Maintenance

Maintenance

Most people who call for help with a landscape design will say “we want low maintenance.” I have yet to have someone ask for “high maintenance”. Low maintenance is a given preference with any landscape planting. As mentioned under the design section, proper design with the right plant in the right place should result in low maintenance. However, “low maintenance” doesn’t mean “no maintenance”. Occasional watering and weeding of the newly planted landscape will be necessary. But there are some rules of thumb that will keep this chore reasonable. Actually, the key is simple observation on a regular basis. Unfortunately, with our busy American lifestyles, we often don’t notice problems until they are hitting us in the face. If you simply walk around the yard every few days you’ll notice if something is starting to wilt. You’ll also see when young weeds are starting to sprout, or a few bugs are appearing on a branch. Catching these problems early will normally allow a simple correction of the problem. But if that wilting plant suddenly turns brown it might be too late to save it. When those little sprouting weeds become large, even spraying them with weed killer will leave large unsightly dead weeds. And those few bugs might defoliate or even kill the tree in time.

Of course the first line of defense against high maintenance is proper design. So many times someone will want a particular plant in a certain place for which the plant will get too large. They’ll say “Can’t I prune it to keep it small? Sure, but this is maintenance! You can prune it for a few years but the pruning job will get bigger every year. Pick a small plant for a small space. Choose plants that have few care requirements. Don’t force a shade loving plant into a sunny spot or a tender plant into a harsh exposure.

Watering

Watering is probably the simplest but most misunderstood aspect of maintenance. It’s really not that difficult. Newly installed plants haven’t had a chance to get their roots established, so they might need supplemental watering if it doesn’t rain.   A significant soaking rain of 1” or more is needed every week.   That’s why planting in the cool, wet seasons of spring and fall are generally preferred. Deep rooted plants like trees and shrubs will need a deep soaking once a week for the first few weeks. As their roots become established they won’t need to be watered as frequently. After a couple of years they will probably not need supplemental watering at all. Shallow rooted plants such as turf and small annuals will dry out more quickly and might need watering every day until established.

Too much water can be worse than not enough! Unfortunately, the symptoms of under watering are the same as for over watering. The roots will die, either from dryness or rotting. In both cases the roots fail to transfer water to the top of the plant and the plant wilts and eventually dies. When plants fail to thrive only weeks after planting it’s often thought that they’ve died from an insect or disease problem. This is normally not the case. Insects and disease usually work slowly over a number of years to kill a plant. The only thing that can kill a plant that fast is a lack of water or over watering. The best way to water a tree is to let the hose lie at the base and slowly trickle for a half hour or so. Do this once a week and let the water drain out between watering. For sod, grass seed or beds of small annuals you might want to use an overhead sprinkler. In this case you can set a measuring cup in the bed and water until 1” of water is collected.

In the following years it’s not necessary to water on a regular basis. However, in a hot dry summer it would benefit your trees to water them once or twice in the middle of a drought period just to keep them healthy.

Pruning (not shearing!)

Pruning, if done on a regular basis, is not such a daunting task. Actually it’s probably my favorite chore in the garden because with natural design, it’s just a matter of lightly pruning out the occasional straggly branches. I like pruning because you can make a huge difference in the appearance of a tree or shrub in a short time.   With trees it’s a matter of eliminating the low hanging branches that hit you in the head when your mowing. Otherwise you are thinning out the dense branches, the broken or crossing branches and opening up the plant for better air circulation. Don’t be afraid to prune! You are not “hurting” the plant. Your trees will be healthier for it. You’ll be discouraging the bad growth and encouraging the good. By opening up the canopy of a tree you’ll also help the lawn to grow better by allowing more sunlight to pass through.

If you are shearing your shrubs into boxes and circles, you will need to give them a frequent “haircut”. Shearing with a pair of hedge clippers will create a dense, uniform plant with all the green growth right on the surface. Once you start shearing you are committed. You’ll need to shear repeatedly to keep that neat look and the inside of the plant will be dark and bare. You won’t be able to make the plant smaller without cutting back into the bare areas. The plant will get slightly larger each year until such time as you’ll need to remove it and start over. With “pruning” the plants will be a little uneven allowing light to penetrate the inside keeping some green on the inner branches. Again, if the proper size plant is chosen for the space it’s filling, you shouldn’t need to do a lot of pruning. Just trim off the long shoots to maintain the natural shape of the plant.

