In article ,
says...
I have rather a large garden. One section about 25x25 yards is rough
grass. Until now I have cut it regularly, which is rather tiring
especially as there are a number of trees around which I keep the area
free of grass and weeds. Now the time has come when I am unable to mow
it, what will happen if I leave it wild? Will it become infested with
nettles and thistles, or just an attractive collection of various
"weeds"? At the moment there are plenty of interesting flowers growing,
however if it became thistle and nettle infested it may well upset my
neighbours. Is there an easy and acceptable solution please? I cannot
afford to have someone to come in every week or so to cut it.

You could raise and plant all over it a selection of grassland weeds
include yellow rattle as it help reduce the grasses vigour, you will
still need to cut it at certain times of year or it will return to scrub
and the work of cutting can be quite heavy,
I left my Orchard un mown as meadow for a few years and kept a log of
hours spent and found at the end of my trial that I spent virtually the
same time on not cutting but Haymaking in August as I had on fortnightly
cutting and it made the area difficult to use so I abandoned the idea.
Fergus Garret at Great Dixter reckons its the most labour intensive part
of the gardens the wild flower meadows.
So as a labour saving measure it wont work, although it may well look
wonderful
How about planting trees with bulbs under, the grass will soon give up as
the canopy knits together.
--
Charlie Pridham, Gardening in Cornwall
www.roselandhouse.co.uk
Holders of national collections of Clematis viticella cultivars and
Lapageria rosea