Archive for the ‘Landscaper’ Category
Gopher pokes head out.
Many of us are familiar with the work of Bill Murray in the film "Caddyshack" - the slow-witted groundskeeper waging a personal war against a gopher who's decided to make the golf course his home. But if you really have a gopher and/or mole problem around your lawn and garden, you don't want to go the Caddyshack route and plant plastic explosives in the ground. So what's a do-it-yourselfer like you to do? For starters, all you need to do is keep reading.
Your first option to consider is fencing. If you have an easy garden and lawn to fence in from the outside world, you should be able to fence it off relatively easily. You might even simply want to isolate your garden so that you have to do as little work and fence purchasing as possible - this isn't a bad idea. If your gophers start to realize that the work involved with getting in your garden isn't worth the food present, they'll probably stop trying to get in. Keep in mind that gophers can burrow quite deeply into the ground, so a surface fence probably isn't enough; and having a fence might not solve all of your problems.
Another option to consider will remind you of "Caddyshack": flooding. If you know where the gopher or mole has been gaining access to your garden, you can "flood" it out by spraying water in there through a hose. Some people don't like to do this to gophers or moles, so it will be a personal decision for you to make. If you choose not to flood the gopher out, remember that you have to be thorough in the other methods you use in order to solve the gopher problem.
You can also find "sonic spikes" that can be installed in the ground, though some people have found these devices bothersome; if you live very close to your neighbors, for instance, there's a good chance they might complain about them.
Keep in mind that you can ask around about gopher traps if you want to make sure that you've actually gotten a gopher from the ground and under your control.
A gopher problem isn't a fun thing, especially if you recently put in a lot of work into your lawn or garden. But if you're diligent, you should be able to get the gophers out of your turf.
Photo Credits: ingridtaylar
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Posted by Fix Handyman on January 7, 2010 in
Backyard, How to Fix, Landscaper, Lawn, pests
Mulch. Mulch. Mulch.
Mulch. It doesn't sound like much, but there's a reason it's such a popular item to use around the home and garden. Mulch can help lock in temperature and moisture in soil, prevent weeds from going, keep unwanted critters out, decorate an area, and even improve the quality of the soil by enhancing nutrients (in the case of "organic" mulch). So if there's been something missing from your lawn or garden, there's a good chance that the answer to your problems is as simple as laying down some mulch. Here's how to do it.
First, mulching will depend on the kind of climate you live in. If you live in a cold-weather climate and your winters will see a thick layer of snow for months at a time, you'll want to apply cold-weather mulch before winter and make sure you replace it every year. If you live in a warm-weather area where temperatures are pretty stable year-round, you'll also want to annually replace mulch, but you probably won't need to apply it for the sake of the seasons.
Mulch can work in both temperatures, however, to keep the soil at a better temperature. In warm-weather areas, mulch can block out a lot of sunlight and keep the ground cooler - after all, you know how warm blacktop can get when it simply sits out in the sun all day. For cold-weather areas, mulch will have an insulating effect. For this reason, you'll want to apply mulch different: just a 1-2 inch layer in the warm weather areas, and more insulating mulch for colder areas, which means an even thicker layer.
You'll also want to plot out where you use your mulch. Mulch can make a great border between grass and garden; just remember that you probably won't be walking on it much. Take a look at your landscaping and ask yourself where the borders should go. Don't go overboard with them; simply realize that borders can really augment and improve the look of a great landscape design.
In general, the best idea for using mulch is to KISS, or "Keep It Simple, Stupid." Use mulch to help keep the soil protected and also provide a landscape border. Don't overdo it with the mulch; simply lay it, inspect it, and then leave it. You'll find that this approach will work just fine, and it will only take on Saturday afternoon of work.
Photo Credits: knitsteel
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Posted by Fix Handyman on January 5, 2010 in
Backyard, How to Fix, Landscaper, Lawn
Got deer?
Many people love deer, but deer can get into gardens and eat the flowers, which means that not everyone will always want to invite them in. If you have a lawn including a garden that's been attracting unwanted deer, there are some ways to keep them out. Here are a few of them.
Build a fence. If you've been thinking about building a fence anyway, but needed something to fence out, you may be able to kill two birds with one stone here. Building a fence to keep out deer doesn't necessarily have to be expensive, but you will want to make sure to keep your whole lawn covered from deer if you want it to be totally effective. Chances are you'd be building this fence in a heavily-wooded area, so be sure to browse around for the best kinds of fences for these terrains.
Warn the deer first. You don't need to stand in a hunting tower rifle in hand in order to scare deer away. You actually should have a few options. If deer are plentiful during a particular season of the year for you, you can apply predator urine to trees around your area in order to scare deer off - this has to be applied on a fairly regular basis, so if you're out gardening frequently, you can make this a part of your routine. If handling urine isn't your style, you can also think about motion-activated noisemakers that can startle deer away.
