Knowledgebase
Landscape plan #866362
Asked April 29, 2024, 4:55 PM EDT
Hi,
A friend and I came up with a landscaping plan for her backyard in Montebello. The house sits on 1/3 of an acre and the backyard is very large. The goal is to create a yard with native grass with low water needs.
She has planted some small trees and shrubs in the back yard but the rest of the vegetation is weeds. The soil has not been amended and is very sandy. The plan is to scrape off the weeds with a skid steer. There are a lot of goat head thorns, so she plans to purchase a sweeper that can be used to sweep up the seeds. The sweeping apparently has to be done several times to be effective.
The area of the lawn that has trees and shrubs would be heavily mulched, avoiding burying the trees with too much mulch. The remainder of the lawn would be planted with blue gamma grass and native flowers. Hopefully this would only need to be mowed a few times each summer. She plans to have a sprinkler system installed. The soil removed by the skid steer may be used to build a berm.
Does this seem like a reasonable plan?
Should she also use weed killer before planting the gamma grass?
Does she need a sprinkler system for the native grass and the trees? It’s a huge yard and is difficult to water using hoses.
Should she add topsoil to the area that will have grass?
We would appreciate any advice.
Thank you.
Denver County Colorado
Expert Response
Installing a sprinkle system is an expensive luxury when the plan is to not rely on one down the road; however, there are many good reasons to have one installed if the budget allows.
For example, those trees will need water for their life. They may be small now but the roots will expand as the grow - something you want to encourage to make them more resistant to drought - and the entire rooting area will need supplemental irrigation. It can be accomplished by periodically setting out sprinklers and hoses, but in my experience, it is more convenient with a sprinkler system even when, after establishment, you only turn on that zone by hand when needed.
Another reason to have a sprinkler is that all the seeds of the native grasses and wildflowers will need moisture to germinate and establish. You mention it is difficult to water with hoses so an irrigation system will make applying supplemental irrigation that much easier. In a year or two when everything is established and the plants have filled in, the system can be set to water only infrequently or just during the hottest times of the year.
The scraped-off soil will contain a lot of weed seeds so those will have to be managed, too. It will delay your timeline but after you do your grading, you could water to germinate a crop of weed seeds, then hoe them down when they are young and repeat a few times. This will reduce the weed seed bank before you lay down your blue grama seed.
Good luck!
