Backyard Planter Bed Help
jmscv
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mojavemaria
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Help with stormwater creek bed in back yard
Comments (12)I agree with Elementalgardener. I have been working with rain gardens for the past four years, and they really do work, if designed properly. Just bear in mind that if you slow water down, it will drop sediment so whatever collection device you design will eventually fill up. So better to keep soil there and instead use plant roots to slow it down and collect it, and then release it into the air. It is a great system called "evapotranspiration" and nature has been doing it without problems for millions of years. Always easier to work with nature and save yourself some time, money and energy in the long run. Let your land do what it wants to do naturally, work with it and tweak it to solve your problem. Patchwork solutions that don't do this (and there are gazillions of them out there and gazillions of people who will charge you to install them), and eventually will have to be redone, which is fine for the purveyors of these types of solutions, keeps them in business. A man made swale can be a good solution, but its not just anybody who can do it correctly. Do some research first. Here are some guidelines: 1.Start at the source (figure out where the water is coming from and where it goes after it leaves your property) 2. Integrate the solutions (realize that what your neighbors are doing is going to affect what you can do, and vice versa. Best solutions integrate the whole picture, not just what is going on in your yard) 3. Maximize permeability (the ability of the soil to absorb the water) 4. Minimize directly connected impervious areas (give the water a place to slow down in between areas where it can't infiltrate) 5. Use drainage as a design element (meaning it doesn't have to look ugly, it can look very cool! Also, you may have to implement a whole series of smaller solutions rather than just one big all-purpose one.) Sometimes these gardens are called "bioswales" meaning they utilize the shape and benefits of a swale, and then also add plants that not only look good but provide more opportunities for water infiltration, along with evapotranspiration (that's when plants release water into the air, which they all do, significantly). Research is just beginning to show how that contributes to managing water problems. Anyway, that's just the tip of the iceberg of some considerations. Good luck!! Maybe check out a raingarden forum if there is one....See MoreHelp with bed /border shapes in my odd backyard
Comments (10)This also brings back a flashback of my own situation. I had been landscaping my backyard over the years, but in pieces and not as a whole landscape. This resulted in several disparate forms, a gazebo on a berm (circular), lawn (rectangle), and playset on bermed area (another rectangle). It wasn't until I saw a little side-bar snippet and drawing in Fine Gardening (don't remember the issue) that referenced "recieving forms". I posted here awhile back my excitement about this (see link to thread below). A recieving form is basically relating shapes to one another, be they bed shaped, lawn shapes or berm shapes so that the peices look that they "go" together, which unifies an area over a stretch of negative space. For example looking from space at the earth, it's easy to see how S. America (brazilian coast) can fit into the west coast of Africa. This type of re-structuring your lawn shape and bed shapes will help to bring together all of the areas of your backyard into pleasant spot. Also consider adding some berms for changes in elevation (assuming drainage won't be adversely impacted)to add some interest and aid in the recieving form effect. Here is a link that might be useful: Recieving forms...See MoreSeek advice - Whats the best raised bed layout for my Backyard
Comments (11)Ok, I'm not sure I am reading your diagrams correctly so bear with me if I'm way off base. But it appears to me you are wasting a lot of space with so many paths, and overly narrow paths at that, just to have so many different beds. So my first question would be why so many beds? More beds is not necessarily more productive or more useful than fewer but bigger beds would be. Is the E-W directional placement of the beds what is limiting you? If so, then that isn't any sort of absolute "law". Lots of gardeners use N-S beds quite successfully and they can be easy to compensate for the direction by arranging plantings and crop rotation. And it would appear that in your case using a N-S orientation would allow for a much more effective use of space. 3' or 4' wide beds that could be 12, 14, or even 18 feet long. For example using Version 7 diagram, one 3x14 foot long bed could abutt up to the patio edge on one side and you'd have a 3' path between it and the green tree band on the east. Follow m? 1' wide paths are basically useless for any practical purposes and 2' paths aren't much better. You'll live to regret those narrow spaces. So on the south side, if you feel you MUST run E-w then combine some of those many tiny beds into fewer larger ones OR make 2 N-S beds that are 4'x-24' long with 3 foot wide paths all around. Much less wasted space, more growing space, essentially the same amount of fill required, and I would argue more attractive than having a bunch of tiny little beds crammed together. Make sense? Dave...See MoreNeed ideas for large, sloping, backyard flower bed
Comments (9)Just because a website says a plant should do well in a given area doesn't mean that is necessarily will. All information must be taken with a grain of salt and then verified before one invests too much. I'm sure the original design intent is that the junipers grow together and be the "groundcover." Using mass shrubs as groundcover has the disadvantage that it's difficult to limit their height without mucho maintenance. What inevitably ends up happening is that they become too large and unwieldy, make somebody unhappy and then get ripped out and replaced. Adding another groundcover in between them would look weedy. Though I would do this if you intended to replace them with that other groundcover, and remove the juniper as the other groundcover took hold. Another disadvantage to the sea of junipers is that you really can't add trees (though it looks like some might be useful for screening) because of the shade they produce. Plants that demand full sun It would help on the weeds if you used Preen, a pre-emergent herbicide that attacks germinating seeds, and mulch heavily. Many people give up on Preen because it usually doesn't do a great job until after its second application. And also, because they don't adhere to the schedule, putting the second app. on way too late so that it becomes just another "first" application. I have found it to be effective and basically a life-saver. It can cost a fair amount to cover a large area, but in my opinion it still beats the total cost of hand weeding once the time and PITA factor is added up....See MoreLyn Nielson
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