How to deal with an overgrown garden?

LibrisLycan

I've just inherited a very neglected garden, full of brambles, buddleia, and other weeds, and is very overgrown and full of rubbish as well. I've ordered some weedkiller, ammonium sulfamate, after reading about it on the net.

I'm worried if I spray all over the garden it could travel through to the neighbors gardens, I don't want that. Is it best to cut the brambles back as much as possible and put weedkiller onto the stumps?

Any other advice for dealing with this garden?

I have UPDATED questions in post 12, thank you

I_have_spoken

Are you in UK? Only ask as ammonium sulfamate has been banned as a weedkiller for the general public to use since 2008

theoretica

I would rather deal with cutting out and removing a live bramble than a dead one covered in weed killer. My personal method would be to cut and maybe dig out things I didn't want and then very targetted weed killer. This would also let you discover and keep any good plants.

lessonlearned

As above.

Don't use weed killer as blanket coverage. Cut back brambles and then dig out. Pull out easy weeds first, then use targeted weed killer to remove the difficult ones such as dandelions, any large areas of couch grass.. Cut back overgrown shrubs, prune trees - when the time is right. Then you'll be able to see what you've got.

Go easy, you dont know what's underneath all those weeds and overgrowth. I once bought a house that had been empty for three years, before that the elderly couple had not been unable to maintain the garden.

Underneath that jungle was a very pretty garden just waiting to be reclaimed. It had some very fine specimen plants which would have been very expensive to replace.

Stumps from trees and shrubs will need to,be injected. This is best done in the autumn when the sap dies down so that the poison can go into the roots. Allow a good six months for the roots to die. A large stump may need more than one treatment.

Be careful when using weedkillers. Wear gloves and a mask when spraying.

Davesnave

I_have_spoken wrote: »

Are you in UK? Only ask as ammonium sulfamate has been banned as a weedkiller for the general public to use since 2008

That's the American spelling. Even on ebay it's 'sulphamate,' so OP may be in the US. We also have 'neighbors,' though that may just be Mr Gates having his end away with our language again.

Anyway, it might be banned as a weedkiller, but it's sold as a compost accelerator....and one might 'accidentally' drop some on the way to the compost heap, I suppose.

If the EU bans something, it doesn't mean it's more dangerous than the alternatives. In the case of ammonium sulphamate, it was as close to an environmentally safe weedkiller as you're likely to get, but no one was going to make big bucks from it and the makers of products using it didn't wish to go through animal testing with it either, so it's licence lapsed.

It was never cheap, but then, neither are the alternatives if you're fighting horsetail or knotweed.

silverwhistle

If you have good fences borrow a couple of pigs for a few days..

mandragora_2

Flame thrower?

Davesnave

LibrisLycan wrote: »

Any other advice for dealing with this garden?

The others might be correct and there could be good plants still lurking there.

OTOH, not all gardens are like that. I inherited a very large and unruly garden, but it didn't take too long to establish there was little worth saving.

Digging up 1/2 an acre of couch grass and bramble really isn't sensible, or any sort of fun, so a chemical means of dealing with it was the most efficient strategy. Even then,I could not gain control over it in a single season. Eventually there was digging, and there still is, because the seeds and remnants still fight back, but shading with dense planting works best now.

Spraying need not affect neighbours if you do it on a calm day and never raise your sprayer far above the surface. Most weedkillers are now systemic and translocate from the leaves, so it's a good idea to cut plants like bramble and buddleia hard back, then leave them to re-grow a bit before spraying. That way, your neighbours stay safe and you treat the plants via their young leaves, which are more receptive.

I_have_spoken

one might 'accidentally' drop some on the way to the compost heap, I suppose.

I fear that's exactly what could happen to some of the 1kg bag I've just bought off t'bay. Whoops!

UnluckyT

i would try to cut back/pull out as much as you can and see what you have under it all.
if you have persistant bits of root, you could always try the poison or the grit from 1 of the bins meant for snow.

UnluckyT

or a bonfire of the rubbish cleared on roots/persistent unwanted bits.
clearly safely located away from anything you dont want burnt.