Garden Maintenance

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Two hands holding two terracotta flower pots with green, woody plants, against a plain background.

Professional plant-orientated garden maintenance for Tendring and Colchester Districts

Reliable garden maintenance from a local plant expert

At Hortus Pink Landscapes, our commitment to your garden health and vitality, means we offer flexible maintenance packages tailored to keep your planted garden and hard landscaping looking their best year-round.

Our services include skilled plant care, seasonal pruning, ad-hoc plant selection, and general garden upkeep, all priced at competitive hourly rates. Let us help you maintain a beautiful and healthy garden that enhances your outdoor living experience.

Flexible service packages from a plant expert

  • Transparent pricing models with budget-friendly options, eg fixed-price and hourly fees provided with cap estimates.

  • Priced from as little as £60 for a spring visit of 2 hours. 

  • FREE no-obligation estimates.

  • FREE walk-and-talk service for existing clients to help educate and build confidence while you take notes and then get on with your ‘homework’ in your own time. 

  • FREE client WhatsApp service so you can ask questions and send pictures during the season.

  • DIY education support provided for novice gardeners.

  • Fast, diligent and hard working services to maximise garden impact.

  • Our plant specialist services can be integrated alongside cheaper 3rd party service providers with limited plant knowledge.

  • Garden care that ensures your careful garden investments don’t simply wither and die.

Available in Essex areas:

  • Tendring District: Clacton/ Holland/ Great Holland, Frinton/ Walton, Harwich/ Manningtree/ Mistley, Brightlingsea/ Great Bentley, Elmstead/ Ardleigh, St Osyth.

  • Colchester District: Wivenhoe, Colchester (all), Dedham, Langham, West Bergholt, Fordham, Great Horkesley, Earls/ Wakes Colne, Marks/ Great Tey/ Layer, Rowhedge, Feering/ Tiptree, Stanway/ Copford, Eight Ash Green.

“Zoe totally transformed our garden, which was tired, overgrown and uninteresting. Nothing was too much trouble. She has lots of ideas and is very knowledgeable about appropriate plants for certain soils. She works hard, taking any rubbish away, leaving you time to just enjoy your garden. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend her services to anybody. She also has building contacts which comes in very handy too, ”

— Sarah & Pam Rolf, Project Beach (Holland on sea)

A wheelbarrow filled with pink and white flowers on a gravel garden path, surrounded by greenery and trees.

From practical lawn mowing and edging, to expert pruning and stunning seasonal planting, we will keep your outdoor space looking its best year-round

Garden Maintenance Services - our commitment to quality

  • 50+ 5-star reviews.

  • Plant-focused garden maintenance services, built to compliment all needs.

  • Eco-friendly, pet-safe, reduced chemical, wildlife-friendly options and practices.

  • Insurance backed, both public liability and professional indemnity.

  • Registered waste carrier and can remove all waste (charged by weight) if your own garden bins are insufficient. 

  • A 4th generation professional horticulturalist. 

  • 15 years personal experience growing beautiful gardens. 

  • Beth Chatto dry garden trained. 

  • Quality plant stock locally sourced with established specialist grower network and expert maintenance packages.

  • Friendly, professional, reliable, organised, and flexible services with trusted client relationships and beautiful gardens at the heart of what we do.

Three flexible and often integrated routes for work are available:

1) General Maintenance, 2) Specialist Plant Maintenance, and 3) Seasonal Maintenance.

BOOK GARDEN MAINTENANCE

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Yes, we are quite happy to provide any services a cheaper lawn mowing firm cannot provide. We are flexible on scheduling and are happy to provide support with services that you find lacking (typically plant focused services eg weeding and planted material installation/ care/ maintenance).

  • No contract is required for our maintenance services. You can book us as much or as little as you need.

    Gardens are generally in need of attention Feb to Nov, with peak season Apr-July. If you need watering services, a weekly schedule or irrigation installation will be required.

    We can arrange garden access to assist when you are on holiday, if needed.We keep an eye on weather and ground conditions and agree an appropriate schedule with you, flexed around the weather and your budget.

    We are organised and conscientious, so will always contact you if we need to reschedule.

