Yes, i have just found the previous owners new address and I'm going to write to them.Ah, I was hoping it was longer because it’s 10 years for registered land and 12 years for unregistered land. Could you make contact with the previous owners and ask them to put in writing that for the X years they lived there it was tended by them because it was their land?
Is there a boundary fence separating his garden to this piece of land/your garden?
He has a makeshift boundary fence. He built it himself, it's not very tall, but to anyone else it definitely looks like we've got separate gardens.