Thank you for playing :)
Personally, I can say that luring guards out into the hedges works almost as well as with gardeners. They will aggro after a bit, but breaking line of sight seems to reset the timer, so you can pretty easily get away with it. The only downside of their disguise is you don't get the shovel. (And you can't interact with poisonous plants without raising suspicion, but it's usually not hard to do that without being seen, so it's not a major constraint).