On Wed, 17 Apr 2013 23:12:17 +0100, Sacha wrote:


The more I think of this and read of the wasteland that's been created,
the more I wonder if this is a wind up. Who on earth would do that to
a well-planted garden, creating huge bare areas which allow the
neighbours to look into the house and garden where, before, they had
privacy and mature planting? I think it's a reverse posting, if you
see what I mean. Or at least, I hope it is. That scene of devastation
is pitiable. Imagine doing that to any garden and then writing about it!

I think it is, in all likelihood, not a wind up. It is what we should
have done. When we took over our current property (an executor's
sale) the garden was in a similar, if rather more overgrown state than
that depicted in the first of the OP's images. We had to cut back the
shrubbery that had seriously encroached on to the drive before we
could get in. As there was so much to do renovating the property we
decided to just cut everything back a bit and then, when we had time,
start to replant where necessary.

In retrospect this was a mistake as we have ended up with a somewhat
muddled, difficult to work with garden and we have repeatedly said
that we should have bitten the bullet and got a digger in at the
beginning to clear the majority of the shrub beds, leaving the odd
couple of specimens which would have been difficult to replace.

The advantage of the slash and burn approach is that you can then
start with a fresh canvas allowing more freedom to execute your own
design and not have take into account the stumps and remains of trees
and shrubs that have been allowed to grow out of control for many
years. I agree that it is inevitable that it will look a mess
following the destructive stage but we know that a couple of years
later we would have had a more pleasing garden if we had gone down
this route.
--
rbel