If you like the outdoors, you will find nothing better than relaxing in your own backyard on a warm summer night watching your landscaping ideas come to live. While re-designing your landscaping is an exciting project, remodeling your whole backyard at once can be a daunting and expensive task.
Here is the solution: Break up your yard into areas and remodel one per year. This can be especially helpful if you are on a budget. Your outcome will be much better if you invest as much time and money as possible on one job, rather than attempting to redesign the complete backyard at once.
Although you are redoing the landscaping of just one part of your yard at a time, you still need an overall design strategy. A good idea is to sketch out your backyard, marking the permanent structures of your property such as the house, garden sheds, decks and trees. Then decide which existing flowers and shrubs will be a part of your new landscaping. Now make copies of your design and experiment with various layouts. Include ideas you like from landscaping magazines or gardens you have visited.
If you have kids, pets or like to BBQs you will probably prefer to keep the garden open and plant along the sides. If you don't need the room, you could create an impact with an center bed, walkways, solar powered lighting or a water fountain and some room for comfortable lawn chairs to relax on.
Here are some ideas to consider for your landscaping design:
If your yard doesn't have fencing, you might want to surround it with a row of bushes to create solitude and provide an evergreen background for flower beds. An island plant bed, as the name suggests, is planted in the center of the yard surrounded by lawn or a bed of pebble stones. Its form and size will differ based on your creativity and the available space. Size the plants from highest in the center to shortest at the edges. Permit sufficient space at the back of the plant bed for easy access. This will also provide necessary air and sunlight for the plants in the back.
It's also nice to have a perennial border. Select plants that will give a long colorful display - the first flowers should start blooming in Spring and the last in Fall. Make sure to place tall plants in the back and plant shorter plants in the front. Naturally, not all plants won't be the best choice for every climate.
The most challenging part of landscape design is deciding on flowers that complement each other both in color and height. The number of perennials proposed in the following is for a 6 feet wide bed in a mainly sunny scenario. Plant groups of three to five plants of each kind and allow 16–18 inches in between each plant. Allow 20–22'' between the different plant groups. Planting an odd number of plants is more attractive than an even number.
Perhaps some of these gardening tips can be overwhelming for first time gardeners. If you want to find the best solution for your backyard landscaping ask a local landscaper, a landscape designer or landscape architect for help. They will offer professional advice for your backyard and make sure your plant selection will be best for your individual landscape.