What’s the best time to prune? Generally, it’s when the knife is sharp! There is a rule of thumb with flowering shrubs and trees. Prune them after they are finished flowering. This give’s them a whole year to set new flower buds. Otherwise you might be cutting off potential flowers. However, it doesn’t hurt the plant to be pruned at the “wrong” time. It is more important that they get pruned than that it’s done at the “wrong” time. Winter is actually a great time to prune most trees because the leaves are gone and you can easily see the branching habit.

Weeding

Weeding is the chore most people dislike the most. It’s no wonder. It’s an ongoing process, some weeds are difficult if not impossible to pull and some are thorny! But there are some tricks to make it easier. No, one of the tricks is NOT weed mat!   I’ll expand on this later. As with most things in life, prevention is much better than repair. It’s much better to keep ahead of the weeding than to be faced with a mess that seems insurmountable.   Walk around at least once a week and take care of the small weeds before they become BIG weeds. You might be surprised to find that some small weeds are actually tree seedlings which if left to grow will become TREES. You’ll quickly find out that some weeds are easily pulled, particularly after a rain when the ground is soft.   On the other hand, some cannot be pulled and you might have to resort to using an herbicide. There are many selective herbicides that, if used properly, can greatly ease the weeding chore.

While you’ve got a clean slate with fresh plantings and fresh mulch, you might apply a “preemergent herbicide”. This material will coat the surface of the ground with a “salt” which burns new seedlings as they sprout. But seedlings are only part of the problem. The roots of certain aggressive weeds such as grasses and thistles will come up from root segments and need to be sprayed with a “systemic herbicide”. A systemic herbicide can be lightly applied to the leaves and will travel internally down to the roots.

Another weapon in the arsenal for gardeners is a grass herbicide. This product will selectively kill grasses in a bed of broadleaves. For example, grass invading a perennial bed or groundcover bed can be selectively killed without harming the groundcover. Unless, of course, that groundcover is another grass! Conversely, you can use a broadleaf herbicide to selectively kill “broadleaf weeds” in grasses. This is what is used in the lawn to take out dandelions. You’ll find several brand names and active ingredients for all these materials so I won’t get into making specific recommendations here. Just ask your local garden center for a grass herbicide, broadleaf herbicide or systemic herbicide. Of course with all chemicals, labels should be read, care must be taken in mixing and spraying to avoid contact with the skin as much as possible. Spraying should be done on a windless day to avoid drifting from the target weeds onto desirable plants. With proper use and understanding of herbicides your time weeding the garden can be significantly reduced.

Edging

Bed edging materials seem to be popular. You’ll see everything from black plastic to concrete, rocks and bricks used to separate the lawn from the beds in residential landscapes. Beds do look nicer with a sharp, gently curving edge. But it’s not necessary to have a brick or stone edge. In fact a brick or stone edge will just give you something else that needs edging when the weeds grow into the cracks in the rocks or bricks. Stone walls are nice when creating a raised bed or terrace on a slope, but on level ground, a stone or brick edge is unnecessary. With a nice low border plant to transition to the ground, your edging can be done by simply mowing the lawn right up to the bed. Simply use a spade or mechanical edger to sharpen the bed edge once a year. You could also use an herbicide to keep the lawn from invading the beds. But maintaining a sharp, shallow trench occasionally with a straight spade is simple and effective.

Garden pests

What about the rodents, deer, dogs and bugs? A lot of these problems can also be solved in the design stage. Be aware of which plants are desired by the deer. Deer love Hostas, Taxus and Arborvitae. They generally avoid Boxwood. However a hungry deer will browse on just about anything. A dog might be the answer to keep the deer and rabbits away! But of course a digging dog might be a problem in a highly manicured small garden area. You might need to design a space for the dog to run in the master plan. The bugs are part of nature. Many insects cause only “cosmetic damage” and are not a serious problem. On the other hand, you should learn which insects do pose a serious threat and apply the appropriate treatments. Of course, here again, plants prone to insect or disease problems can be avoided in the design stage. As mentioned in the windbreak section, it’s a good idea to plant diversity in your landscape so that a future epidemic doesn’t wipe out your effort.

Garden gimmicks

While everyone appreciates a pleasant, colorful landscape, no one wants to be tied to constant maintenance. Understandably, many products have been promoted to magically reduce your maintenance time in the yard. As you’ve heard before, if it’s too good to be true, it’s probably not. Again, a good rule of thumb is, KEEP IT NATURAL. Weed mat is not found in the woods!

