Ask the Experts: Smart Landscaping

NTTA employees have a wealth of knowledge to share with customers and each other to help make life a little easier.  This month, we asked NTTA Maintenance Center employee, Tony Lucido, who has 13 years of professional experience as a registered landscape architect in Texas, to share tips on improving your own yard – whether you have a green thumb, or are just a beginner!

Start with the Right Ingredients

Proper plant selection is the first step, and it is very important to select the right plant for the right place.  Take time to study the sun and shade in your yard at various times of the day to understand exposures.  Lucido recommends selecting native Texas plants or plants adapted to this region.  The combination of native and adapted plants especially works well in residential landscapes.  Often times the adapted plants provide the winter greenery that native plants might not offer.

Make Your Bed

Prepare your planting beds correctly: remove turf and weeds, add soil amendments and till.  Turf and weeds must go, and if you have Bermuda turf, it should be chemically treated with a glyphosate product such as Roundup.  (Allow 10-14 days for a complete kill.)  Once you have removed all turf, add 2-3 inches of organic compost.  Compost not only improves the nutrient level of the soil, it also changes the soil structure to allow for more water retention.  Incorporate the compost into the soil by mechanical tilling or hand spading it to a depth of 5-6 inches.  This will also allow air and water to move through the soil.

Plants Should Sip, Not Gulp

Water conservation is a critical issue in North Texas, where about half of the water used in a home each year goes to watering the yard.  Lucido recommends breaking the habit, and only watering when it is needed.  Seeing is believing; making a physical inspection of the landscape is still the best source of information. 

You should also water the correct way.  Reaching root zones with water through drip irrigation or soaker hoses conserves water and is healthier for plant development.  Investing in quality irrigation controllers, rain sensors and hose timers also pays off.  Timing is also important: be sure to water during the coolest times of the day.

Finally, “top-dress” all plant beds with approximately 2 inches of mulch to regulate soil moisture.  Lucido recommends a shredded hardwood mulch since it tends to bind together and not float during heavy rains.   

Want more information?

On the Web: Lucido says Texas A&M’s Aggie Horticulture Web site is always helpful, especially the “Earth-Kind” information.

Resource books: Plants of the Metroplex and Plants for Texas by Howard Garrett are excellent for identifying plants.

In person: If your schedule allows, visiting local garden centers is also a great way to educate yourself about different plants.