Gardening in a rented garden

Until we're able to get a mortgage, we're stuck with renting our little home. And that's fine, apart from living with an uncontrollable urge to have a garden of my very own that I can fill with obscure plants and ponds and goats and chickens and bees.

Interestingly, whilst there's a clause in our tenancy agreement that we shouldn't remove any plants, there's nothing to stop us planting a bamboo forest. Or Japanese Knotweed jungle. We've mostly behaved very well, apart from tearing up a bit of Hypericum (because it's hideous), and planting a dwarf apple tree (because it's the burial place of Molly the rat.)

Having lived here for over a year, I've come up with a strategy for not being too upset when we move:

Containers
Horribly heavy when you end up moving house, but it does mean you can have shrubs and perennials without leaving them behind.

Annuals
Successes this year have ranged from calendula, cosmos, morning glories and petunia to cucumbers, tomatoes, and salad leaves. If you need to leave them in the ground when you move, it's no big loss: they'll only last a season anyway.

Bamboo
Bamboo will tolerate living in a large pot, and if you have a friend or local plant swap, stick a few pot-fulls of bamboo in the corner to mask the unsightly and provide a decent backdrop for other plants.

Height
Wigwams and trellises are essential for that lived-in look: pop a trellis behind a container and plant a climber. Or you could try a tall rose - we've had Queen Elizabeth growing in ours successfully.

That Weedy Corner of Lawn
I can't imagine your landlord would mind it being turned into a veg plot.. Besides, it'll be prettier and easier to maintain than a patch of brambles and ragwort.