February is too early!

            On the outskirts of town it is predicted to get to freezing next Tuesday! That combined with the extreme records from last month could be the breaking point for a already stressed frost sensitive plat. Do not remove the dead growth on any plants yet.

            Just because your neighbor’s landscaper did it last week, do not make it the right thing to do. (Think of what your mother use to always said, “You wouldn’t jump off a bridge just because everyone else was, would you?)

            I recommend waiting until March at the earliest to address the issue. If you HOA tries to say otherwise, get on the board and change that for next year. Freezing weather is common in February and very possible in March.

            With ground covers such a lantana you can usually cut it to just above ground level. With trees you should wait for new spring growth and selectively remove just the dead branches. With shrubs you have now the plants trimming tolerance. Shrubs such as Sages and Ruellia can be cut as small as you would like to help train a smaller plant, but less tolerant plants such as hibiscus and roses you need to wait for buds and or new growth to form and selectively prune back to that.

I am going to skip over seeding my lawn this year!

One of our HOA accounts has elected to only over seed the entrance area this year. Our top goal is obviously to do a good job with the overseeded area and make it look as good as possible. I am not going to go into detail on our process, there is plenty of literature out there one that. All I am going to say is that last week was way too early, and it still is this week and most likely will still be too warm for a couple of more weeks.

A very close second goal is to keep the non over seeded grass green as long as possible. We will do this through proper watering and fertilizer. Even slow growing grass needs water. A lot of irrigation controller out there have seasonal adjust setting on the dial, “never use it.” I learned a long time ago that I shouldn’t use absolutes like never or always, but I do to get a point across. I am sure that if another landscaper was to read this blog, they would give me a couple of examples of when they felt like that had to use that setting.

It is better to adjust watering frequency than run duration. For example if you were watering 10 minutes every day and wanted to cut the water in half you have two option on most irrigation controllers. Option 1 move the watering down to 5 minutes and keep it every day or Option 2 keep it as 10 minutes but water every other day. Most experts agree that option 2 is best. This can be summed up is one simple argument. Water duration determined how deep the water will penetrate and plant roots don’t move up and down in depth with the weather.

Drainage Problems

Is the standing water in the corner of your lawn after every rain? Or on the side of the house? Depending on if the problem might be affecting the foundation of your house, you might need to call a grading contractor or engineer. For minor problem you might consider installing a drainage system. There are two way to deal with the water, move it off site or help it into the ground through a dry well. Moving the water off site is usually the cheapest and safer solution.

Most yards are intended to be graded to drain all water to the front yard, and down the street to neighborhood retention area (often a park in newer HOA’s.) Many homes have issues with this not happening 100% correctly. It might be because the grading got changed during a backyard construction project or even the brick boarder to your grass is retaining some water, it is often a fairly simple fix.

If you don’t have a slab of cement that would need bored under or a giant tree with a web of roots in the way, a drainage box and some corrugated pipe will be your answer most of the time. If boring is required, you have some calculating to do. A drain box and corrugated might still be your answer pipe, but more often you might be easier and cheaper to dig a dry-well to help the water percolated fast.

Give us a call and let us help you make that decision.

Weeds

This has been a fairly wet year so far, rain counts at Sky Harbor don’t conform that, but the weeds starting to pop up everywhere do. Sense it has been a lot of little rains, the water isn’t getting to deep in most places, which means herbaceous not woody weeds. This is better, because they are easier to control. There are two main classes of Herbicide (Weed killers) are Pre-emergent’s and Post emergent’s.


Pre-emergent’s are to be sprayed on the ground before you can see weeds. They help “prevent”/reduce new weeds. The more frequent they are applied with the correct timing, the better the results, they’re most effective closest to application. Sense most of the pre-emergent’s have 4 month and 6 month mix ratios. My opinion is that it is best to do 3 properly time 4 month applications. Their seems to consistently be three wet periods in the Phoenix Valley: Late Winter/Early spring (February to Early April); Monsoon (July and August) and fall (Late October to Early December). That’s not to say they there is never rain in between. If your budget does not allow for 3 applications, two can be timed for decent results.

They are a few products out they that have Pre and post emergent property, because they are usually a mix of two or more chemical, they are more expensive and both are rarely needed everywhere on a property.

Post emergent’s kill existing weeds. Even with a pre-emergent plan, a few weeds might needs sprayed with a post emergent. If you are having a problem vegetative growth ([not from seed] Bermuda grass where you don’t want it) you will need a post emergent because pre-emergent will not control it.

July Coupon

Download June and July's Coupon at:

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B7Dd2BXSU817SU5tZElSb3NrRDg/edit

Monsoons season is here again.

During monsoons everyone’s first concern is trees. If you have ever seen a whole tree or a majority of a tree on the grown after a wind storm, you might have thought to yourself that tree needed trim before the storm? Most likely that tree was trim before the storm, the issue is that it was raised not thinned. A high percentage of the “trees” planted in the Phoenix valley are some verity of Mesquite, Palo Verde (Brea) or Iron Wood. The word trees, is in parenthesis because that is the biggest problem; Mesquites and Palo Verde’s are not trees they are very large shrubs. A tree is “self pruning.” If you want to see the difference between a self pruning and non self pruning plant, go to a northern Arizona pine forest and then go to the natural desert (15 minutes out side of town.) In the pine forest you can walk through it with little to no ducking, and no human punned them. In the desert the Mesquite and Palo Verde’s will a have branches all the way to the ground. If the placement was right on tree when planted in a urban landscape, it should never be raised more then 1/3 the height of the tree. If you do raise the tree higher, it likely will became top heavy or grow unsightly suckers. If a “tree” is top heavy is needs thinned, or it might be one of the trees on the ground after the next storm.

The second concern should be the waste of water. This is the time of year when the desert gets a lot if its yearly ran. Most landscapes can do without irrigation water for a several days after a rain. A few ways to handle this are to: manually turning off the water, a rain sensor or soil moister sensor integrated into the irritation system. Most irrigation clocks are compatible with one and/or the other. Rain sensors are great for grasses and ok for shrubs. They have no way of sensing how deep and how long the water last in the soil, so that aren’t ideal for tree lines. Soil Moister sensor are great for all three categories but are usually a little more expensive.

June Coupon

Download June Coupon at:
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B7Dd2BXSU817TkRpWW9DVm5melk