Low maintenance gardening may not be on your radar when you’re still in your 30s but as the years begin to creep up, the attractiveness of a garden that is designed to be easy to manage a little later in life begins to make sense. It helps to plan ahead.
Gardening is a popular low-impact activity for men and women in their retirement years. It gets the person out of the house, provides a sense of achievement, and is something that they can still do even if they have a more restricted movement or a disability of some kind.
Related: Flexible Living Options for Seniors
Getting it Right from the Outset
If you’re helping to move your parents from an overwhelmingly large home to something much smaller with a more manageable garden, there is the option to do some planning and garden design ahead of time. This way, they won’t get stuck into the garden post-relocation and then find it too difficult to deal with.
Replace Large Lawns with Attractive Paving
Large lawn areas do not need to be a reason to avoid buying a certain property. In fact, some of the garden area can be cut back by changing part of the lawn into a paved area. This will be easy to walk on for someone getting on in years. There are many paving choices that a company such as Easy Pave can offer consumers.
Provide Easy Access to Sources of Water
Consider how water will be accessed. It is possible that accessing a water tap from down the other end of the garden and trailing a long water hose will be too heavy for someone older to lift. Therefore, consider creating new access points close to where the water will actually be needed. The type of taps that will be used to open the flow of water should also be considered to make sure they are easy to grasp and not difficult to open or close.
Consider the Preferred Method of Gardening
What does your loved one like most about their existing garden? Is it caring for the lawn? Tending to the vegetable patch? Or experimenting in the greenhouse? Whatever their favourite aspect of gardening turns out to be, see how the new garden can be moulded in order to place a greater focus on their happiest activity in the garden. Get creative with ways to relocate favourite gardening activities to reduce the amount of movement or exercise needed to still participate in them.
Keep It Simple
Creating a low maintenance eco-friendly garden is all about assessing the options. A huge compost area at the back that requires heavy lifting to access it probably isn’t viable. Look at low-level, lighter options instead. Permanent edges can be added to a garden to reduce the maintenance required. A lawn can be grown longer to cut down on the amount of time needed for lawn care.
A low maintenance gardening set up is all about a little bit of thought and some careful planning ahead of time.
