I know it's silly but...

My new neighbours have just over the last two days ripped out every last shred of green from their back garden, including an old and beautiful pyracantha that sheltered dozens of sparrows over the years.

I know of course they're perfectly entitled to do so but it's really brought me down. I'll get a grip soon but just wanted to share with people who might understand. Looking for sympathy, I suppose

 

You - and the sparrows - have my sympathy. I'm currently dreading the same thing happening here as my neighbour of many years told me last week that she's putting her house on the market. Whoever takes it on will most likely want to give both house and the garden a major makeover to 'bring it up to date'. I just hope that can be done sympathetically, and without ejecting all the trees and plants that are there at present.

 

I've recently witnessed my favourite local garden being ripped out and replaced with masses of concrete. It absolutely devastated me, it was truly beautiful in all seasons.

 

Thank you, Clare G. It does help knowing that I'm not the only person in the world who finds this sort of thing deeply saddening. I do hope your neighbour sells to a gardener

 

Oh, Friendly, I'm so sorry to hear that. It's heartbreaking and I feel for you.

To be honest, my previous neighbour who passed away wasn't a gardener so it wasn't a particularly beautiful space - just grass, roses, a tapestry hedge of euonymus all down one side and the majestic pyracantha at the end of the garden. My neighbours now have a lovely view of their shed, though...

 

I am a lover of leaving things be and my garden would win no prizes on any tv gardening programme. I have the same problem as you, but in my case it’s a national park that has desolated the land next to mine. Guardians of the countryside? Ha! Tawny owls that nested there, gone. Thrushes, tree creepers, black caps, greater spotted woodpeckers, all gone.

The world is stuffed. We just have to admit it.

If you want a bit of a rueful laugh, watch a set of six programmes called Small Prophets. The neighbour there will have you shouting at the screen.

 

Funnily enough i was talking about this on my morning dog walk today when we passed a couple of houses with fake grass. I can't understand people that want a desolate wasteland to look at when they open the curtains. We are supposed to love nature as a species but I'm fairly sure our neighbours would have a plastic garden if it wasn't an effort to put it in.
I only see the front gardens but they are nearly always stripped bare when someone moves in. There was a beautiful garden nearby that was almost maintanence free, mostly compact shrubs and conifers, which was ripped out and replaced with a gravel section, that now grows lots of weeds and looks horrid, and more worrying a Kilmarnock willow (you can't account for taste).

 

Thank you, Tidemark. I'm astonished to hear it's happening in national parks as well. I'll take you up on the rueful laugh

 

Thank you for your reply, TheVictorian. It's comforting to know that there are people like you and the other kind responders who do care.
I find it baffling that people like my neighbours buy a house with a 75 foot garden if they've no interest in having a garden (and also think they could have spared a few feet for the poor pyracantha). They'll probably pave the lot.

 

I think some people get rid of gardens due to medical reasons - if they suffer badly from hay fever for example.
I also think a lot of people don't pay much attention to the garden when buying a house.

 

What has the National Park done to the land next to yours?

 

People want modern gardens mostly, that's if they want a garden at all.
The growing trend is paving or gravel at the front for carparkng, and a massive extension out the back, mostly including blocking off any side access to the back.

Then a paved patio with a barbecue area, a few plants that grow no bigger than 2ft high,this is where the plastic plants come in, and garden lighting.

If you have a compost heap you are weird.
Every last speck of dirt or twig and leaf goes in the council bin.

 

Not silly at all. We lost a massive old hedge next door when new people moved in and the difference in birds was immediate, went from constant activity to basically nothing. Took a couple of years for them to find the garden again properly. The pyracantha especially is a real loss, nothing else quite does the same job for sparrows.

 

WE had a big drop in bird numbers with in the last 10 years, the only thing that i know has been happening is a big land owner is cutting down lots of muture trees for timber (£) lots of trees have now gone (and i mean lots) but they have replanted some other land with lots of trees but looking at how it planted i say that the trees are the fast growing one so a quick buck, i wouldn't be surprized it the owner has had a big grant for it all as they don't do anything unless there is money involed (tax payers money)