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Principles and Practices
Maintenance
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Most landscape companies offer maintanance on some level. There are the "mow and blow" companies, which do just that. They mow the lawn, blow off the paths and sheer the shrubs into boxes, usually spending an hour or less per property. Other companies offer a deeper level of attention, more thorough pruning practices, irrigation repair and fertilizing schedules. However, they still miss important ecological elements of landscaping that help address the environmental problems we face today. Using harmful chemicals, polluting water and degrading top soil by removing green waste material, throwing it in the landfill instead of letting it decompose to feed the soil.
In my practice, I bring the best elements of a detail oriented landscaper, a keen focus on aesthetic beauty, while doing it in a way that puts the environment as the first priority, for example I use electric tools (leaf blower, hedge trimmer, chainsaw, weed eater) as a small step to being more environmentally conscious. I love to work with color, creating works of art in the garden with many layers, shapes, sizes, sounds and fragrances. Most of all though, I appreciate the garden as a center of activity. I love to attract insects, butterflies, bees, birds and reptiles to my properties. I feel that there doesn't need to be a compromise between beauty and ecology.
Pruning:
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Pruning is one of the ways I set myself apart from other landscapers. I have years of experience pruning all kinds of trees and shrubs from the pickiest to the most tolerant plants. Timing is everything with pruning, I develop a schedule with all my properties of when to prune each plant. Pruning for disease treatment and prevention are part of my practice as well. If you have fruit trees, berries or other kinds of food bearing plants, I have experience in keeping them healthy, happy and productive. I prune plants so that they are healthier, and more open, allowing better air flow and discouraging insect infestations, however, I do so in a way that accents the natural shape and growth pattern of the plant. Much in a way a sculptor works with their material to bring out its natural beauty, I let the plant tell me what form it wants to be and I try to bring that out.
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Weeding:
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Weeds can be the biggest and most consistent problem in any garden. Often controlling weeds is the breaking point for people who normally would be avid gardeners. Adding in the layer of ecological mindfulness doesn't make it any easier either. Steering clear of pesticides and herbicides makes it a lot more difficult and time consuming to control weeds. I don't have any short cuts for this but I do have the experience in holistic weed management to know how to gain control of the problem. With weeds that is the goal. Turning a weed problem from an overwhelming situation to a manageable one doesn't happen overnight but with timing, diligence, and knowledge it can happen.
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Pest Control:
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If weeding is heavy-lifting for the gardener, pest control can feel Herculean if not impossible. I find that holistic pest management is not only the ecological solution, but often it is the most effective solution as well. When a pest problem is approached from multiple angles and addressed in as many ways as possible, however small and seemingly insignificant, long term success is much more likely. Often the environmental conditions surrounding a plant are more the issue than the plant itself. There are times when a plant has an incurable disease and there is nothing that can be done, but frequently the case is that a plant is struggling because it is in the wrong spot, getting too much or too little water, or the surrounding bio diversity is not strong enough to prevent harmful organism populations from getting out of control. It can be a frustrating process, but ultimately, ecological pest control is much more effective than spraying chemicals on a monthly or even a weekly basis.
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The following is a summary of the core elements of my landcare broken down into simple catatgories
Soil building, Water management and Habitat. It by no means is a comprehensive treatise of the ecological landscaper, but I find it helpful in summarizing my overall approach.
Mulch and compost:
Soil Building
This is the simplest and most effective solution for long and short term soil restoration. Annual applications of mulch and compost will add life and nutrients to the soil and keep it there.
A thick layer of mulch (any kind of organic soil covering) has countless benefits to the soil. It provides long term food for microbes in the soil, which in turn break down the mulch and create compost over many seasons of activity. This not only creates healthier soil structure, but it also helps prevent nutrients from leaching out of the soil with the rains. Other benefits of mulch include protecting the soil from erosion, protecting plant roots from extreme temperatures, providing habitat for various organisms, and reducing water evaporation to name a few. For an initial application of mulch , I tend to go as thick as possible, from 4 to 6 inches if not more, and from there I recommend 1 to 2 inches be added annually replace what has been broken down by hungry microbes.
The most common way to add mulch is to order wood chips from a company. This works well as a quick and easy way to add a lot of organic matter quickly. Another avenue though is to use the "Chop and Drop" method. Simply put, when you prune off branches from the garden, mix it in with the existing mulch rather than throwing it away in the green bin. This also works for leaves and certain weeds.​
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Cover Crops:
Using cover crops is not just for farmers. The concept is planting a vigorous vegetation that grows during the winter and can be cut down at the beginning of spring to feed the soil. This can also be done throughout the growing season, harvesting non invasive weeds in the garden for soil food while removing the pest species.
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Leave the Leaves:
While planting a cover crop can be an effective step to building soil, one of my favorite methods of builing soil is to use the resources that are generated by the garden itself. In addition to bringing in amendments from outside sources, there is a large amount of orgainic matter that is created by your trees and shrubs that can be used to feed the soil. Not only does leaf debris break down and feed the micro organisms in the soil but it also is used as a site for insects to lay their eggs and overwinter. If you have a butterfly or pollinator garden, you have to have segments of your garden dedicated to leaf debris. It looks messy at first but I find that the more I see it as a center of life, the more I appreciate the beauty of it.
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Water Managment
Water Conservation:
Saving water has been front of mind for more and more people, especially in California. Residential landscapes can be a fantastic opportunity for water conservation on many levels. The first thing i recommend is to get a smart controller for the irrigation system and a water flow sensor. This allows the proper management of how much water is being used every time the system turns on. With that in place, all adjustments and overhauls to the irrigation can be measured accurately to maximize efficiency. Examples of adjustments to irrigation are:
-Changing over to drip irrigation instead of sprayers
-Organizing your irrigation zones into "Hydrozones" so that all low water plants water on the same station, med water plants are on a different station and high water plants are on a different station.
