Some of the clients I meet often request a ‘low maintenance’ garden space because they lead busy lives, are juggling too many work/home commitments and are overwhelmed with how to manage their garden spaces. It has taken me a while to get my home gardening hacks fine tuned to relinquish more time to spend how I want it, albeit, doing more gardening at the plot …
I do see many gardens designed and landscaped with the obvious go-to ideas for a ‘low maintenance’ garden… smaller borders so less plants to worry about; less soil for weeds to take hold; raised beds for a more contained [and again smaller] border space; increased lawn and very often no lawn at all but artificial grass installed along with larger hard-landscaped patios. I’ve even seen plastic plants planted in front gardens.
Our gardens could be our saviour mentally, physically and environmentally and I do believe that doing some good old gardening is achievable even in our time-restricted lives. There are ways to help a garden become easier to manage without creating sterile or nature-deficient spaces. There are lots of informative tips out there to help the non-gardeners and time-restricted to be able to get hands on in their own space. Check out Laetitia Maklouf’s five minute garden approach.
We all know that spending time outside, including in our gardens, really is good for us. It does improve our mental health, it can keep us active, connect us to nature, give us a sense of achievement, responsibility, teach commitment and patience. Ten [or five] minutes weeding the border or clipping the hedge can sneakily put us outdoors amidst something natural. I love that.
Good gardening also happens to be beneficial for our planet too. Creating spaces in our back yards that seek to enhance local wildlife by creating different habitats is something a lot of us have the opportunity to do… and we can still integrate our outdoor dining areas to be able to relax, eat and cook alfresco if we want to do so.
If you are lucky enough to be able to have a look at re-doing aspects of your garden then do think about the following ideas to help keep maintenance down but also keeping/creating habitats for a range of pollinating insects and birds.
Reduce your mowing. Imagine a mown circle within your lawn area. Everyone loves a circle. It will create a crisp contrast to the longer un-mown areas so will still create an illusion of 'neatness’ within an albeit wilder outer. You can also mow a pathway to the circle if you have a more rectangular or mis-shapen lawn. Mow a pathway around the outer so you can access your borders too. If you have the budget you could think about replacing those un-mown parts with wildflower seed or turf [latter gives you quicker results and less initial maintenance].
Reduce your lawn. Caring for your lawn is actually very time consuming and costly… especially if you add in all the ‘traditional’ maintenance aspects such as fertilisers, moss killers, aeration, scarifying, over seeding and regular edging to keep it looking pristine. Biodiversity wise they are not that great either so reducing your lawn area could work for you.
Gravel garden. Replacing some of your lawn [for example] with a gravel garden will help to increase the biodiversity of your space. You will be replacing a monoculture with a much diverser range of plants and you will be reducing your weeding by covering an expanse of bare soil. Do plant lots of small shrubs, perennials and grasses.
Groundcover and perennial plants. The more plants in a border the more chance you have of covering your soil to a point where little or no weeds will take hold. This is the approach I take with my own garden. Groundcover plants are really useful as they will provide dense growth that will spread. Try Persicaria affinis, Epimediums, hardy geraniums [go for the longer flowering varieties like Rozanne or Dreamland for a not so vigorous option] and Betonica officinalis ['Hummelo' is one I use often].
Steel edging. These are simple to install and really do help to keep your lawn separate from your borders. They are positioned so the edge is flush to the lawn so that a lawn mower can go over and help to reduce the time you need to keep your edges trimmed.
