Never had a garden before!

The only thing to put in your garden requiring no maintainance would be a solid sheet of concrete, and that would need sweeping and demossing.
It is like asking for a plant which flowers all year round, has interesting foliage, doesn't drop leaves, only grows to the size you want, doesn't need water or food and will grow happily wherever it is planted. Sun, shade, dry or wet or a container.
I don't think such a plant exists.

 

Yes, definitely. I've asked my builder to give me her gardener's details, which hopefully she will do next week or the week after. I think maintenance is something I could do, I can trim the grass and snip some bushes but the bending over to plant things is beyond me. A bird table is a great idea, I would love that! Though I have been told it gets expensive to buy the food for them?

 

Given the state of the grass, do you think I need new turf? Or it what's there rescuable? It looks like a load of weeds to me and the grass there looks unhealthy and very sparse. Should I start with getting it all turned over and starting again? I like talking to strangers! I know 3 neighbours so far and none of them has done much of anything with their gardens tbh. Totally agree on finding the right person. The landlord hires a gardener to do the fronts and I thought about hiring her for the back but she turned up 4 days late to make the garden presentable after I moved in, then said she'd come back to strim the edges last week... and never showed up. I don't like that. It's unprofessional. I'm hoping a great gardener will be reliable!

 

Excellent info! I am going to B&Q today to get a bit of spare paint and I am now adding shears, weed killer and a hose (I figure I need one) to the list. How often should one water the garden?

 

I do want to keep some grass because it's pretty! But I do imagine big beds will end up there. If the grass really is crap then I can address that, but I want to try and keep it a bit to start with. But your advice is fantastic, thank you! I didn't think at all to wait to get plants until the soil has improved. I'm not feeling the pond but def dig a bird feeder. However, my bff does this and says fatballs add up in cost! I don't want to continually spend money to feed birds.

 

Re your question about the turf (is it salvageable), I think a lot depends on how much time and money you want to spend doing it.

Personally I would get the whole lot dug up, levelled and start from scratch with a blank canvas.
If you want instant results you could go for turf (which for the area you need would probably be a reasonable price), or if you're happy to wait you could go for seed.

When it comes to bird feeding, I agree about the cost ! However, if you have a small lawn, some evergreen shrubs to provide cover as suggested by @Songbird and water (even if it's just a couple of small dishes), you'd be surprised at how quickly a small eco system forms, and the birds will find grubs etc to feed on. Saves a fortune .

 

The pound shops sell bird seed quite cheaply I think, and you really only need to put fat balls out in cold weather. Once your plants get going, the birds will come for free seeds and berries . They also need water to drink and bathe, so a bird bath would be a cheaper option initially and ideal through the summer months.

 

We got our concrete birdbath from a car boot sale for a tenner. Money well spent as the birds come down, particularly in this warmer weather, for a good old bath and rinse over! I have two other little ground ornamental bird watering holes and have to keep them all well topped up or refreshed almost daily in this weather.
My birds must be very discerning, they won’t touch expensive fat balls, just the cheap ones from B and M or Poundland so my costs are very minimal. I know lots of people put out seeds and blocks but our birds turn their noses up at them. Funny little beggars The birds dig about in the lawn and borders for insects and worms etc so it needn’t be an expensive thing. I do put out some mealy worms now and again but they are not too expensive either.

 

I buy boxes of fat balls150 fat balls for £4.99. from B&M or my local GC and never feed the birds during the summer when there are plenty of caterpillars and grubs around.

 

Well here's what I would do....
I would divide the garden into two parts with a straight or curved line running from the back left to the bottom right, roughly two triangles. I would put a narrow path along this dividing line and in the back left corner I would invest in a nice birdbath. This would draw the eye along the diagonal and make the garden seem larger. The left side I would keep as lawn, I think the grass has just been cut too short and if you get the gardener to aerate it and put some dressing on it I think it would green up if it were left a bit longer. The right side I would either cover with cardboard and compost and leave for the summer while I decide what to grow in it. Summer weekends would be spent visiting all the places others suggest with a notebook so I could jot down ideas. If you don't want to have cardboard and compost ask the gardener to dig it over and rake in an annual wildflower mix for this summer.
In the autumn/winter it would be ready for planting. I wouldn't put in too many shrubs that grow too big and would need pruning but there are lots of small to medium shrubs which you will probably fall in love with on your garden and nursery visits. Don't forget to have something that gives winter interest such as evergreen and/or variegated leaves or berries. You can have fun choosing bulbs to plant for the spring too.

Enjoy your garden!

 

Some very 'sound' advice from everyone, @LizT.

Is that the dreaded Ground Elder perennial, pernicious weed running around the edge of the plot? If it is, forget everything else until it has ALL been killed off, because, trust me, you'll never get rid of it otherwise. My guess is it's coming from under the path and via the fences. It will need repeated application of glyphosate at a rate of 30ml per litre of water. Even then, if it's in your neighbour's gardens, it will keep creeping back under those fences.

Sorry to be a killjoy, but I speak from experience - you do NOT want Ground Elder or it will be a constant battle for you, and you may end up wasting a lot of money on plants and landscaping that later have to be moved before they're over run. Yes, it WILL come back and spead through new turf. It'll spread through ANYTHING.

For now, plants in pots would be my suggestion, if you can't wait to get started, but for the sake of your sanity and your budget, deal with the Ground Elder first.

 

I do want to reduce the amount of grass, but I think starting from scratch is a good idea. I think seed is better in the long run, right? Great idea about evergreen shrubs and water!

 

I talked to my best mate (a gardener) and she asked about what's in sun and what's in shade, I took some pix and basically, the back of the garden gets no sun. The right hand side and the bottom does. So this should affect what plants I get, right? I'm not sold on a birdbath, I don't really like how they look. But dividing the garden is an excellent idea. When I get the gardener, I'll figure out whether to start again with the turf, but you think it can be saved? Aiming for autumn planting sounds great. I don't live near any garden centres and have no car, so it's all going to be online shopping. What I need is a list of plants that I can think about which would work. Am starting a Word doc on all this as we speak!

 

I talked to my mate today and she worried that weed killer would do more harm than good, a scorched earth approach. I mean, people do use it, but won't it kill the grass too? It looks exactly like ground elder, I think you're right :-/ I bought something called Resolva Xtra Tough, to spray directly on (as opposed to diluting in water). Should I go out this evening (I avoid sun!) and spray all the little weed plants with it?