Once I have determined my style, and committed to how much time and effort I want to invest, what do I do next?
Create your garden plan
Make a drawing of the garden area. Include existing and future fence and building boundaries, water, sewer and electrical access, location of walkways, gates, windows on each building and how high they are off the ground so you can decide how high a shrub will be to keep a view open or to purposely block it. Then, lay out each “room of your yard” (e.g. bbq area, playground, sitting area, etc.) with boundaries. If you are not receiving consultation, consider flowing, curved boundaries that mimic nature. Next, you can draw in the plants making circle sizes to scale of their mature size. After the plan is completed, draw in irrigation lines. Some sprinkler companies and hardware stores will help with this for free since you are buying supplies from them. Also, nurseries usually help with suggestions on plants and design layout.
A plan example:
Making the plan come to life
Next, take lots of pictures in to the nursery along with your plot plan (yard and house drawn to scale) for the fastest and best help. Convey your style and the feeling you want to accomplish. If you have favorite plants you want included, be sure to start there so your consultant can make appropriate companion suggestions. Now, DO NOT DIG until you have your utility companies identify their lines that are on your property. They come out to your house and use marking paint to indicate where their lines are. They don’t want to spend time and money fixing lines and if you break their line, you are usually billed for repair. There is almost always one number to call (usually 811 or on line at http://www.call811.com/ ) that will alert all the utilities that you are going to do work involving digging. Any one of your utilities can confirm this phone number. It will involve your water main, sewer, cable, any underground electrical, gas and possibly others.
Be sure to use colorful flowering plants by the front door and walkway to indicate the main entrance for your guests. Include lots of color on your patio or deck for attractive entertaining. Use containers, as needed. Now, on to getting on with the foundational work.
Soil, soil, soil. With good, nutritious soil, you can grow most anything and with less effort. A good soil texture has the capacity to hold some water, nutrients and oxygen all at the same time. Professional nurseries know soil textures in their city neighborhoods. If in doubt, take a sample of your soil to them and they can add water to it and determine what your soil texture is. If you have sandy soil, they will recommend adding compost like nitrified redwood or fir mulch (not ground-up bark); sometimes, even peat moss. In loamy soil, which is the best soil because it is a balance of sand, clay and compost, you probably won’t need to add anything except fertilizer. In clay soil, you’ll need to loosen up the soil with gypsum and compost. Notice I’m not recommending adding sand to clay soil because doing so makes bricks. Plants don’t grow in bricks. An easy way to remember amending soil is this: “Clay on sand, money in the hand; sand on clay, money thrown away.” Both extremes of soil types, clay and sand, benefit from adding lots of compost. Gypsum changes the clay soil structure to act more granular, and therefore, drain better. Common to the central valley are hard pan and clay pan soils. This is an impenetrable layer of compacted clay that causes the soil to hold water, killing plant roots by drowning. Over time, deep tilling with compost and gypsum helps change the physical and chemical structure of the clay pan making it plant friendly. In the past, hard pan soils were drilled and cracked with dynamite. The soil below the hard pan is anaerobic and once penetrated smells like rotten eggs. In general, clay soils are more nutrient-rich than sandy soils. If you live near a river, you probably have a sandy soil. If you live in old agriculture land, the soil is more likely to be clay pan, which is caused from years of running heavy equipment over clay soil causing compaction. Hard pan, though, is a layer of compacted clay that is chemically bound and acts like concrete. You might need a jack hammer to penetrate it. Dynamite is no longer legal to use in most cities. If you have three feet of good soil above the hard pan or clay pan, you can grow most any plant. Large trees might require more root space, but everything else will grow well. As you can imagine, a large part of your time and money will go into soil preparation. It reminds me of painting. So much of the work is prep and is not seen, yet essential to success. Lawns require soil preparation six to eight inches deep. Shrubs and small trees perform best with two or more feet of good soil. In the case of untillable soil, you can build planter boxes and beds one to three feet high and fill with loamy soil for ideal conditions. For individual plantings, you can add a mound of soil and just plant into it. Till the native soil before dumping on the good soil and be sure to blend the two before planting. The mound should end up looking like a small mesa, flat on top so water will sit long enough to penetrate. If you bring in soil, be sure to have it checked out by a reputable nurseryperson so that you aren’t bringing in more trouble with poor soil, weeds, contamination, etc. If you pay for it, it’s soil. Dirt is free. Your wisest investment is almost always compost. In Sacramento, talk to Hastie’s Capital Sand and Gravel, Capital Nursery or Redi-Gro Corp. to buy what you need. Be sure to describe how you will use the soil or compost so they can sell you the right product.
Healthy Gardening,
K. Alan Brizzi
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