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video that's right for you. Welcome to Home Time. In this videotape, we're going to give
you a thorough introduction to the basics of landscaping. We'll apply some of the principles,
let me tell you, on this tired old yard here. The plan we'll be working on has been designed
for this Cape Cod style home in a northern climate, but we'll be focusing on things that
hold true for any yard and in any climate, including yours. And we'll get started right
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Before starting, let's first talk about what we had to work with here. The home was built
in 1936 on what's basically three city lots. There were several mature trees and a lot
of overgrown shrubs when we began an extensive remodeling project, which is now finished.
The addition basically cut the backyard in half, and our goal now is to totally rework
the landscape around the house. We lost one of our big trees during construction, but
we saved this one and made it the centerpiece of the new deck we built around it. This blending
of the old tree, the new deck, and the new addition illustrates one of the basic principles
of landscaping, incorporating the best features of the yard into your landscape plan. It's
the plan we'll talk about next. A good plan is the most important factor in creating a
good landscape. That's because it takes most do-it-yourselfers between three and five years
to finish a big landscape. Well, first of all, it takes more than just a couple of weekends.
Second of all, the plants and materials alone can run into the thousands of dollars, so
it gets spread out over a few years. Well, you definitely want to start working with
a long-term plan. The last thing you want to do is the first year, you'll say, go wild
on a bunch of flower and shrubs, and the next year plant all kinds of evergreens. In the
third year, well, decide that we'll build a deck where we planted half our evergreens
last year. Without a long-term plan, you're going to end up spending a lot more dollars.
This was put together by Rosalie Towne, who's a local designer for the nursery providing
our plants. Let's get you oriented here. This is the house, this is the garage, and this
is a deck we just finished building as the first part of our landscape job. Rosalie filled
in around the house and around the edges of the yard with a series of planting beds and
dozens of plants. This is definitely a three to five-year plan, folks. Each of these symbols
represents a type of tree or shrub, so you can see all the work it would involve. Well,
for this videotape, we're going to focus on the beds around the house that would correspond
to what you typically might do the first year in a new landscape, or maybe the first and
second year. The plants alone are running $3,000 for that part of the house. That's
why it makes sense to execute the plan in stages and spread the cost out over a few
years. But many nurseries like the one we're dealing with will provide a free plan like
this, and others will give you a big discount if you buy all your plants and materials from
them. Now, it's definitely possible to draw up your own landscape plan since the basic
principles of landscaping aren't that complex. So we're going to lay those out for you now.
We're also going to show you how to put some of your ideas on paper. But not everything
is covered by the basic principles, like for instance, what are the growing conditions
in your area? What plants are available? So it's not a bad idea to check with a landscape
pro in your area before you spend a lot of dollars on your own design. Now, the first
consideration is the style of landscape that will work best with your property. Well, our
house has kind of a cozy look to it, and Rosalie has enhanced that with an informal style in
her design. That's where the beds have curves rather than straight lines, and where the
plants seem to be placed almost at random. That's all very carefully planned, though.
You'll see it come together later on in the tape. But right now, let's take a look at
a finished example of an informal landscape. This video shows a newly planted garden done
in the English garden style. It was designed to harmonize with the architecture of the
home, and it features mass plantings of shrubs and perennials with no formal borders between
them. Compare that to this garden, which shows the formal style of straight lines and perfect
geometrical shapes. Featured here are a garden house, patio, and concrete stairs, which create
a classical garden next to the house. The highlight is an aerial hedge, which follows
the arc at the end of the patio. Here, the plantings seem orderly, not random, and they're
closely managed and pruned to maintain the formal effect. This formal garden is laid
out for a somewhat different effect. The brick walkway forms a square, leading to a circle
of plants in the rear. That's the formal influence. But the flowers and shrubs are laid out in
an English garden style with mass plantings of perennials and annuals and no formal borders
between, so you can actually combine formal and informal styles in the same landscape.
This garden was just planted in the small backyard of a townhouse, and it shows an oriental
style in its use of rocks, evergreens, and water. And a lot of different plants were
used to create several perspectives. The highlight is a mock rock spring next to a formally shaped
pom-pom juniper, and this one is done in a woodland style to blend in with a wooded backyard
in the sloping terrain. Even though the waterfall looks natural, it's actually man-made and
it operates with recirculated water. The terraced hill is planted with a variety of native and
woodland plants, creating the type of natural rock garden you might see in the woods.
