We could enter our lawn(s). We never water them.
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All false around me except one who planted seeds and now has a lovely patch of weeds only! I have dried mud.
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Itâs the weeds that keep our lawns green in summer. 
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The agents made the sellers keep the grass mowed. A chore made possible with a petrol motor mower. Despite my offer, it was taken away. I didnât want to spend âŹ350-400 on a machine to do a job I had no interest in. I had a lot on indoors, in the âplywood shackâ.
The main âlawnâ, a useless 30 x 45 metre patch of âsoft green concreteâ on a considerable [and thus impractical slope] used to look like this
Other pointless patches of grass were similar.
All are now a knee-high pampas, waving in the breeze.
The only reason I have any concern about these is that they should not turn into bramble infested wildernesses and how I could make them look vaguely respectable to a future potental buyer.
The sun is shining. I have a vague guilt that I should get the strimmer out and reduce the pampas to ankle height - but why? itâll only grow back again.
Iâll get on with making my next batch of harissa.
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Strimming followed by regular mowing, shame it wasnât maintained 
I feel that about dusting / washing up / hoovering. Iâll only have to do it again. 
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Isnât maintained. I am the villain of this piece. Iâve never had a garden before. I have many interests but gardening is not one of them. Not in the least. And mowing grass is gardening, to me.
My neighbour asked âWhy did you buy a huse with this much ground?â The answer was the view and the price.
As the grass was neatly mowed when I viewed the place the connection between the state of it and the business of keeping it that way sort of failed to register. And to do that really needs a petrol mower. The main area of grass is 4m above and behind the house, [rue Olivier Basselin is cut into the side of a cliff] up a flight of steps, and continues to rise from the bottom to about +3m at the top where there is a 5m high wall keeping the property above me from falling down the cliff.
I had an idea that planting some apple trees might be a way to make something of this patch, which I never see and most of the time forget exists.
Get a few sheep?
500 euros? off your tax per year as âaide Ă la personneâ would cover keeping it mowed 2-3 times year?, I suspect
The idea has appeal but mountain goats would be more appropriate.
Err ⌠I am in the unfortunate position, as Mark Twain noted, of paying no tax. Thus my successful application for CSS.
I suspect you have to pay out something to get the work done⌠âaide Ă la personneâ
But you can then claim/note the Bill on your next Worldwide Declaration⌠and the Tax folk will refund pay you the appropriate percentage⌠even if you donât actually fall into the âpaying Taxâ bracket.
Thatâs handy. In effect a discount on the bill.
I shall try to keep the wilderness at bay until the time may come to sell up. Then I might need the heavy mob and some machinery.
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A cautionary tale about lawn neglectâŚ
When I bought my S African house it came with about a hectare of âgardenâ mainly ringed with large, water hungry non-indigenous trees (Australian black wattle) everywhere within was patchy lawn and bare earth so decided to let the grass grow au naturel. A few months later while walking through the long grass, got bitten by a button spider (SA black widow spider). The bite swelled up to the size of a henâs egg and months later when it had finally healed, there was a correspondingly henâs egg sized depression in my calf and Iâd learned why old Afrikaner farmers in the veldt wear thick knee length woollen socks .,âŚ
Thankfully thatâs not going to happen here unless you have vipers.
We probably do but we also have Western Whip Snakes, which are large, aggressive (one stood up to our Airedale) and can be somewhat alarming, but also are non-poisonous and I believe eat vipers.
We have very long grass in our field but OH also has cut paths with the sit-on mower which makes wandering through the field a pleasure.
Iâm surprised it was not more robust than sox - calf-length boots for example.
The house I was staying at in the interior of Trinidad had 2-3 acres of lawn. The gardener [the only person I have met with the name Christophine, the feminine version of my name] wore wellies. I realised why after walking on the grass. I found my feet had been invaded by tiny little mites which burrowed into the soft parts of my insteps.
The resulting trip to the doc and subsequent prescription swallowed up the budget I had reserved to take the g/f for a slap-up dinner when we got back to Port of Spain.
I think the nasty wildlife, like the excessively hot summers, stay south of th Loire.
I friend of mine bought a house because it had a field big enough âso I can hit a #1 driver and the ball still be on my landâ. The field was about 2.5 hectares.
My pal mowed a patch at the top as a tee, a 50m circle 3/4 the way down as a green [more like secondary rough] and a path through the grass joining both.
A local farmer took two crops of hay from this field in exchange for sending âJack the Ripperâ round once a year to trim the hedges.
I reckoned that my pal paid a premium of ÂŁ100k for his private driving range. His wife used to say she wished a developer would buy the field to build a housing estate.
Now he has the great good fortune - so nice to have an astute father in law to save you from bankrupcy by leaving the wife a couple of US$ millions - to live on the bank of one of Wiltshires great chalk streams, the Wylye.
But he has no interest in trout fishing
Even our weeds gave up this year, but they have come back again now with the rain and cooler temperatures.
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