First home. Need your expertise on facade, landscape, and driveway!
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3 years ago
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3 years agoA&B
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Help Please I am from the Home Forum and Need Your Expertise
Comments (11)Gracie, It is OK. Perhaps, if we are successful, we will help you grow into a gardener. You know, as beautiful as any home is and can be, each home needs a lovingly planted and well-maintained landscape to showcase it to its' best advantage. If you are in the Oklahoma City area, you are in zone 7. If you have clay soil, the absolute best thing you can do for your plants before they are planted is to amend the soil so that it both holds water well and drains well. To do this, add the following to your soil: peat moss OR compost, composted manure and finely shredded pine bark (or cypress) mulch. You don't have to add tons and tons, but at least 2 to 4 inches as a minimum. Till it into the soil (if you don't have a tiller, perhaps you can rent one or borrow one). Then, rake and level the soil, and plant. You will notice that the improved soil is mounded up somewhat higher than the surrounding grade, and that is a good thing. Improving the clay even a small bit will help your plants to grow faster and to maintain good health. If you want to go one step further and make the area low-maintenance, cover the prepared soil with a cloth-type landscape fabric mulch. Peg down the ends of the fabric mulch with the landscape staples (U-shaped metal things) or plastic pegs (usually green, they look like large green plastic nails). Cut an "X" shape in the fabric and plant in that spot. When you're done planting, cover the fabric with the mulch of your choice. This extra step will repay you many times over by making that area low-maintenance. The plants will benefit because they won't have grass or weeds competing with them for moisture or nutrition. Now, about the plants. In order to decide what you want to plant, figure out what you like. I'd rather plant shrubs and vines that have a look to them that I like seeing, and not just a plant that someone recommended. If you don't know what you like, go to local nurseries or to the Botanic Garden or to the Myriad and look at the plants. When you see one you like, try to find out what it is. (Hopefully the plants are well-labeled.) BEFORE you buy, research the plant and make sure you understand its' needs. For example, some plants need full sun, some need full shade, others tolerate partial shade/sun and some (especially the holly family shrubs) can grow in either one. Also make sure you understand what the plants mature height and spread will be. It can be tricky. The red-tip photinias, as Randy and I have already said, can get very large. I have seen them get 20 feet tall and 10 feet wide in less than a decade. Since most people plant then only a few feet from one another, they begin to crowd each other out. Pruning them works for a while, but after several years of that, you have pruned them back to the point that all you have are huge limbs with lots of stubble covered by leaves. They are also overused, and I like using plants that aren't as commonly used. Your clay soil may be a faster-draining clay because it has some sand or loam, or it may be a heavy, thick clay that bakes brick hard in summer and holds pools of water in spring. Take the type of clay you have into consideration when choosing your plants. Last year,I compiled long lists of clay soil-tolerant plants for Emily. I'm going to go to this forum's back pages and find those and bump them up to the top for you. You might find some additional ideas there. You'll know them when you see them as they are titled "A Tree List for Emily....", "A Shrub List for Emily..." etc. Good luck and keep communicating with us. We'll do our best to help you. Dawn...See MoreNeed help with Landscape around my home
Comments (13)I have been asked so many times over the years, "What is the BEST _____?" Fill in the blank with "thing-to-build?", "time-to-cut?", and so on. I would like to dispel the notion that the "BEST" matters much. The answer is often that there are several, or many, bests and usually quite a bit of leeway. There is no need to obsess about absolute perfection. Better to look for what works well. It would be as if someone said "What is the best clothing to wear?" and intended to wear only that for the rest of their life. So many different plants a yard can "wear" and many would look good. Also, with the walk material, there are choices in both brick, pavers and concrete that would work well. Personally, with your house, I would keep it traditional -- like red brick or pavers in the standard brick shape -- and avoid styles that look modern or fakishly rustic. Get samples large enough to create something that can be seen from a distance, and appraise it. Since I had to invent the foreground it's understandable that the walk might not work as shown. It's just to give ideas. One would adjust as reality demands. A note about trellises: If placed in front of a wall, one would provide enough separation so that there was space between the wall and the plant. That way, it's never a problem with the siding. Also, I've never seen a ready made trellis that was worth a flip. It's something that must be custom made, though it's generally not a difficult proposition for someone with modest carpentry talent. The large dome-shaped shrub near the wall could be many thing. I'm not sure if it grows in your zone, but while I drew it, the plant that came to mind was Viburnum carlesii ... producer of one of the most delicious scents known....See MoreLandscaping to Hide Your Home
Comments (36)OneDevotedDame - if it's just me and hubby, I don't close the bathroom door. It's neighbor's that I want privacy from. I don't want to talk to the old man who pulls up (fly undone) and gums his way through what he's seen the neighbors do, what I did last week, etc. I just DON'T CARE, and I'd like my privacy. I've chosen a childfree life, so the only children I want on my lawn are the ones I've invited over. I don't want neighbors backing into my fence, or coming over to sell me crap I don't want. I do want to be able to have friends over for bonfires, to listen to music, to do silly things, and generally not be bothered by others. I want a huge garden and flowers that *I* see, not that the neighbors enjoy. THAT is why I've moved to a semi-rural setting, and am planting hedges and trees! HandyMac has a point regarding safety. For us, that means limiting access to the backyard with large wide rows of rosebushes (ow!), using strategic gates, and yes, lighting to discourage views, as well as an alarm system. But my neighbor leave his garage door open ALL THE DARN TIME, EVEN WHEN HE'S NOT HOME, so I think he's the bigger (ugly) target :P...See MoreNeed Curb Appeal! Driveway Landscaping and very large front rock bed
Comments (24)It would definitely be trouble to have two groundcovers (they usually spread sideways ... ivy does for sure) abutting one another in the same bed. How would you keep them apart? (That looks like English ivy in the picture. Algerian ivy is similar, but is a more robust, more drought resistant plant as I understand it. @longbranchstitch ... " I’m curious about the ivy comment. We live in the PNW where we battle ivy all the time ... I personally would never set out to plant it." You can't identify any use that it would serve ... covering and smoothing over rough ground? ... erosion control? ...growing where no other plants will? ....low cost per square foot of cover? ...evergreen for all-season use? Those are some of the reasons a person might want it. If none of those reasons work for you, why don't you get a serious program going that includes IVY KILLER, and get rid of it? If it's somewhat useful and you don't want to get rid of it all, why don't you consider learning to manage it? For example you complain that it grows up trees. It takes literally one minute per year to severe all the ivy growing up a single tree trunk. If you have 180 trees, that's three hours per year to solve that problem! How much time would it take to mow a lawn on which 180 trees would fit? ... maybe 50 times that amount of time and it would require an expensive machine! So the trade-off for ivy seems possibly favorable on that count. Anyway, you can evaluate whether it could be useful to you, or not, and then either get rid of it or get it under control....See MoreBeverlyFLADeziner
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