Okay, let's assume that you've decided which styles you like best. Your next consideration
is what you want your landscape to do for your house and yard, besides make it look
nicer. Here's where you want to start thinking about the function you want your landscape
to perform, like creating new areas for play and leisure, increasing privacy, and blocking
the sun, wind, or street noise. You should also think about ways to improve the view
of your house from the street by framing it better or highlighting the entryway, but don't
forget about the views from inside the house. If you have large windows or French doors,
think about how you can improve the views you now have through them. The same would apply
if there's a porch, patio, or a deck. If there's no outdoor seating area, you might include
one in your new plan and then work on the view you'd have from that area. Finally, check
out the rest of your neighborhood and try to imagine how your ideas would blend in with
the other yards. There's a certain value in keeping a visual continuity between the houses,
so you might think twice about anything that's wildly different. In fact, you might want
to incorporate some of your neighbor's ideas in your own yard to promote continuity. If
you do that, then you'll be starting to think like a designer, but you also have to be thinking
about some of the other materials that designers work with, the trees, shrubs, and flowers
that actually make up the landscape. If you're going to plan your own landscape, you'll need
a pretty good idea of which ones will work in your climate. Trees, shrubs, and flowers
are all categorized by their plant hardiness, which means how well they perform in different
climate extremes. North America has been divided into ten climatic zones in the plant hardiness
zone map put out by the U.S. Department of Agriculture with zone one the coldest and
zone ten the warmest. National plant reference guides and nursery catalogs will list the
plant hardiness by zone, so once you determine the climatic zone you live in, you can figure
out which of the plants will thrive in your part of North America. Your local nurseries
will, of course, stock plants that are hardy to your climate, and if they do carry any
non-hardy plants, they'll alert you to the special care those plants need to survive
in your climate. In addition to the climate factor, there's also the sun factor for trees,
shrubs, and flowers. Some need full sun, some need full shade, and they won't thrive in
the opposite extreme. So plant guides and catalogs will also list the plant's sun or
shade requirements, and that's something you have to consider in your planning.
Your catalogs and guides also list the plant size and maturity, which is critical for proper
spacing on your plant and in your yard, and this catalog also lists the time of year when
the flower or shrub is in bloom, and that's a consideration when you're trying to maintain
color in your yard through the entire growing season, spring, summer, and fall. The main
thing to be concerned about is what your trees, shrubs, and flowers look like. Now, if you're
like me, you look through one of these catalogs, you find dozens of things that you like, and
then later on you forget what they were or where you found them. So we think it's a good
idea to get extra copies of the catalogs if you can, and actually cut out the pictures
of the plants you think might fit into your landscape, and cut out the plant descriptions
too so you know at a glance all the important facts. This step won't really help if you're
just going to put in 20 lilac shrubs, all of the same variety, but it will help you
keep a range of trees, shrubs, and flowers in mind if you plan to mix quite a few into
your new landscape. All right, we've got you thinking about landscape, plants, styles,
and functions. Now we want to turn those thoughts into a workable landscape plan. Well, first
you'll need some big sheets of paper because a plan should be to scale with an eighth inch
on the plan equaling a foot in the yard. That's typical scale. And you can get graph paper
with the grids laid out in eighth inch scale. Well, these three-sided rulers are handy too
because they have this eighth inch scale marked off as feet, which means you don't have to
convert all the measurements yourself. Just read them off the scale. Of course, you'll
have to get all the measurements before you start drawing. If you're lucky, you'll have
a blueprint left over from the construction with all that on it. Otherwise, you'll have
to measure it yourself. You'll need the basics like the yard's length and width plus the
dimensions of your house. You'll also need a pretty good idea of where the house sits
in the yard in relation to the boundaries of the property. To be exact, measure from
one corner of the house to a couple of landmarks, like a corner of the yard or a gate. Then
after drawing out the perimeter of your yard and marking the landmarks, set a drafting
compass to the measurements and draw an arc the proper distance from each landmark. The
corner of the house would be where the arcs cross, and you can measure out the rest of
the house from there. That's kind of an involved technique, which you don't need for every
landmark in the yard. But you should be pretty close on any existing features that will impact
your new landscape. If your drawings look a little amateurish, don't worry. Just so long
as the measurements are accurate and you can read everything when you're done, that's really
all that matters. Let's say that you've got your yard drawn and you want to try out some
ideas on your new landscape. One tip that we've learned is to use tracing paper at this
point so you don't have to redraw the yard over and over again. Now what I've drawn here
is a hypothetical house and yard. It might not look like your yard, but as we step through
a couple of likely plans for this house, we'll highlight the basic principles you can use
in your yard. Let's start with an informal style. We'll first frame the front of the
house with taller plants anchoring the corners. For example, a shade tree like an ash on one
side and an ornamental tree like a flowering crab on the other. Not exactly symmetrical,
but that's typical of informal landscapes. By the way, spreading these out a couple of
feet will make a small house seem a bit bigger. The entry would be framed on each side with
a group of taller deciduous shrubs like mock orange reaching a height of five to six feet.
