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Give
Your Garden a Makeover Have you ever watched those shows on TV when a designer makes a ho-hum room look like a showplace by just rearranging the furniture? Ever wonder why we can't do that ourselves? I think we become house blind. After awhile, we just don't see our furniture and accessories anymore and can't imagine them any other way. A designer comes in and sees the possibilities in all our everyday items. They move things around, put stuff in the closet, take from other rooms and voila - a whole new look. The same thing can happen in our gardens. After years of looking at our plants, we really don't notice them anymore. Overgrown landscapes completely cover the exterior of the house or mushroom into the driveway and eat up the front walk. My theory is when people move into a new house, they have one year to make changes - after that they become house blind, too. So strip off the blinders and really look at your garden. It can be greatly improved without spending one dime, just by using variations of the same methods the home designers use. Transplant: Move your furniture! Sometimes a nice plant is simply wasted by being overwhelmed by other plants. Last year we needed a palm tree to replace a frost damaged one. We decided to move a palm that made little impact where it was originally planted. It was actually a nicer palm than we could have bought, didn't cost us any additional money, and is a showstopper in its new position. The moral of the story? Try to use what you already have before buying anything new. Transplanting small or young plants is easy because they have a fairly compact root ball. Older, more established trees and shrubs, however, have a much larger root system. To minimize damage, encourage a compact root ball, and lessen transplant shock, try root pruning the plant first. Using a sharp spade or shovel, cut a circle around the tree the size of the root ball you want to move. Cut straight down the depth of the shovel with each thrust. Wait a month or two, then dig up the root ball, which should be full of healthy new feeder roots. Replant at the same soil level and water well. We used this technique last fall to move a 5-year-old 8 foot tall crape myrtle with great success. Divide: After a few years, many perennials can develop into huge unwieldy clumps that bloom poorly and are out of scale with your garden. Dig up the clump and divide it into several new plants. Replant these by spreading them through your garden. This will give you "repetition", a technique designers use to give your garden a pulled-together look. Eliminate: Do you really need it? Decide if a planting arrangement is enhancing the area. Homeowners and landscapers alike are usually guilty of over planting. Plants are planted to make a garden look full initially. It may be time to take some out. Do you have five trees crowded along your fence where three well-grown ones would actually look better? Take two out. Do you have a plant that is bug and disease bait and never really looks good? If it's not adding to the landscape, take it out. How about a plant that is a pruning nightmare, sprouting straggly arms as soon as you turn your back? Again, if it's too much trouble, doesn't look good, and you have no other place for it, get rid of it. You'll be amazed how much better your landscape looks without it. Expand: Most people start with narrow rectangular beds hugging their house and fences. Sometimes when plants have grown too big for the bed, the answer isn't to shrink the plants but to expand the beds. While you're at it, be sure to add a little curve to the beds too. Bigger beds mean less maintenance because leaves and other debris will drop into beds and not on the lawn and you'll have less lawn to mow. This spring try using your imagination instead of your checkbook
to give your garden a fresh new look. Move things around, split
things up, and get rid of stuff to get a look the designers
would be proud of! January 22, 2004 |