At one time or another, everyone's been there. Whether you're looking out the window at an out-of-control landscape that your home's previous owner installed, or realizing you have a landscape disaster and not knowing what to do or where to start, it's time to get your revival under way and get your landscape headed in the right direction.

Here are a few tips.

Tip#1 Avoid planting too many plants too closely

The single most common landscape disaster I see over and over again is plants that never should have been planted in the first place. Before any plant goes in the ground, you need to know its characteristics. These are usually on the label supplied by the nursery, and additional information is easily researched on the Internet. How tall and wide does the plant grow?

What kind of soil is required? What are the light

requirements — sun or shade or something in between?

Tip #2 Avoid plants that will grow too large for the space available

It seems like most mature landscapes that I see are all over-planted. It's perhaps a natural tendency when you plant, to want to fill in empty spaces. But stop, remind yourself that they won't be emtpy for long. Believe the description on the label; otherwise, in an amazingly short period of time you will be tearing out the plants or heavily pruning them or both. Remember, immature plants take several years to grow to their mature size.

Tip #3 Plant the plant in the environment it likes

Plant the right plant in the right place. In other words, place a sun-loving plant in the sun and a shade-loving plant in the shade. If you plant in the wrong location, you will spend a lot of time and energy trying to make sure it gets proper water or shade. As time goes on, plant will continue to struggle and eventually die. Put your plants where they will naturally thrive.

Tip #4 Never use landscaping cloth

Somewhere along the line, it became popular for many people and landscape companies to use landscape cloth as a so-called weed barrier. Not only is that a gardening myth, but landscape cloth makes for a maintenance nightmare and does far more harm than good. Landscape cloth actually inhibits water from getting to the roots of plants and prevents groundcovers from spreading. When you apply mulch on top of landscape cloth, it actually keeps the mulch from decomposing and doing its job. And it is not an effective weed barrier. Many, if not most weeds get into your garden via the air and grow from the soil surface down. Once weeds get rooted into and through the landscape cloth, they are next to impossible to remove without ripping up the landscape cloth and making a big mess. It seems wherever you look, it's easy to spot the unsightly landscape cloth flapping in the breeze in someone's garden. We can't stress this one enough — if your landscape company wants to use it, switch companies.

Tip #5 Mulch, but not too much

When it comes to weed control, use 3-4" of shredded bark, organic natural (non-dyed) mulch. Mulch keeps the soil cool, allows moisture to reach the roots of your plants, decomposes about 1 inch of thickness each year and adds organic matter to the soil. Weeds that do grow are easily removed. Refresh your mulch 1" each year. Never, ever use more than 3-4" of mulch and don't create "mulch volcanos." Mulch piled up against plants and trees will kill them. We have actually have had a number of cases where we have been called in to remove up to a foot of mulch that had been applied to gardens. In the case of mulch, more is definitely not better.

Tip #6 Remove deer magnets

Most properties in our area have a white-tailed deer problem and many landscapes are devastated every year. No matter what you spray, apply, or otherwise use to try to discourage the deer, you will achieve limited results at best and the treatment will need to be re-applied frequently. The solution is simple. You must get the deer food off of your property and use plants that deer don't eat. There are many, many choices of suitable and beautiful replacements.

About the author:

Linda K. Lillie has been President of Sprigs & Twigs, Inc for the last 19 years. She is a graduate of Connecticut College in Botany, an accredited NOFA Organic Land Care Professional, a Connecticut Master Gardner and a national award winning landscape designer for her design and installation projects.

About the company:

Sprigs & Twigs is a highly regarded, professional, full service, national award-winning landscape design, installation, maintenance, tree care and lawn care company. We are completely organic. Visit our website www.sprigsandtwigs.net or call us at 860-235-0752 for more information.