|
What type of plants are you interested in growing? This poll is closed. |
|||
|---|---|---|---|
| Perennials! |
|
142 | 20.91% |
| Annuals! |
|
30 | 4.42% |
| Woody plants! |
|
62 | 9.13% |
| Succulent plants! |
|
171 | 25.18% |
| Tropical plants! |
|
60 | 8.84% |
| Non-vascular plants are the best! |
|
31 | 4.57% |
| Screw you, I'd rather eat them! |
|
183 | 26.95% |
| Total: | 679 votes | ||
|
We bought our first house this summer that had a lot of what our inspector called "deferred maintenance" and that seems to have extended to the yard as well. We have been tackling the indoor stuff but want to start working on the yard and lawn in the spring. What are some good resources for someone in our situation? We have only a vague plan, which is 1: improve the lawn, 2: improve everything else. I've already done a few things with the grass, like spread weed & feed, try to kill moss with moss killer and spot treat broadleaf weeds. I've also been mowing and all that. What I think I'm looking for is resources that deal with lawn care to help me get the grass back in better shape, and something to help us identify the plants and trees already on the property, as well as something to help us develop a plan to prune, thin, transplant and add to the existing beds. A note about our chemical use- we hope to get things into a place where we have to use as few chemicals as possible. The yard, and lawn specifically, are kind of teetering on the edge of chaos. My limited reading so far tells me that the best way to prevent weeds is to have a full, healthy lawn to shade them out before they can grow. We want to get to that place as soon as possible. The lawn already looks 100% better than when we moved in but it has a long way to go.
|
#
¿
Oct 25, 2013 19:28
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 7, 2024 07:14 |
|
|
OK, images. These are from the inspection day and are not the greatest at showing the beds along the fences. They also don't really do the weeds justice, since they started growing like crazy as soon as the rain started. Front of the house. The seller took the two arborvitae in pots with them.  Right side of the driveway. Very dense and messy-looking. The property stops at the fence just visible on the right of the picture.  From the rear of the yard looking toward the front.  Same area as above, looking the opposite direction.  I believe these are known as "plants" but I might be wrong here.  Gross overgrown weeds along the side of the house. The lot is 8000 sq ft. The house is in the Portland, OR area (zone 8a). As for goals: green lawn (we like it), neater appearance and planting for more privacy. We like sort-of "ordered-chaos", where it looks cared-for but not straight rows of plantings arranged from tallest to shortest.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 25, 2013 20:33
|
|
|
Thanks for the comments and especially for identifying the plants in my yard pictures. If anyone's interested, I took some more pictures and assembled them into an Imgur album with some commentary here: http://imgur.com/a/qnSlJ If you're bored enough to look through them, I'm hoping to get ideas of what we have now and what we should focus our time and money on to get the most bang for our buck. I bought some books on landscaping to get ideas and they are helping me see that there are a lot of really great possibilities for our yard. If anyone can recommend resources on landscape planning, that would be very helpful. Right now, we still don't really know what specifically we want to do, let alone how to plan it out to the point that we could go to the nursery and buy plants. My next step, I think, is to get some graph paper and make a scale drawing of the whole lot as it stands so we can try to sketch out ideas.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 6, 2013 21:32
|
|
|
gender illusionist posted:Weed and feed with a watering can. I'm going to disagree with using weed and feed products. Weeds are best treated when they are actively growing. It would be best to put down a general fertilizer first, then in a couple of weeks spray a broad spectrum herbicide. The best time to do these things is during the spring and fall growing seasons. If you're moving in right now, you might still be within the window to do this- depending on your area. If you miss the spring growing season, don't fertilize until the fall. Just water over the summer. When the fall growth flush starts, spread a balanced fertilizer (10-10-10 or whatever) at the rate on the bag. Then in 2 weeks, spray some Ortho Weed-B-Gon or similar herbicide.
|
|
#
¿
May 27, 2014 16:34
|
|