How to kill a garden

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We've inherited a few nice plants and a lot of mess. The garden will be totally reconfigured after work on the house, so everything has to be moved or go entirely.

The row of plants is earmarked for an extension, so have to be fully removed before they root any further. The ivy needs killing pronto. The only thing definitely being saved is the Jasmine, a transplant from the old garden.

Firstly, what will be the best way to kill/remove some of these without digging up all the inevitably huge roots, and secondly, are any of these plants worth being saved and moved to a "safe" spot?






Bonus points for a use for a dodgy plastic fence feature.

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randlemarcus said:

Do you know any farmers, or people with a farm? Get them to go to the farm store, and get the proper strength stuff. Into a sprayer with a couple of squirts of fairy liquid (to get it to stick to the ivy), and job jobbed. If you are killing the lawn as well, some dark plastic down to try and kill the weeds that will be in there, during the works, then concentrate on it afterwards.

Nice tip. My mother's other half is a farmer conveniently.

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Shaolin said:

We had an apple tree in the way of the foundations of our extension last year, we cut the tree down and then the builders removed the massive roots with their digger. Do you really need to be playing around with killing them at all other than cut down to just above ground level? Seems like making a job for yourself for no reason.

To put it simply, only some of these are "in the way". A lot that aren't in the way need to go (or get moved) either way as they won't look good once it's reconfigured - and, I want to get the garden root free and nicely conditioned for next year.

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RichB said:

here's a Fatsia Japonica in the middle of that.

Thanks Rich, I had no idea and I've been a little aggressive with it so I'll leave it and try and get the ivy out. The ivy is the priority as it's making the fence into even more of a mess. Believe it or not that ivy was another 1.5 metres higher before I chopped it down last month.