  • We will recommend a suitable way forward with indicative prices.

    We are firm believers in building confident DIY gardeners and will always provide advice to help you build skills and reduce paid for maintenance requirements, if that’s the best route for you.

    If your needs are different or change over time, we can suggest options to help manage costs.

    We can set a monthly budget and do the most urgent tasks, or the tasks you don’t feel comfortable/ hate doing.

    We are here to help manage the tricky stuff so you can do what you have time for and enjoy, while improving your garden year on year. 

  • It really depends on your budget and the size/ complexity of your garden.

    Most gardens in the Tendring and Colchester Districts can be handled perfectly well on a biweekly/ monthly schedule based on a minimum of 2 hours per visit (excluding watering).

    If you need us to water, weekly visits are recommended during drought/ heatwave periods - we can also provide an estimate to install irrigation, if needed.

  • Yes, as a plant-orientated business, we tend to focus on gardens with planted material whereby our clients value beautiful plants and soft landscaping to enhance garden ecology and soften hard landscaping.

    This means we do not provide mow-only services or undertake one-off garden clearances.

    We predominantly maintain domestic gardens (peoples home gardens), but can also support commercial gardens (typically the planted material and weeding).

    We are highly skilled and passionate in all kinds of gardens with plants of all styles eg wooded, hillside, full sun, shady, dry gardens, etc.

  • Not for regular maintenance visits (many clients give us a key to their side gate so we can access directly).

    For initial visits, education visits or for specific tasks we will require your attendance as a quick conversation is usually needed.

  • We will need to use your lawn mower, but all other tools will be provided by us.

    We can provide feeds and pest/disease treatments (the cost will be added to your bill) or give you a shopping list and use what you provide.

    We tend to follow a ‘less is more’ ecological philosophy and try to avoid chemical use and suggest bee friendly or organic pest/ disease treatment where possible.

  • We don’t provide pond or tree services, but we have a trusted network of local aquatics and arborist specialists who we coordinate on behalf of our clients.

  • Not generally as we follow a no-dig philosophy, which improves soil health by maintaining its natural structure, fostering beneficial microorganisms, and increasing carbon sequestration.

    By avoiding turning the soil, we protect worm channels, preserve fungal networks (mycorrhizae), and drastically reduce weed growth (leading to healthier plants, improved moisture retention, and easier, more productive gardening), especially when combined with biannual manure mulching.

    The only exception to this is when we are overhauling an entire border. We do occasionally smarten the soil surface using a claw rake, when the ground is moist enough.

General Maintenance

Core services covering essential regular tasks

Everything you need for a tidy and thriving garden, with DIY suggestions provided for management in between. Scheduled to budget and garden needs eg Weekly, Biweekly or Monthly. 2 hour minimum visit for £60. Adjustable frequencies with easy add-ons:

  • LAWNS: Regular mowing/ edging/ scarifying/ spot-weeding/ turf laying/ lawn seeding. Knowing when and what to apply to lawns for the best finish is an art.

  • BORDERS: Weeding and debris removal, manure/ wood chip mulch for weed control, dead-heading and basic seasonal tidying, removal of dead plants. Keeping plants looking at their best.

  • LEAF CLEARANCE: Leaf blowing and clearing up.

  • TREATMENTS: Pest and disease control, feeding, weedkiller, drive and patio anti-greening.

  • WATERING: Lawns, pots and borders. Irrigation installation.

  • HARDSCAPES: Jet-washing/ sanding/ sealing of patio or driveway surfaces, painting of sheds/ fences/ pergolas.

BOOK GENERAL MAINTENANCE

Specialist Plant Maintenance

Premium services integrated with our core services on an ad-hoc basis

Covers specialist plant knowledge that takes years to build and is designed to cost-effectively improve existing borders. Targeted ad-hoc improvements to planted borders, blended in 30 min blocks and priced at £20:

  • SEASONAL SPECIALIST PRUNING: Whereby plants are reshaped to improve their overall health and visual appeal within the border.

  • EXISTING PLANTED BORDER IMPROVEMENT: Ad-hoc border assessment to replace dead plants and provide infill recommendations (plant sourcing/ selection and installation), relocating plants in the wrong position and garden problem solving.