-Changing sprinklers over to MP rotator high efficiency sprayers
-Keeping up on repairs
-Eliminating unnecessary irrigation
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Water Harvesting:
Another approach to water management is water harvesting. This is a practice that involves setting up elements in your garden to capture water in your landscape and store it for future use. This can be as simple as digging basins and ditches in the garden that collect water and infiltrate it back into the soil instead of running off into the storm drains or as complicated as rain water catchment systems where roof water runoff is stored in a tank to be used later or even diverting grey water from the house out into the garden (shower to flowers). There are pros and cons to each practice and often the best solution is a combination of them.
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Soil Building:
The importance of soil health cannot be confined to one category. A healthy soil goes a long way towards proper water management. I would argue that you cant have an efficient water system for your garden without good soil. A soil with high organic mater not only absorbs and stores water at a greater capacity but it also allows water to infiltrate the soil faster, decreasing runoff from rain and irrigation. Along with that, a thick layer of mulch will reduce evaporation significantly, reducing the watering requirements for your garden.
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Plant Choice:
Often it is said that to have a healthy garden you need to consider the right plant for the right spot. If a plant prefers part shade and you put it in full sun, its probably not going to thrive. The same goes for watering. A plant that is in a bad location may need additional watering that it wouldn't ordinarily need. Proper consideration to plant location can have a great impact on how much water is necessary to maintain your garden. Choosing native plants and drought tolerant plants whenever possible is something I highly recommend as well. This is where it helps to have a wide knowledge of plants in order to find drought tolerant alternatives to common garden plants.
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Habitat
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Habitat can seem like a fringe category, like icing on the cake, but the more we unpack what it means to incorporate habitat value in our gardens, we find the greater effect it can have on the overall health of our gardens. Between native bees, beetles, birds and butterflies, you'll find that the more these visitors pop up your garden, the healthier you're mini ecosystem will be.
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Pollinator gardens:
A pollinator garden can have many forms depending on what you want to attract. You can cater to native bees, honey bees, flies, beetles and butterflies. A lot depends on the plants you choose but most concepts apply to all the types of pollinators. If you give them food, water and shelter, they will find your garden and happily grace you with their presence. The key I try to emphasize is growing a wide variety of flowers of different shapes, sizes and bloom times. Having flowers blooming all through out the growing season gives pollinators a year round source of food until they hibernate for the winter. The variety of flower shapes accommodates the different shaped mouth parts of pollinators. If you are interested in a butterfly garden, there is an additional consideration for plant selection. Not only do butterflies need a source for nectar, but they need a host plant for their larva to feed on as well. After a consistent food supply, a nearby water source being available is very important. A simple birdbath dish is all that's necessary but there are plenty of fun ways to incorporate water into your garden. Lastly the element of shelter is best addressed by not cleaning up green waste. Leaves, twigs, logs and dormant shrubs are places insects love to lay their eggs and overwinter in. Ground nesting insects also need patches of bare earth to dig in for their nests too so leaving some bare soil in some areas is a helpful thing to do to encourage pollinators.
Native plants:
My affinity for native plants is not worth me trying to hide. I love native plants for innumerable reasons, primarily because I find them more beautiful and interesting than non natives. That being said, they do offer more as a foundation to a bio diverse garden than non natives. Native plants have unique relationships with other native organisms in their region. These are lifeforms that have evolved together for thousands of years and over that time have become dependent on each other for survival. While some types of insects can survive on a wide variety of plants as their diet, certain insects can only eat one species of plant. If that plant isn't there, they won't survive. What this means is that in order to foster bio diversity, a wide range of regional native plants is necessary to have a strong diverse insect population. With that strong insect population comes other forms of life that depend on those insects for food. Larger insects, spiders, birds, reptiles and mammals will appreciate having a healthy food source that non native plants aren't able to provide. Bio diversity is ecological resiliency. A diverse system can withstand more stress without failing. Drought, late frosts, heat waves, floods, ect.
Bird gardens:
Bird gardens can be seen as a natural extension of a native plant garden. While a bird garden can be as simple as hanging bird feeders and having a bird bath, it can be taken to a deeper level by integrating the same concepts as native and pollinator gardens. Having a diverse population of insects for most of the year will go a long way to having birds make their home in your garden. The elements that take it from pollinator garden to bird garden are water and shelter for our winged friends. Bird baths are always a welcome addition and can come in many different forms. Ponds, water features and streams are great for encouraging birds to visit. As far as nesting sites, there are many types of bird boxes you can buy or build to make little homes for birds. Different sizes attract different species of birds. Along with this, planting dense shrubs and trees also attract birds to build their nests in. For this purpose, I generally let these plants stay dense rather than prune them to be open.
Care and maintenance:
Maintaining a pollinator garden is an exercise in aesthetic discipline more than anything. Being able to let things get brown and ugly during the winter time is a big part of having a habitat garden. this doesn't mean that the whole garden has to look like a chaotic explosion, but there has to be space dedicated to overwintering critters. Exposing butterfly eggs to harsh frosts will effect how many butterflies you will have in the spring. As with anything garden related, timing is everything. Thats why I create a schedule for all important tasks for each client to ensure that each plant during each season is given the proper attention it deserves. It isn't always a straight line of progress but I am dedicated to getting the results that people can appreciate in all seasons while feeling good about their relationship to the planet and its beautiful creatures.
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