Now a series of medium sized shrubs along the foundation would cover any exposed block.
One option would be spreading junipers maturing at a height of three to four feet. Again,
we don't want these too orderly to keep that informal style. To finish the beds off, we
would use a series of short shrubs like spirea, mostly to round off the outside edges. And
then we'd fill in here with a mass planting of perennials like a stillbee. The finished
plan shows how carefully planned the informal layout really is despite the random look that
it presents. Notice how we built each bed with the short plants in the front, the medium
plants in the middle, and the taller plants in the back. Now that's a basic rule you should
follow to keep all your plantings visible from the front. Now we'll take the same basic
house plan and treat the landscape a bit more formally. We're starting here with a low formal
hedge. Alpine current would be a nice choice, trimmed in this case to a height of two feet.
We'd want to see pretty straight lines and square corners here, nothing rounded or curved.
We'd frame the entry with a pair of upright conical evergreens, possibly techniarbivite.
Along the foundation, we'd continue the geometrical sequence with a globe-shaped medium sized
slab. One option would be a Japanese U. For color, we'd fill in the middles of the beds
with tall perennials that would be visible above the hedge. Daylilies come to mind for
that. To finish this treatment, we'd anchor the corners of the house with a pair of ornamental
trees, maybe a couple of flowering crabs pruned to hold a globe shape. Well this example shows
the main features of a formal layout, straight lines, geometrical shapes, and a sense of
balance or symmetry. Well let's look at some other landscape issues. Like if there was
an immediate need for a privacy barrier with the neighbor's yard, we could put up an eight
foot privacy fence along the boundary. An alternative would be a hedge of tall shrubs
like lilacs or arborviti, but that would definitely take longer. A tall hedge like that would
also be a way to soften a long featureless wall on one side of the house. A row of evergreens
on the north side of the house would provide a real nice wind barrier in the winter. And
a few shade trees on the south side would eventually shade the house in the summer,
but drop their leaves in the winter and let the sun warm the house. We're not landscape
designers so we're not saying like these are great plans or anything, not at all. We're
just trying to give you an idea of what to think about as you start jotting down your
landscape plans. So, I think we're ready to get to work. You found the loppers, huh? I'm
going to grab this rake so it doesn't fall off. I have the chainsaw gassed up. Well the
plants are all set and we're finally ready to start landscaping. Our basic plan is to
lay out the planting beds and rip up the grass and put the plants in. First we have to get
rid of some tired old shrubs. Well these shrubs here are about 30 or 40 years old and you
can see they haven't exactly improved with time. Plants like this are supposed to frame
the house. These are too flat, they're all too far from the house and they're just plain
too scraggly looking. So, really about the only choice we have is to rip them out. Well
we're using garden hoses to lay out our planting beds here. They're flexible so they work real
well in laying out these irregular areas. We want everything to look all sort of random
once it's all planted. At the same time, a lot of thought goes into exactly how we're
doing this. So we're trying to follow Rose Lee's plan as closely as possible. The nursery
sent out these little rulers. They convert the eighth inch scale on the plan to feet
so it makes it easier to get our measurements. Like off the corner of this house we want
to get this curve here so we take three measurements off the plan. We go 90 degrees off the corner
of the house and we get 11. Then we go 45 degrees and we get 13. And another 90 degrees
and we get 9. Now we put stakes in at those points and loop the hose around to match this
curve. Yeah, I was thinking the same thing but we've got a lot of stuff to put in it
so it should be pretty big. That's true. Boy, it looks kind of weird when you first start
laying it out and see all the side you have to take out. Okay, tweak this one a little
bit here. Alright, how's this looking do you think? Good. You all set there? Yep. Okay,
well now that we have all the beds laid out, we're going to cut our side down to the top
soil. Now Robin's been edging around the outside here with a square nose spade so to cut out
the side we're going to be using our side kicker here. It has this little blade that
goes down to the depth of the roots of the sod so it's just a matter of getting this
blade started and then kicking it along as you go. Moist sod is heavy so getting rid
of it is the hardest part. You can always use it to cover up some bare spots in your
lawn or you can put it in a compost pile. I knew this one guy to save time he just turned
it upside down in the bed and then buried it about six inches. The next year he had
grass coming back up through there. He's still pulling grass out of his bed so your best
option is to just get rid of it completely. You all done? Yeah. Now a hose can get kicked
around as you're laying it out here so it's not a bad idea to spray in the line. As I
mentioned before the side kicker is a pretty handy little item. With a little bit of luck
you should be able to find one of these at your local rental center. Well we've got all
the beds laid out and cleared and we're ready to install this plastic edging. Now this isn't
absolutely necessary but it makes a good barrier for keeping the grass from invading the beds.
It's made out of plastic with this round bead on the top that stays above the surface that
separates out the planting beds and this web here, the bottom portion, let me get this
up here, this web portion gets buried under the ground and these grooves tend to anchor
the edging in the ground since the edging has a tendency to work itself out of the ground
during winter frost heaves. Sometimes this edging can be a little stiff or twisty if
it comes in a coil so you might want to lay it out in the sun for a few minutes until
you're ready to work with it. While the strips have been warming up out in the sun I've been
digging a trench here to bury the edging. I'm going down six inches which should do
a good job in accommodating the depth. Now the depth of the edging itself will vary.
More expensive stuff going four to six inches into the ground. If your winters bring a lot
of freezing weather try to get the deepest edging available because that resists heaving
a lot better. I've seen this edging come in strips 60 feet long but these 20 footers
are pretty common. Can you grab that for me? Yeah. Okay. Once it's manageable you just
put it into the trench with the bead the same height as the lawn. Well once we have the
edging in the trench it's a good idea to stake it in place and we do that at each one of
the ends and about every 10 feet or so and we can brush some of the dirt back in cover
These come with plastic connectors for splicing but they can still separate after a couple
of winters so to strengthen the joints we cut back the bead a few inches to allow us
to double up the web. Here you go. Now the webs will overlap the amount that Robin cut
the bead we have our connector here in the middle and that'll hold everything in a straight
line and then I'll just run a stake right through both of the webs and that'll really
hold everything in place very nicely. Well we got all of our edging in and we were able
to fill in the sod over in this empty area with some of the sod that we took out right
over here and now's a real good time to make any amendments to the soil in terms of drainage
or chemical composition. I'll tell you with what we're working here we're going to be
fine. Yeah all we're doing is adding black dirt to build up the soil against the house
and then slope it down away from the house. This keeps rainwater from pooling up against
the foundation. With a big project like this it's not a bad idea to have a couple yards
of black dirt on hand. If you're stuck with some miserable looking topsoil you can improve
it by adding some black dirt to it, compost or peat moss which is what we're going to
need here. At this point we're not figuring a lot of flowers but in this bed we're putting
in a ground cover known as Pacasandra. Now the nursery recommends that we first prepare
the soil by mixing in about 4 inches of peat moss. Now you don't want to work with this
stuff in the wind. I'll tell you it'll be gone in no time. What we're going to do is
just spread it around the dirt here and we'll work it in with a rotor tiller. What it'll
do is just keep the soil nice and loose so the roots of the ground cover can spread out
real nicely and evenly. If you've never planted bear rich shrubs before then pay close attention
because they're different from planting any other form. First of all you want to take
a plant off the bundle just one at a time and then cover the rest back up so they don't
dry out. And then before putting them in the hole cut about a quarter inch off the end
of each root and this is to promote new growth. You want the hole about six inches wider and
six inches deeper than the roots themselves so these holes aren't exactly going to be
massive. You also want the crown of the plant that's the area right where the roots start
to be right at the surface level. Okay that should do it. As soon as you get the right
depth you want to make a mound of dirt on the bottom of the hole for the root mass to
sit on. Now it should be high enough so that the crown is just above ground level or two
to four inches higher if you're planting and having mulch. How's that? A stick laying
across the hole will help you determine how high it should be. Okay that looks pretty
good there. Then you fill the hole halfway with soil and pour water over that to help
it settle. These are going to need a lot of water the first week and this is just the
first drink. Well now's a good chance to reposition the plant and then bring in the rest of the
soil and just place it nice and firmly against the roots. And these are really the basic
steps in planting bare root stock. As a final step they say it's essential to heavily prune
the plant to help reduce the shock of replanting. They recommend cutting about one third to
one half of all the branches off. But since this plant is going to be pruned as a hedge
we'll wait until they're all planted and then prune them all at the same time. Well the
strange thing about bare root stock is you can compact so many plants together in one
little area like this. In fact we were talking to one of the guys at the nursery and he was
saying people will call up to order three plants by the time they get them to their
house they think they've got just one plant and they'll end up sticking three of them
into one hole. We've moved ahead and got all the forsythia planted. What I'm doing now
