On 08/07/2014 13:09, Louise89 wrote:
This askes more questions ......
Why were the bushes cut down so drastically?
My friend was supposed to cut them back for me as they were getting
wild, he went too far and i ended up with branhes rather than bushes.

Roses will normally respond to a severe pruning by throwing up new
vigorous branches fairly quickly. You lost their flowers this year.

Given you want rid though you will have to dig them out manually and
then deal with any suckers until the root stock gives up the ghost.

What is the problem with your 3 year old daughter relevant to
gardening?

The sharp thorny branches are about the same height as her, meaning I
cant let her in the garden to play properly because she could really
hurt herself.

Rose thorn scratches hurt enough to discourage going too near them a
second time. Same with nettles they teach respect. More important is to
check that you don't actually have something deadly poisonous about.

Why are you killing the plants?

The state of them now, i dont want to leave them as they are for the
rest of the summer and wait for them to grow back. Also as a full time,
working, single parent and uni student, I dont have much free time to
maintain a garden so something smaller with less pruning would suit me
better.

Digging them out is the way forward. But you have basically just made a
much larger mess of dead stuff and a lot of work for yourself.

What do you want in their place?

See above.

??? You haven't said what you want beyond a smaller garden and I don't
see how you can achieve that without a lot of hard landscaping effort.

Low maintenance gardens require a very high input to set them up in the
first place to prepare the ground get it weed free and then planting
stuff through weed proof membrane. Heathers, strawberries, raspberries
and dogwoods would be things you might want to try.

Nasturtiums and calendula grow pretty fast from seed. Bit late now to
grow sunflowers but they are fun for a small child growing very fast.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown