By Matthew Tuel
Founder, Red Cedar Landscape Architecture
DULUTH, Ga. | With spring around the corner, your garden plants are getting ready to “wake up.”
Tuel
Now is the best time to start tackling any of these four simple projects that could spruce-up your yard. Most of these can be accomplished over a weekend.
The first project to undertake is cleanup. Do this before your shrubs and trees start to flush-out their new leaves. Start with pruning overgrown and dead branches out of your shrubs and trees. Also remove any tree branches that are within 12 feet of your home. (Call an arborist if you want to hire this out).
Next, refine your existing planting bed edges using hand tools or a string trimmer to cut into the intended edge of your lawn. Top-dress mulched areas with fresh material, to a depth of no more than three inches. Remove old built-up mulch as needed. Install seasonal color and small perennials after mulching.
If your lawn is looking tired, remove the lowest branches from over-shadowing trees to help more light reach the turf.
If your driveway and paths are dirty, power-washing is not only an easy way to shine-up your home’s exterior. It is also satisfying to watch or do yourself.
Via Wikipedia.
Now that your outdoor space is cleaned up, let’s find some furniture to sit and entertain with. Look for outdoor rated furniture that fits your style and budget. Start with a small dining or seating set, and gradually add more as-needed, based on your lifestyle.
Don’t forget about your cooking appliances. These should be placed convenient to your back door, but far enough from structures to avoid heat and smoke damage.
The space is really shaping up now that we have placed our furniture, we can now move on to container plants, which we can use to provide accents of color and texture. There are a wide variety of containers available, something for every space. Mix and match to add variety.
After bringing home your containers, place them where you ultimately want them. They will be heavy once planted. Fill the containers with potting soil until it is one inch below the rim. Choose one plant that has a vertical growth habit, a “thriller,” which will go in the center of the pot.
Surround that with a mix of “chillers,” which have a low or mounded habit, and “spillers,” which like to spill out of the pot as they grow. Use no more than three different flower colors, and two different leaf colors. Sometimes less is more.
For cool season grass such as Fescue, you can over-seed in the early spring to fill-in thinned-out areas. For warm season grasses such as Bermuda or Zoysia, sod and plugs are more effective at re-establishing lawn. Sod is instant, while plugs require patience over more than one growing season. Always keep the soil moist after seeding and sodding. Expect to water new lawns as often as daily for the first six weeks.
If you are ready to make some quick changes to your garden but are still unsure where to start, a qualified landscaper will be able to help. Projects that require more advanced planning or permitting such as swimming pools, pavilions, decks, and drainage, are best handled by a licensed Landscape Architect.
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
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