For Release On Or After 09/17/10

Late October through March is the prime season for planting hardy trees, shrubs and ground covers in Louisiana, so now is an excellent time to assess your landscape situation and begin to make plans. Landscaping is a great way to give your home a beautiful appearance as well as make outdoor spaces function usefully for the family. The benefits of a well-planned landscape are many, from providing shade, privacy and color, to correcting drainage problems and creating outdoor living areas. Beautiful landscaping increases the value of your home.

Most gardeners have no trouble dealing with small projects themselves. Planting a tree, designing a flower garden or planting beds around a deck are good do-it-yourself projects. Designing an overall landscape – including drainage, traffic patterns, use areas, outdoor living areas and major plantings – requires careful study, planning and a good sense of design. Even this is not necessarily beyond the ability of many home gardeners. After all, most of us do a decent job designing a home interior that’s attractive and comfortable.

If you need help, it’s available. Books on home landscaping provide an excellent source of information. Carefully studying one or two of these books will either convince you that you can do it yourself or that you may need to consult with a professional.

To do the right job when designing a landscape yourself, make sure you determine your needs first. Do you want a free-flowing, natural garden or something more formal? Is a play area for the kids important? Do you enjoy tinkering in your garden, trimming and planning next year’s flower beds, or would you prefer a lower-maintenance garden that minimizes general care?

Study your site carefully so you can match plants to the growing conditions they need. And make sure you choose plants that will mature at the right size for their location and thrive in your area. Your parish LSU AgCenter office has excellent pamphlets and information available to help you select appropriate plants.

If you decide you need to seek professional help, you have several options.

You can talk to horticulturists at your local nurseries or garden centers. They can answer questions you have on choosing the right plants, how big they grow and what growing conditions they prefer. Some nurseries have individuals on staff who can even help you develop a design or give you feedback on some of the ideas you have.

If you have a good idea of what you want to do but need some help refining the details, a landscape architect often can be hired as a consultant for an hourly fee. A landscape architect could also be hired to draw up a complete design for a fee. You may then hire their firm or a landscape horticulturist to install the plan, or you can install it yourself.

Landscape horticulturists are basically licensed to install landscapes. They also can help you develop a landscape design, but only in a package deal that includes the cost of the plants and instillation.

Before you hire a professional, make sure you check their credentials. Landscape horticulturists and landscape architects must be licensed by the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry in order to conduct business in Louisiana. Also, ask for references and to see pictures of previous jobs they have done. Try to interview several individuals before making your decision. The best way to establish a productive working relationship is to find an experienced professional whom you trust and who understands what you want to accomplish.

Get a mutually acceptable written agreement, including a firm price, everything that the price includes, and a work schedule and completion date. Be specific about what you expect and when you expect it.

Remember, the landscape plan and the instillation are two different parts of the process. You could pay a professional landscape architect to create the plan, and then install the design yourself in sections. This will spread the cost of plant materials and construction over time, making it easier to budget. The advantage is that even if the instillation is done in sections, it is guided by a comprehensive plan that creates a unified, attractive and functional landscape.

If your plans include establishing a new lawn, you should try to get that done as soon as possible. This late in the growing season, you should use sod and try to get it laid by early to mid-October. If you’re considering including tropical plants in your landscape, such as palms, gingers or philodendrons, they should be planted next May.

So if you’ve been thinking about adding a shade tree, planting privacy hedge, landscaping around the patio, dressing up the front of your house or even doing extensive landscaping, the time to start planning is now. As the weather begins to cool down this fall, you will be ready to plant the hardy trees, shrubs and ground cover that make up the bulk of our landscapes.