Creating Your Ideal Yard

Do you ever dream about what your yard could look like some day? As you look through garden catalogs filled with beautiful trees, shrubs, flowers and pictures of beautifully landscaped yards--complete with ponds and garden sculptures--the choices seem endless. Before ordering hundreds of plants or giving up because you cannot decide what you really want, let us take a closer look at Xeriscaping your yard.

Generally, people are looking to create an attractive, peaceful and private environment. So take a look at your yard, ideally how would you like it to look. What features are you looking for? How will you use each space? When you start to design your Xeriscape yard, you need to keep a few things in mind. You are looking to create a sustainable landscape, which is attractive, is balance with your local climate and requires minimal added resources, especially water.

Another thing to consider is your long-term and short-term goals. Your short-term goals may include creating your Ideal Yard in sections, or keeping in mind that any new plantings will need extra water to get them started. A long-term goal might be to have a sustainable landscape designed to your maintenance needs.

Your Xeriscape design begins by considering many different factors. Part of this process will include answering some of the following questions:

• How would you like to use the space that you have?
• What conditions currently exist, that you need to address? For instance, existing trees, large rocks or boulders, local or homeowner association covenants.
• What is your budget? Are you looking at doing all or part of the work yourself?
• What is your timeline for completing the project? Will it be completed as a series of smaller projects over a number of years?
• What are you looking for as regards to maintenance? Do you want a high or low maintenance yard? Or something in between?
• Ultimately, what are you looking to create?

Remember, a professional landscape designer / contractor can help with the design and construction process, and the local nursery with plant selection.