is trimming them off as recommended. You want your hedges to be wider on the bottom than
they are at the top, slanted on both sides so you cut them at an angle. This promotes
leaf growth throughout the entire plant and makes a nice full hedge. Now it doesn't look
like we're doing much because the plants are so small but it's good to start training
a hedge right off the bat. It's a good idea to put the bigger plants in first and then
plant the smaller ones in around it. That's if you've got any strength left. That's why
we're starting today with the trees. Now these bald burlap plants have got to be some of
the most awkward things to haul around here. Ideally it would be great to have the nursery
set right next to where you want it but it's not an ideal world so hauling it around this
tarp is probably one of the best things to do. Now what you don't want to do is carry
the tree around by the trunk. It could damage the root ball. You could get away with rolling
the ball a few feet but that could crush the roots so be very careful. Now this is one
of the four Hawthorns we're going to be putting up here in the front yard. It's going to
serve to anchor this end of the bed here. Now we're following the plan really closely.
Rosalie laid out the plants knowing just how big they were going to get at maturity so
we want to plant pretty much according to this plan. Being off a couple feet on a tree
like this in a bed this size may not seem like that big a deal but if you're in the
wrong spot as the tree goes larger the branches may end up lapping up against the siding or
some of the other shrubs become more mature. It may become more obvious that in fact you've
got it in the wrong spot. Seven and a half feet to the left and then four feet out. Now
it's a little difficult sometimes to come up with the exact angle to locate this off
the house so the easiest thing to do is to measure straight off the front of the house
and then come out a 90 degree angle. What was that four feet? That's by far and away
the most accurate way to locate it right there. By the way you never know when you're going
to run into electrical sewer or water lines so always make sure to check with your local
utility companies before digging in your yard. We're okay here but we do have an electrical
line in the backyard we'll have to watch out for. We've heard a lot of different suggestions
on how big to dig the hole for trees. Now the nursery sent along these instructions
which should be pretty accurate because they guarantee their plants a hundred percent.
They recommend digging the hole six inches wider than the root ball. For the depth they
say that the top of the root ball should be three to four inches above ground level if
you're adding mulch. If not it should be just a little higher than ground level. You really
don't want to eyeball these things. What you can do is take a board, lay that across the
hole and then measure down from it. What have we got here? Nine and a half. The last thing
you want to do is dig the hole, throw the ball in and then find out that it isn't quite
deep enough. It can be a little difficult to get back out. Will you help me muscle this
thing in? Oh sure. Okay. Just a little more. Okay here. There we go. Boy those spines are
sharp. Yeah they are. Okay here. Make sure it's straight. The burlap is biodegradable
so you can actually leave it on after planting except on the top. You should pull it back
there to expose the surface and fold the burlap down the sides. Otherwise it will wick moisture
away from the ball. Now you just start filling up the hole here with dirt about half way
up the root ball. At this point you might be tempted to fertilize but you don't want
to do that on trees the first year. Fertilizer just encourages leaf growth. The first year
on trees you want to encourage root growth. Regular fertilizers can also burn the roots
but there are slow release fertilizers that work over a three year period. The nursery
sells them in these packets and they're developed by the University of Wisconsin and you just
throw them right into the planting hole. Now that's if you're concerned about your soil's
nutrients but we're not. Ours is fine. If you've got a heavy clay soil some growers
recommend mixing this back fill with peat moss to create kind of an intermediate zone
for the roots to grow through between a good nursery soil and hard clay. Usually your existing
soil is going to be this fine. Once the hole is filled up half way you want to soak it
real good with water. This packs down the soil and makes sure that the roots are getting
adequate moisture. And to remove any air pockets just jab the hose in and out of the soil around
the root ball. It looks funny but it will help the roots. Now at this point if things
are looking a little lopsided you can do some adjustment but actually this looks pretty
good so just fill in the rest of the dirt. Well now that we have the hole filled we're
forming a basin around the root ball with the extra soil. This will pool water over
the root ball which needs a lot of moisture the first week. Once the basin's all set then
you can water it to soak the root ball real well. Now you don't have to worry about over
watering the first week. If anything you have to worry about not getting enough moisture.
