Secrets To Landscape Success: Part 4

Study Your Landscape. Study Your Area. Know Your Climate.

It is best to look at your yard different times of the day. Just like you did from in the inside of your house look at all angles and different vantage points around the outside of your house.  Take particular attention in any space you may be spending a lot of time and have large focal pieces.  Even look in different weather conditions and think about the different times of the year.

An easy way to document this is by taking pictures of the different views, weather and times of day. This way you can go back and look and refer to your landscape plans and put the pictures to use to visualize this more. Especially for those who may not be as spatial as others. Meaning, those who can not look at something and see in their mind what it will be transformed into.

This will also allow you to see where shade will fall and where rain pools. That way you can use the plants accordingly in low-light areas and areas of more or less natural saturation. This makes choosing plants that are well adapted to your yard’s conditions and zoning. Here, ground coverings, such as Pachysandra, are used quite often especially since we have very angular yards sometimes with steep inclines.