Make your garden undesirable. If you don't want to attract deer, maybe you shouldn't grow such deer-attracting plantlife! Deer love some items that can be found in gardens, and if enough deer are getting into your garden that it ruins much of the plantlife, you can try some of the above-mentioned tactics or simply start growing plants that deer don't like. If this seems like too much to you, you could also try keeping a border around your garden that will keep deer out.
A border could include a natural border through plants, an actual fence that you post up, and/or placing the deer-unfriendly plants on the outside of your garden.
You don't necessarily have to remake your entire garden or lawn to keep deer away. You simply need to understand how deer can be deterred and give them one powerful reason for them to keep moving along.
Photo Credits: Lee Coursey
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Posted by Fix Handyman on December 3, 2009 in
Backyard, How to Fix, Landscaper, Lawn
Got pesky garden slugs?
When you plant a garden, you do it either because you want to have delicious, fresh food to eat, or beautiful flowers to see every time you walk outside. Presumably, you didn't build your garden to be a home to slugs and snails, which can not only be irritating to have around, they are not beneficial to have around. So if you want to get rid of your slugs and your snails, just follow some of these quick instructions.
First, a quick word about chemicals and pesticides: when it comes to your garden, you don't want a lot of chemicals swimming around in your soil and on your plants. Chemicals can work very well, but when it comes to a tight area like your garden that features a lot of different types of plant species, you don't want the unintended consequences that can come along with chemicals. Stick to more natural solutions for now.
Remove the current slugs and snails by hand; or by glove if you're not all that keen in working with the little creatures. Place them in a plastic bag and throw them in the garbage, or if you want to be more kind to them, you can let them go free in the wild - far away from your garden. Once your slugs and snails have been removed, keep removing them frequently until you start noticing that they're finally cleared out.
What's to prevent them from coming back to your garden? Placing copper wire around your garden will help, as snails aren't often interested in crossing areas of copper. You can also put copper strips in key areas to keep snails specifically out of key areas, such as a specific plant.
The best ways to use pest control are the most natural, chemical-free ways. But if you have no other options, you'll want to investigate some possible chemicals to use like iron phosphate - the chemical you'll want to use if you're preventing snails and slugs from entering your garden.
Regularly maintain your garden - the more attention you pay to it and regularly remove pests and improve the quality of soil, the more you'll be ready to address challenges before they continue to grow. Let your plants do their thing, and do your best to protect them, and you should be fine in your garden maintenance endeavors!
Photo Credits: photogirl7
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Posted by Fix Handyman on November 24, 2009 in
Backyard, How to Fix, Landscaper
Got a dry lawn?
Sure, you can read plenty of do-it-yourself articles that focus on home improvement and fixing different appliances and fixtures in your house, but what if your lawn is the thing that needs repair? If you've just gone through a dry month and need your lawn to go from brown to green in a hurry, this post is for you. We'll take a look at some tips and techniques for getting your lawn looking, well, alive again.
- First, be sure what the source of the problem is. If you're not sure that it's the dry weather that's making your lawn brown, you'll want to figure out if it's a shortage of water or an abundance of hungry insects that's making your lawn go brown. If your lawn is brown in patches, there's a good chance that it's something other than the dryness - or at least not the dryness totally - that's effecting your lawn. If your entire front and backyard are both brown, you're probably looking at simple dryness. Hint: a good way to test this is to take out a clump of your lawn and look for the roots. If the roots are eaten up, you have bugs to blame. If not, the weather is probably the factor.
- Next, you'll want to make sure you apply the appropriate amount of water to your lawn. Look up your individual grass type or at least climate and try to find out the typical amount of water your grass needs to look green. You don't want to under-water your grass, but you don't want to over-water it either. Note: making sure you water your grass the proper amount doesn't necessarily mean that you'll want to conserve water. It seemly means that you'll want to find the right amount of water for your grass type - it might be high or low.
- Finally, you'll want to make sure you have strong blades of grass with strong roots. This is achieved by mowing your lawn with a high setting, meaning that you'll leave tall blades of grass. Why? The shorter the blades, the less need they have for strong roots to provide them with strength and nutrients. If you have longer blades of grass on a regular basis, the roots will grow strong and give your grass blades a healthy, attractive look. Remember that the more roots there are, the more water they'll need.
Photo Credits: Bill Hails
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Posted by Fix Handyman on September 28, 2009 in
Handyman, How to Fix, Landscaper, Lawn
Summer Blooms.