For in-depth whole border revamps and new border installations, see our Border Design Services.

BOOK SPECIALIST PLANT MAINTENANCE

Seasonal Maintenance

Tune-ups for established gardens.

Often just spring or autumn visits with clients managing things in-between:

  • SPRING (Feb): 

    • Soft landscaping - Early pruning and hedge trimming, weeding and debris removal, manure mulch, lawn scarification and edge shaping. 

    • Hard landscaping - Patio or driveway jet washing/ re-sanding/ sealing, patio anti-greening treatment, fence/ shed painting.

  • SUMMER (Mar-Sep): 

    • Soft landscaping - Weeding, planting installation and border adjustment, specialist pruning and cutting back, pest and disease treatment, feeding, plant supports and staking. 

  • AUTUMN/ WINTER (Oct-Jan): 

    • Soft landscaping - Turf laying, plant/ bulb/ tree/ hedge installation, weeding, cutting back/ pruning and shaping, adding winter protection, leaf clearance.

BOOK SEASONAL MAINTENANCE

Related Garden Maintenance Blog Posts

Why plant-orientated gardens matter

If you’re planning a garden makeover in the UK (Essex or Suffolk), you’ll gain more than just curb appeal by embracing plant-orientated design. A garden that prioritises living material—trees, shrubs, perennials, grasses, and climbers—delivers ongoing multi-dimensional benefits to biodiversity, climate resilience, mental health, and property value. This blog explores the benefits of designing new plant-orientated gardens in the UK and gives practical design tips for implementing changes, utilising existing plants, and introducing new plant installations. It also explains why living landscapes outperform purely hard-landscaped spaces on every level.

Read blog

Garden maintenance: Keeping your new garden in tip top condition (soft landscaping)

This blog post summarises some key garden maintenance tips and tricks to keep a newly built Hortus Pink garden looking at its best. I've split out hard landscaping from soft landscaping in separate blogs.

Aftercare of a new garden, especially for the novice gardener, can be daunting, but with a few pointers followed, it really isn't' rocket science. All my clients quickly get to grips with their new garden and build fresh confidence that they are doing the right things to help their new garden mature successfully.

Read blog
Read more blogs

Garden Maintenance Client Reviews

  • “Zoe advised on how to approach my mature garden and devised a plan to make the garden more manageable. Zoe fully consulted with me about the plan. She’s certainly not afraid to get her hands dirty and do the hard jobs that I can no longer do. I wanted someone who would love my garden the way I love it and would notice all the little things. Zoe is that person. She is a talented, versatile gardener with an eye for detail and always listens to my needs and wants.”

    — Barbara Barnett, Project Queens (Frinton on sea)

  • “Zoe has totally transformed our garden, which as tired, overgrown and uninteresting. Nothing was too much trouble. Zoe is a very hard working lady (puts some men to shame). She has transformed our lawn and our flower beds, she has a good knowledge of plants, etc. This is the start of the second season and can only get better. Last year was great from a dead start.”

    — Angela Frearson, Project Church (West Bergholt)

  • “After being let down by several garden companies, I was really pleased to have come across Hortus Pink. Zoe has been very helpful in sharing her horticultural experience to refresh some very tired borders. The front garden and courtyard area is now looking fresh and vibrant. I am looking forward to next spring when they will be in flower. I cam very satisfied with the quality of her work and level of service. Highly recommend.”

    — Michael Woodward, Project Grassfields (Frinton on sea)

  • “We want to say a massive thank you for the transformation to our garden. We are both thrilled with the outcome. Our garden has become dull, boring and uninspiring. Through your addition of new plants to our existing ones, you truly have brought the garden back to life, and we’ve already spent several hours in our outside lounge. Thank you so much.”

    — Adrian & Suzanne Powell, Project Beeches (Colchester)

  • “My garden is a pleasure to see and work in. I couldn’t be better pleased with the end result. I fully recommend Zoe and her team who are hard working, friendly and a pleasure to discuss one’s requirements with.”

