Your Garden Project - How To Plant And Place Shrubs And Flowers

How to plant and place shrubs and flowers in your garden project. Here are some basic tips to ensure your shrubs and flowers stay happy and healthy. You have planned and prepped your new area outdoors and are ready to do the final step, positioning and putting them in the ground.

Placing your shrubs or flowers property is a very important. There are many different ways to design your beds, but correct spacing of each specimen is so important in allowing the plants to grow properly. The first step is to know how high and wide each plant will be when it is fully matured. When doing any garden project, think down the road a few years. You may get this project done and say to yourself,"wow, all this money and time and these plants look so small. I should have bought more." I have had many clients feel this way. Shrubs and trees take time to grow but with a little patience you will see the difference in the near future. Unless you buy a full size plant, each specimen grows at different intervals. Before you purchase any materials know the maturity of each shrub and flower. This will make it so much easier for you in the long haul. The average shrub comes in a one, three, five, or seven gallon containers. Flowers are put in trays of six, twelve or twenty four plugs. They also come in pint, one or two gallon containers.

The first tip is called a staggering pattern. This style of spacing can be done with any type of landscaped bed. Always place the shrubs first in their containers approximately where you plan on planting each one. Lets take an example of planting across the front of the house. Many people are doing this type of project today. There is no set rule of where to position your first shrub. Sometimes I will put the first one in the center and work my way on either side. You can also start at one end and work your way down to the other end. Remember not to place the shrubs too close to your foundation. Say you are planting all three gallon containers. Put your first one closer to the house, second shrub one to two feet away and position further away from the foundation. Continue this pattern all the way across the front. When you are positioning the shrubs, consider how to place them if they are at different heights. Taller shrubs look nice on either side of a window or door. When you have the containers all positioned, place your flowers the same way in their containers. If you have them in trays, separate each one or put them in groups and position the flowers. Gallery of plants - photos of trees, shrubs, flowers, and herbs can give you some suggestons for any project. Always step back and look at how you placed them. Now is the time you can play around and and take the necessary steps to make sure you like the way they look. Change their locations if you are not satisfied. There have been some jobs I have taken over an hour and a half moving plants around. I may move it six inches here or there. Take your time doing this part of the project. The staggered look is more of a free flowing pattern. I do this style in many of my designs.

Once the hole is dug, tip the shrub on its side and gently tap the container with your hands or a shovel. The shrub should come out easily. When purchasing shrubs at a nursery or local store, always check the bottom to see if the roots are showing or hanging out. This is a sign the shrub should be planted soon, or it has been in the container too long. Before placing the shrub in the ground, take your fingers and lightly loosen the roots. Make sure you do not damage any of them. Apply an organic mushroom compost or a slow six month release nitrogen fertilizer into the hole before the shrub goes in. You need to apply these two materials only once a year. Add a little more of the compost or fertilizer into the loose soil and fill the rest of the hole with the remaining dirt. Never mound the dirt up against the shrub. Plant all your shrubs this way.

Once the shrubs are in the ground, position your flowers the way you had done previously. Take a spade or shovel and dig your hole. Flowers do not have a large root system, so you don't have to plant them very deep. If the flower roots are small, put two or three plants together in one hole. Follow the same steps in planting flowers as you would in doing shrubs. Once you have the bed done, step back again and make sure you like their placement. This is the final time to make any changes to this project if you are not one hundred percent satisfied. It will take a couple of weeks for the roots to get established. Finish the bed by applying mulch, pine straw or decorative rocks though out the garden. Never mound mulch, pine straw or rocks right up against the base of the plant. Take a hose and turn the water on low and place next to each shrub.Water for five to ten minutes. Do the same for the flowers. Watering Techniques explains how to water trees, shrubs and flowers.

Finally it is time to step back and admire this garden project! You also can do a straight row of shrubs and stagger your flowers. Mix and match either pattern in any bed. Take these tips and you can easily position and plant any deciduous or evergreen shrub. Accenting the shrubs with annual or perennial flowers can create a wonderful new garden project anywhere in your yard.

Please feel free to send on the commit page questions you might have on any aspect of shrubs or flowers. I would be happy to help you work through any landscape project or solution.