By HILARY JOHNSON
Garden Landscape Design Mistakes You should Avoid
Designing your own garden landscape is very fulfilling especially, if you have successfully managed to achieve your goals and have seen in your garden what you have drawn in your plan.
However, there is a chance that you may not attain self-satisfaction if you become careless before, during, and after making your garden landscape project. Here are some garden landscape design mistakes that you have to avoid.
1.) Failure to make a plan. Most people, out of excitement, will start putting plants and shrubs all over their property thinking that this move will make their yard look good. Before you start any home improvement project, you need to draw you plan.
You need to start on a paper and sketch your whole yard with details of the things you want to see on it. This way, you eliminate the risk of ending up with nothing but a yard filled with different plants, ground covers, and shrubs scattered all over. Draw a plan and stick to it!
2.) Doing the whole garden landscape all at the same time. Landscaping is an expensive investment and the last thing you can do is to assume that you can finish the whole thing in one blow. Plan your garden landscape design in phases.
This way, you can finish one area of your garden one at a time. Do not rush the project. It is better to start and finish a portion of your garden than to begin planting your whole yard and leave it incomplete.
3.) Failure to irrigate. A constant supply of water will ensure that the plants in your garden will stay alive all year-round. However, during summer, when plants need water the most, you go on vacation and nobody will water your garden.
What you should do? You can call a relative or a neighbor. But this is not worth the risk, right? The right thing to do is to install in automatic irrigation system.
4.) Failure to put winter interest in your garden landscape design. Your garden landscape design should stand during the 4 seasons – especially during winter when most plants wither. Your garden should be alive during winter. In planning, choose plants, shrubs, and trees for winter interest.
5.) Failure to put fall interest. As was mentioned, your garden landscape design should have interests for all 4 seasons. While summer and spring receive most attention, it is also equally important not to miss out the colors that fall brings. Research on the plants and shrubs that flourish during autumn.
6.) Treating the lawn as an indispensable landscape element. Not because everyone else has lawn in their garden landscape, means that you are obliged to have it as well. Take note that there are other options to consider other than sticking to lawn which, by the way, requires at least once a week mowing.
7.) Failure to work with what you have. One common failure of homeowners deciding to have their garden landscaped is copying to their garden what they see on the magazine. The thing is, before you start your garden landscape project, you have to know your yard.
The characteristic, texture, and nature of your yard influence or dictate what type of plants and other landscape materials you need to have.
Studying carefully which are appropriate to put in your yard will make your project successful and your investment worthwhile.