Let's face it: raising a garden isn't always easy. Even if you pull it off and design it well, there's still a good amount of manual labor and honest work that will go into it. Tilling soil, landscaping, acquiring seeds, and making sure that your plants get what they need to grow can seem like an everyday endeavor. But if you plan your garden smartly and know what will be involved, you'll be ready for a full, lush garden within a relatively short amount of time. If you want to plant you garden the right way this summer, check out these tips.
Look up all of the plants that work well in your area. It's one thing to plant a garden in Wisconsin during summer; it's another to plant one in Arizona in spring. The simple facts are that some plants won't thrive in some areas like they will in another. That's why it will be crucial for you to do your homework up front: what kinds of flowers and plants work best in your local climate? This doesn't mean you necessarily have to plant something that everyone else is planting. Hard research on your part will yield some interesting flowers and plants that other smight not have thought of. Bottom line? If you plant something in your garden, make sure you know what that plant needs. That way you won't be surprised if your garden seems lackluster this season.
Make sure your soil is high-quality. Local garden centers can help you with soil testing kits that tell you exactly what is happening in your soil. After you know what plants you want, you'll want to make sure to treat and till your soil that that it's ideal for plant-growing. You want the right nutrients and amount of moisture in your soil to be conducive to growing the plants you sew. So make sure that your soil is ready for those plants; if not, be prepared to buy some high-quality soil from the garden center and mix it in with what you've got.
Make sure that your garden gets the right amount of sun. If you can't plant a garden under a tree, look for an area that does get a ripe amount of sunlight during the summer. If the problem is too much sunlight in your area, ask yourself where you might be able to get shade for large portions of the day. Most importantly, ask yourself how the plants will receive what they need to - and how you might block what they don't need.
Photo Credits: brewbooks
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Posted by Fix Handyman on August 7, 2009 in
Handyman, How to Fix, Landscaper
How to Fix and Maintain Your Yard
Maintaining a great lawn isn't only about cutting it every week or so. Depending on the climate and area you're in, maintaining great lawn turf can mean a lot of different things. But the principles at play will remain the same: understanding your lawn, how to fix problematic areas, and following through with excellent lawn-maintaining habits. Once you learn how to maintain your lawn turf in the best ways, you can develop those good habits and keep them for the rest of your life. With that in mind, let's take a look at some great tips for maintaining great lawn turf.
Mow the grass at the right height. What's the right height? You'll have to do your own research on this because I can't predict what kind of turf you have. But looking up various types of grass and lawns, you'll be able to find the ideal heights to promote healthy growth and make sure that weeds and other problems don't develop. If you want to maintain a short lawn for its own sake, that might be a good idea, but you'll have to make sure that it's good for your grass, as well. If you want full, lush green grass, you'll have to consider your mowing height as a variable depending on the type of lawn you have.
Aerate your lawn after the dry or winter months. If you've been through a long winter, for example, your lawn will probably be hard and compact. Maintaining a good lawn means that you'll have to at least aerate it at the beginning so that you can both loosen up the soil and get more healthy air around the entire area. This will promote the recovery of your lawn back to its original lush green quality. In dryer states, this might not have the same effect, but you'll want to looking into aeration anyway.
Monitor watering time closely. Watering your lawn should also be a variable that depends on the type of grass you have. Dry states might need a lot more moisture than wet states, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't keep track of when your lawn is watered and how. For example, if there's been a plentiful rain fall and your grass looks lush a few days afterward, you can probably hold back on watering it. If there hasn't been any rain in weeks, you might have to keep a pretty strict schedule yourself. Remember that maintaining a good lawn means keeping up these habits in order to keep up with nature. If you make watering your lawn a part of your to-do list, you can keep tabs on your lawn without much thinking.
Photo Credits: SharkeyinColo
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Posted by Fix Handyman on August 3, 2009 in
How to Fix, Landscaper, Lawn
How to Fix the Look of Your Property Landscape
If you've ever looked at the plain green lawn in front of your house and felt that you could put a little more color in, you're probably a landscaper at heart. Many homes have elaborate landscaping that are the envy visitor and passer-by; some people who don't have this kind of landscaping around their home are left wondering how it's done. Don't fret. In this article, you'll learn how landscaping works and how to design one of your own so that you don't become a carbon copy of someone else's work.
First, scope out your territory. It's nice to think about your landscaping from your point of view - from inside the house - but the way most people will see your house is actually from the road or sidewalk. That's why it's important to scope out your own territory, no matter how well you feel you know it. Looking at your own land from a different angle can help inspire new ideas that you might not have thought of before; although there's no guarantee that this kind of endeavor won't be fruitless, you can at least have a new perspective and the chance for inspiration.