That being said, weed mat can be effective in some cases, such as a commercial site under gravel mulch to keep the gravel from mixing in with the soil. In the home garden I see no place for weed mat. The worst case scenario is a layer of plastic that totally inhibits percolation of water and air through the soil column. Soils are alive with microbes moving and mixing the minerals, organic materials, water and air. To put a layer of plastic in the middle just creates a barrier to this natural process resulting in a wet, poorly oxygenated, unhealthy muck. Most modern commercial weed barrier materials are perforated to allow some passage of air and water. But still it’s an artificial barrier to the beneficial earthworms more than it blocks weeds. Think about it. With some exceptions, most weeds don’t start down deep in the soil and grow up through the mulch. They start by seeds blowing into the top mulch layer and sprouting there. Therefore, they grow in that thin organic layer on top of the weed mat! Remember the idea is to design for eventual massing of plants to cover the ground and eliminate space for weeds. The desirable plants will have a hard time spreading and covering the bed when they are constrained by a layer of weed mat. Suppose you want to plant some bulbs or annuals at some point? Now you’ve got to cut through the weed mat. And finally, one of the most annoying aspects about weed barrier fabric is the fact that invariably, it will blow up on the edges or start to show through the blowing and decomposing mulch becoming unsightly.

How about plastic bed edging?

Of all the different edging materials that can be used to separate the lawn from the bed, the worst is plastic edging. You’ll often see plastic edging “frost heave” out of the ground or become wavy from the heat of the summer sun. Of course the lawn mower will also catch it and either cut or tear it out of the ground . Metal edgings, while more expensive, will give better long term results. At least with metal it can be driven back into the ground annually after it heaves up.

Do you really need an irrigation system ?

Irrigation systems have become commonplace in many home landscapes in recent years. I’ll stop short of calling it a “garden gimmick’, but I really feel that irrigation systems are unnecessary for the average home landscape. I know it makes watering easy. But is all that watering necessary? A newly planted landscape will require close management of watering for the first year or so. But after the plants become established, they should thrive where they are placed without supplemental watering if the design is correctly done. Turf, on the other hand, will require occasional watering during the hot summer months if one expects it to remain green. However, cool season grasses such as bluegrass may be allowed to go dormant during the hot months of July and August. It is possible in an extreme drought that lasts a couple months that bluegrass can go from dormant to dead, so an occasional watering to keep the root system healthy might be in order. But to keep the grass bright green and growing all summer, while it might be desirable for some, isn’t really necessary in this age of “environmental sustainability”. Furthermore, if the irrigation system waters the landscape beds as often as it does the turf, the beds are probably getting over watered. For example, golf courses often have problems with trees and flowers getting over watered around the greens and tees because of overlapping irrigation patterns. The turf, with its shallow root system will benefit from a daily watering, but that’s far too much for flowers, trees and shrubs.

Irrigation is often sold to new homeowners with the rational that it makes watering easy and the lines can be easily laid before the lawn is put in. But a year after the installation, most homeowners don’t have a clue where all the lines are buried. Often times, in fact, even the installer is no help in determining where these shallow lines are. So the lines get cut when planting trees or even seasonal planting of flowers in the flower beds.

One might also think that an irrigation system will reduce maintenance, right? Well, not necessarily if one considers that regular watering is not necessary after the landscape is established. Not to mention the need to blow out the lines so they don’t freeze in the winter. Mechanical systems will need maintenance to prevent breakdowns and repair when they do.

An irrigation system is only as good as the water pattern it lays down. If there are wet and dry spots you’ll have problems. There is no substitute for careful observation and hand watering of the dry spots. Folks with automatic irrigation systems will commonly rely on the system too much only to find some plants getting soggy while others are badly wilting.

Cost cutters and time savers

Just because you live on a budget is no reason to deprive yourself of the benefits of having a well designed home landscape. You CAN do it yourself. But of course you still need to start with a well laid out plan. If you don’t have the time to do the research and draw up your own design, you could hire someone to help you with the design stage.

Once you have the master plan, every little thing you do will eventually lead up to the final result. If you are considering hiring some of the work done and want to do some of it yourself to save money, don’t offer to do the planting after all the groundwork is done. That won’t save you much. The planting is the easiest job. Removal of the large old overgrown plants or the bed preparation would be a more significant portion of the labor if you are able to get these things done yourself.

As mentioned before, you can skip the irrigation system and save a lot of money. You might consider seeding your lawn instead of using sod. While sod will make your lawn look nice immediately, it is about 5 times the cost of seed. Be aware that a seeded lawn might take a year or two before it’s filled in and finished.

You can skip the edging material and still have professional looking beds as explained above.

Consider using smaller plants. The right plant in the right place will still achieve the desired results. It just might take a little longer to see them grow to maturity. Although in the case of trees, a small tree might mature sooner than a large tree!

Consider using perennials instead of annuals for color. They only need to be planted once. Just be careful what you use and where you use it!

email: mikeepp@mindspring.com