    — Joan Durrant, Project Norwood (Holland-on-Sea)

  • “Excellent service by an equally excellent lady.”

    — Angela Frearson, Project Church (West Bergholt)

Colorful flower garden with various blooming flowers and lush greenery.
Shady plant selection for tortoise friendly planting: oregano, chive, camassia, astilbe, camomile, parsley, thyme
Hands holding a clump of dirt with some soil falling from it.
A lush garden with a variety of flowering plants and green foliage, bordered by a well-maintained lawn and trees in the background.
Dry garden planting of succulents, sedum, oregano, libertia grandiflora, iris, gaura, verbena, erigeron
A lush garden with colorful flowers, green leafy plants, and a well-maintained lawn on a sunny day.
Close-up of pink and red leaves with water droplets on them.
Border planting for body and depth, featuring colourful foliage from fatsia, physocarpus, arbutus, elaeagnus, cotinus, viburnum, photinia, phormium
Cherry blossoms in bloom in front of a house with a brick and white exterior, a sloped roof, and windows with divided panes.
Naturalistic planting for birds, featuring subtle coloured blooms and delicate leaves: wild strawberry, astilbe, blueberry, cornus sibirica, camassia, anemonie, erigeron, stipa, libertia grandiflora
A garden scene with pink hydrangeas in the foreground, purple flowers behind, and trees with a wooden garden structure and a black compost bin in the background.
A vibrant garden with colorful flowers and a birdbath, next to a brick house with a sloped roof under a clear blue sky.
Blue-silver themed planting with a Japanese-mediterranean twist, featuring: bamboo, cherry, ceanothus, fan palm, new zealand privet
Purple and violet irises blooming in a garden with green foliage, a brick border, sunlight, and a wooden fence in the background.
A garden bed with various green plants and succulents, bordered by a wooden fence.
Colorful garden with yellow, purple, and orange flowers under bright sunlight, with a blurred background of greenery and residential buildings.
Garden with various flowering plants and a well-manicured lawn path in the background.
Shady low colour planting for moist soil, featuring greens and whites: cornus, hellebore, fern, japanese spurge, hakonechola, hosta, euphorbia
A colorful garden bed with pink, purple, and orange flowers, green foliage, and mulch on the ground.
Colorful garden with pink poppies, purple flowers, and green shrubs, with a house and blue sky in the background.
Close-up of green fern fronds unfurling amid small yellow and purple flowers in a natural setting.
White hydrangea flowers blooming on a shrub with sunlight background.
Garden bed filled with various green plants and herbs, bordered by a wooden and woven fence, with trees and a blue sky in the background.
Structure planting for a full sun border, featuring pinks and purples: cornus kousa, silver birch, crab apple, whitebeam, magnolia, hornbeam
Close-up of a lush green potted hosta plant with broad, ribbed leaves in a garden setting, with a blurred background of trees, bushes, and a fence.
Purple irises blooming in a garden under a sunny sky, with a grey wooden fence and various plants in the background.
Blue themed full sun planting for the front of a border:gaura, euphorbia, agapanthus, iris, oleander, nepeta, grasses
Colorful garden with a variety of plants and flowers, including purple, pink, and green foliage, and well-manicured round green bushes.
A cobblestone garden path lined with colorful blooming flowers on both sides, bathed in warm sunlight.
Shady garden planting with structure: hornbeam, silver birch, amelanchier, cornus, fern, libertia grandiflora, whitebeam, rodgersia, cercis
hanging basket with bright hot colours in pink, red and orange
Border refresh with before and after images showing revitalised planting and plenty of colour
Bulb planting mood board, with: snowdrop, allium, camassia, fritillary, narcissus, grape hyacinth, tulip
Mature border planting after 3 years showing lush planting and plenty of colour
Sunny border planting for a dry garden, featuring burnt orange, purple and soft pink: verbena, libertia grandiflora, centurea, bearded iris, lambs ear, nepeta, salvia, gaura, sedum
A greek statue rests amongst lush planting with pretty colours or pink, red and yellow
Shady planting with a silver-purple theme, featuring: japanese spurge, liriope muscari grass, fern, hosta, carex grass, nepeta, choisya