Well now that you have an idea of how to plant a bald and burlap tree we've got about six
more to put in so I'm going to go ahead and measure those and then we can dig them. Well
we got all the trees in so I think we're going to call it quits for the day but before we
stop we want to talk a little bit about pruning. Now once the trees are in the ground it's
a good idea to cut some of the branches back but before we do this it helps to take a look
at a catalog to see what this tree is going to look like once it's mature. What you might
look for are any branches that are too low on the trunks. Now remember the branches stay
at their initial height no matter how high the tree grows. One rule of thumb is to leave
the stems clear up to a third of the overall height. Also look for any crossing or inward
growing branches and cut those off so they don't choke each other off. Be sure to remove
any dead or broken branches like this. Try to cut them off just above an outward growing
branch to promote spreading. As we said earlier we're going to keep these trees well watered
during the next week and before we call it a day we're also going to give the shrubs
a good soak. We're going to start planting those tomorrow. Pruning bald and burlap trees
isn't mandatory but by thinning out some of the branches and improving the overall
shape it will help the tree's appearance. Plus then the roots can concentrate their
nourishment on areas where you'd really like to see the tree grow. I think this should
work out fine. See a little bit closer together. Didn't we have this discussion the other day?
Well I just don't want to get them too crowded. Well this is just what Rosalie had on the
plan. Besides I think they look kind of lost and alone if they're too far apart. I can't
argue with that. Plus I suppose we can always prune them back if they start looking a little
too tight together here. Right. We think it's a good idea to try out your plan before you
actually start to do any digging. Just place the plants in the beds where they're supposed
to go. Well this is also a good technique if you're just working with a few plants
and not a big plan. It gives you a good idea of how everything's going to look all together.
True. But you want to think ahead a few years to what your plants are going to look like
as soon as they mature. Like here up against the house. We don't want our foundation plantings
to get too tall because of these low windows. These intermediate yews can get three to five
feet tall. But they respond well to shearing so we can keep them kind of as low as we want.
Okay. Want to check that for me? That's a lot closer. The steps involved in planting
a bald and burlap shrub are basically the same as what we told you yesterday for planting
trees. Starting with the hole being six inches wider than the ball. And where the ball sits
in the hole depends on whether or not you're going to mulch. In this area we're going to
be putting in four inches of mulch. So when everything's all said and done we want the
top of the mulch to be level with the top of the root ball. How's that look? Is it getting
better? Now we just pull this twine off and then peel back the burlap to expose the top
like we did on the trees. Okay. I can finish this. It's not really necessary to add fertilizer
for shrubs either. But you could put in a slow release fertilizer at this point. Now
we just back fill it halfway, water it, finish back filling it, and then form a basin on
the top. We'll be pruning the shrubs just like we did the trees but we'll wait until
everything's in the ground. The next thing to go in now are the asperia. These are container
grown but digging the hole is the same as doing the bald and burlap. You want it six
inches wider than the container and a depth that leaves the surface of the root ball just
a little higher than the finished surface of the bed. The main difference with container
plants is that you need to take the container off the root ball. For smaller plants like
this, these one or two gallon that we have, place your hand on the root ball around the
crown to support the plant. Tip it upside down and tap the sides of the container until
it's loosened up. Take the container off the root ball like that but don't drop the root
ball, you could damage it. These container grown roots tend to grow in circles so before
planting take a knife and make four or five vertical cuts like this to get the roots growing
out again. Then it's ready to go in the hole. Okay we're all set. Now the rest is the same
as for bald and burlap shrubs. Backfilling, watering and building a basin for water above
the root ball. Well be sure to check the moisture on these before you plant them. If they're
too dry when you flip them upside down they could fall apart. In fact it's a good idea
the night before to take all your container grown plants and water them so they're all
set to grow the next day. Now these range in sizes from one to seven gallons. Now the
larger ones you're not going to be able to just flip upside down and hold on when they're
going to be too big. So as an example lay them on their side, tap the sides of the container
