and now have a gardener come every couple weeks. £15 a hour and well worth it. He came two weeks ago for 3 hours and did what would have taken me 3 days to do. He's doing the heavier and more back breaking work.

Lighter battery lawn mower for the grass with evergreen shrubs in borders. Will petrol mowers be banned? They do produce a lot of emissions. Yes shrubs need trimming but usually not every year and only if a desired shape is wanted. A hedge trimmer/shears does the job in minutes. Plant spring and summer flowering bulbs, amongst the shrubs for variation and colour. I have a fair sized area of grasses all different sizes and colours. You don't need to trim them every year although some of the experts say you should, I don't as I love seeing the sway of the tall ones even in the winter. Pots are lovely but oh so much work and can be heavy for moving. Good luck, sure you will find a solution you will enjoy.

My mum had her back garden paved with just a few gaps where she had shrubs planted. She put in lots of plants in lots around the garden . This arrangement was perfect for her and worked very well. Very little weeding, just a small amount of pruning and then watering the plants and that was allege had to do to maintain her garden and she loved it.

Froglady

My mum had her back garden paved with just a few gaps where she had shrubs planted. She put in lots of plants in lots around the garden . This arrangement was perfect for her and worked very well. Very little weeding, just a small amount of pruning and then watering the plants and that was allege had to do to maintain her garden and she loved it.

That was supposed to read lots of plants in pots.

DillytheGardener I found her through friends as she already had a clientele but over the years we have found people from business cards in local shops and even a friend of our car mechanic who did a great, and affordable job halving the height of a hedge.
When DH was alive, he was a bit sensitive about asking another man to come and do what he wished he could do and I find this attitude prevails among several older folk but if I had someone to "help me" that was OK.
Facebook local residents forum is full of recommendations or otherwise for everything under the sun.

I looked in the local area before we had hard standing installed for our cars instead of a front garden (narrow road with only a few places to park). I realised I had room for 2 largish raised beds as well as some pots - still room for 3 cars. Our house isn’t huge and the garden was small - it just took some planning. However I have to live longer than OH because he’s itching to dig up my cottage garden at the back and install paving or, even worse, fake grass. Take your time planning and look what others have done for ideas.

This might not be the answer for you but it certainly helped me overcome this problem because in my late 60’s I had the same issues .....sore back and achy hips when I started spring gardening.

So I started attending seniors yoga sessions ....an hour of only slow stretching twice a week, and I’ve kept it up now for several years. It has minimized so many of my aches and pains in all parts of my body and gardening can still be an enjoyable pastime in my life without so many of those miserable aches and pains.

If your soil is suitable then rhododendrons and camellias don’t require a lot of work. Just deadheading.
My problem is the leaves and acorns from four oak trees, only one of which is mine. I really don’t see a low maintenance way round that. The leaves are bad enough but the acorns are very very heavy and on my only paved area act like ball bearings. I’m always terrified the delivery people will slip on them and hurt themselves. Very best of luck with you quest - it would be lovely to see a photograph of what you end up with!

I'm with Muse, but my area is small because I downsized a decade ago.If you can find someone young and strong to come in for an hour a week at £15, it's well worth it. If you have a local college with an appropriate dept, contact them, or just word of mouth, as you want someone you can trust. You can do the choosing, potting etc (the fun stuff), they mow the lawn and weed awkward bits. I have pots I water daily, and I throw out or prune back the contents once a year

I dream of two things: a robot lawn mower and paving the entire front garden, but I can't afford either.

I might just manage the robot lawn mower this year, if there is a good cheap offer.

We have cut our hedges down quite a bit, and I want a little more off them so we can cut them without having to stand on a ladder.

Apart from that, I tell everyone I meet that it is good for the environment, especially insect life to let the weeds grow.

The idea of slabs and concrete goes against the grain with me - better to turn and area over to wilderness for wild life than slab it over.

Have a patio to sit on, but anywhere else you could reduce the mowing by simply letting the grass grow - or cut it down and add wild flower seeds or wild flower turf.

Lawn with shrubs and trees is hardly any work at all, I have a gardener to cut the lawn every other week in Summer.
The only "gardening" I do, are the pots and window boxes.

Thank you everyone, so many ideas.
I like grass, it sets off the flowers beautifully and as OH considers this his job, and we have a lightweight Flymo, that is not an issue right now. The beds have been well nourished with organic material since 1989. There are so many bulbs which pop up at random times during the year starting with the snowdrops and ending with the nerines. The 6ft high fencing in the back garden is clothed in clematis, jasmine, honeysuckle and roses.
This is a corner site so the back garden is triangular. Quite unusual.
We won’t be moving as we have future proofed the house and have a walk in shower room downstairs together with the kitchen, living room and the dining room is now our guest bedroom. If we can’t make the stairs we shall simply live downstairs.
We have a driveway for 2/3 cars so no need for additional parking as we now have one car.
I used to have a rose bed bordering the front but turned it into a wildflower meadow about 10 years ago. It has got out of control (though it looks lovely during the growing season) with some patches of rampant grass. I have thought of introducing yellow rattle but have no idea how long it would be before I saw any effect.
I am just rambling now. I shall read your suggestions again and again before making any major changes. Thank you so much for all the suggestions.

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

How about replacing some of the grass lawn with a chamomile lawn, or thyme, or mint? Better for the environment than slabs, low maintenance, and depending on what you plant may give some colour and scent when you walk on it. It could be done piecemeal too, just reducing the lawn a bit each year.

A young-ish couple took over my mums large garden and used it like an allotment. She didn't charge them but they always supplied her with fruit, veg and a few flowers, it looked lovely and she could sit and have a chat with them (and they let us know if she wasn't up and about) Everyone was happy.

mrsba I love it!
We (a group of us in our town) are presently trying to get more people to do this kind of thing.
How did your mum find the couple?
There is a scheme running in Edinburgh and I am sure in other towns and cities too. It was in response to the lack of allotments and a long waiting list while others had little interest in gardening or lack of time and energy.
www.edinburghgardenpartners.org.uk/getinvolved