Second, ask yourself where the eye is gravitated to. Most of the time, people like to look at focal points on your lawn: driveways, mailboxes, paths, anything that sticks out from the flatness of the lawn itself. That's why you'll probably do most of your focusing on these areas. It's a nice idea to assemble some landscaping in the middle of a green lawn, but many times this can simply look out of place or even tacky. Instead, worry more about the "borders" of your landscape: how can you make the path stand out better? How can you make the transition from your house to the land itself a more attractive site? What can you do in the areas where your driveway meets the road? These are the kinds of question to ask yourself.
Sketch it out. Once you have the right questions, it's time to start dreaming up the answers. You can do this by drawing a rough sketch of your landscape. This doesn't mean that you'll have to be an artist or even make precise measurements; simply think about the overall property and how it will look if you implement the changes you've thought about. How will the colors go with your house? Will it be too much? Often, the best way to landscape is to do it in the simplest ways. That's why you'll want to sketch it out and remove any unnecessary ideas you had that won't work.
Photo Credits: sharon_k
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Posted by Fix Handyman on July 31, 2009 in
How to Fix, Landscaper
Create your favorite garden!
Whether the new season rolling around is spring, summer, or fall, it's always the time to think about your lawn. If you take a lot of pride in the way you treat your land and landscaping, but don't know exactly where to start in order to create a green and lush piece of property, this article is what you've been looking for. Preparing your lawn for the new season means knowing what your grass needs, how to avoid common mistakes, and making sure that you actually follow through with these tips. Let's take a look at how to best prepare your lawn for the new season.
Find a need and fill it. Different climates will mean different soils; that's why it will be up to you to find a need and fill it. Whether this means you inspect your lawn after winter to see where the weaker, dead areas are, or simply considering the quality of your soil and what it needs to become more fertile, you need to consider your weaknesses first. If your soil is dry, you might want to concentrate on sprinkler systems that can keep it moist throughout the dryer seasons. If the quality of your soil could be improved by adding more organic minerals to improve fertility, then buy some garden soil and spread it evenly in the most needed places.
Don't make the assumption that you'll know what your soil needs. You can head to a garden center and find ways to test the quality of your soil, and they'll be able to give you more tips for preparing your lawn in your specific climate.
Don't be afraid to destroy in order to re-build. This is especially true in areas where the winters are more severe; each season, there will be affected areas on your land that will be different from the rest of your land. If you need to dig, remove, or destroy some areas and replace it with different soil, then go ahead and make that change. Landscaping from year-to-year can include changes to keep up with your land; if you want to keep everything consistent, it still may be necessary to uproot before you start building again.
What are the places that might need a little bit of de-constructing before you start landscaping? Soil where dead grass seems persistent can need some uprooting and aeration. Borders that might include dirt or mulch could probably use re-freshening. Keep all of these tips in mind when you head to your local gardening center.
Photo Credits: katsniffen
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Posted by Fix Handyman on July 29, 2009 in
How to Fix, Landscaper
Four Tips for Typical Lawn Problems
One of the frustrating things about growing a lawn is that even if you work hard on it, unforeseen problems can arise that simply stump your landscaping knowledge. Instead of overworking yourself and burning out, you'll want to simply increase your range of knowledge so that you know how to address these typical lawn problems when you see them. That's why this article will explain some common lawn problems and some easy tips to help fix them.
Tip #1: Take out bare spots through aeration and repair.
Bare spots in your lawn can mean a number of problems, but often it means that your grass may be fighting off a disease and losing the battle. If you need to reinvigorate one particular area on your lawn, make sure to treat that spot specifically. Aerate the area to loosen the soil, perhaps add some fertilizer and make sure that there are enough seeds to allow grass to grow there again. If one area of your lawn is stepped on a lot, it can mean compacted soil, which can lead to poor grass.
Tip #2: Avoid weeds by cutting your grass high.
There are a few reasons for cutting your grass high, but one of this is quite simple: clipping your weeds at their high point will help avoid weeds. First, longer and healthier grass will have stronger and deeper roots, starving out the weeds by taking up most of the nutrients in the area. Short grass won't need as much strength, and this will allow weeds to spring up by using up all of the soil. Mowing your lawn high will clip the weeds and allow your grass to simply starve them out.
Tip #3: Water deeply and less frequently.
You might have noticed how healthy lawns can look after a really wet rainstorm. This is because deep watering can promote healthy grass by forcing roots to go deep in order to soak up all the moisture that they can. Deep, infrequent watering will support your longer grass and help build up their strength, making grass look healthier and making sure that there are less nutrients for the weeds to use up.
Tip #4: Make sure to test your soil at the start of the season.
Testing your soil - even in different areas - can help you understand what potential problems you might be potentially running in to. If you must, test your soil after you've noticed a problem, and see if the problem is being caused by an issue with your soil.
Photo Credits: chippenziedeutch
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Posted by Fix Handyman on July 24, 2009 in
How to Fix, Landscaper
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