and then just slide the container off about like that. Go ahead and cut the root ball
you're all ready to plant them. Well we planted all of our shrubs yesterday now we just have
a couple of things left to do. One is to cover all of our planting beds in four inches of
hardwood bark mulch. One of the main reasons for adding mulch is to discourage weed growth
in between your trees and shrubs. With an organic mulch like this you need to add a
full three or four inches to stifle the weeds otherwise they just keep popping back up without
any trouble at all. Now one thing about organic mulch is that it does decompose over time
so you have to do a little replacing every now and again. Another option is rock mulch
but there you have to put some type of weed barrier underneath so the weeds aren't sprouting
up through the rocks. Now make sure you don't use plastic because then water can't get through
to the plants. Instead use something like landscape fabric that still allows water to
soak through. We're leaning toward organic mulch because in hot weather it keeps the
soil relatively cool and it holds its moisture better than rock mulches so we don't have
to water as often. We want the mulch to pretty much reflect the contours of these basins
and keep water pooling over the roots. Remember we planted all these pretty high so the crown
of each plant is just a little bit above the surface of the finished mulch.
We're making a walkway in this bed with concrete paver blocks. We're just pressing them into
the dirt a little bit to hold them in place and then we'll put mulch around them. It's
not the most permanent walkway but it matches the informal style we have here. This area
here doesn't get much sun so it's going to be real difficult to grow grass so we just
kind of turn the whole area into plantings with buckthorns, yews, and a few hostas. Ready
for the next one? Yep. There we go. What do you think? Keep going straight pretty much
and probably... We ended up ordering 15 cubic yards of mulch
which may seem a little unreasonable but when you think that our beds are 4 inches deep
and it takes a cubic yard for every 80 square feet of beds at that depth, really we should
have the right amount here. Now you can get this stuff in bags but on a job this size
really the only thing that makes any sense is to have a truck deliver it, dump it off
in your driveway here and then just scoop it up as you need it. If you go with organic
mulch the actual material will vary depending on the part of the country that you live.
Like I like that cypress bark mulch. It's a really light colored mulch but it's expensive
here because I have to ship it from down south. Now down there it's cheaper and it's a lot
more popular. Right here? Yeah. Right there. They use a lot of pine needles in areas like
Texas and Florida. Down there they call it pine straw and it's pretty inexpensive. We
heard it smells really great too but we haven't used it ourselves. The point is you should
be able to find an inexpensive mulch made in your area.
Well we're working with a processed mulch which basically means it's been turned into
strips and shredded. Now working with a processed mulch is the best. It has a tendency to hold
together a little bit more so if you get a real heavy rain you don't have to worry about
the mulch, especially on a grade like this, sliding down the lower areas and leaving all
the dirt exposed. That hardwood mulch is going in all the beds except this one where we put
the pack of sand or ground cover. Here we're putting cocoa bean mulch which also covers
the soil but it's lighter so it doesn't keep the ground cover from spreading out. As you
might have guessed cocoa beans are not native to this area so it does have to be imported.
It's a pleasure spreading this stuff though because it does smell like chocolate chips.
Well we're just about done with our mulch here and what I'd like to do is show you some
of the things we've done back here to illustrate some of the goals of landscaping. Well first
of all we've created some new views for the windows back here. In the past all you saw
was this plain fence and there was an old brick fireplace. Now we've created a new bed
so when you look out the windows you can see that. This air conditioner used to stick out
like a sore thumb so by adding these four shrubs here we pretty well disguised that.
And the side of the house is real plain so we dress that up a little bit using four buckthorns
and add a little bit of color with a plum tree. Just one more reminder before we wrap
things up, keep a close eye on your plants during the first week to make sure that they
don't dry out. After the first week you can cut back on the water to about an inch a week
or less if it's raining. To check them just dig down the dirt a couple of inches and if
it feels kind of dry, well it's probably time to water. Well good luck on all your projects
and thanks for watching.
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Home Time is made possible by Chevy Full Size Pickup, the most dependable, longest lasting
full size pickup on the road.