Article 2 : Ideas

Landscaping Designs Ideas - Planning Makes Your Ideas Come Alive

The best landscaping ideas usually come for free. No matter where you live anyone can make the landscape of their front or backyard look like a professional architect was called in.

Imagination, not skill will make the landscape of your dreams happen! Time to get your hands dirty!

Planning Makes Your Landscape Ideas Come Alive

Although landscape ideas may come for free - Time and planning will move the idea to reality.

Lay out your ideas, thoughts and dreams on paper. Take your time and think about what you are looking for in your yard - a desert landscape, rock or flower garden? Does a swimming pool come into play? How about lighting, the daytime light and accent lighting for night time?

Plan around large unmovable items like trees and outside buildings. Make these unmovables fit in with your landscaping design.

Getting Started With Ideas

One of the fastest ways to get ideas and landsape inspiration is by taking a drive. Look at your neigborhood and jot down the things you like. Don't forget to take the digital camera! Snap a quick picture of the ideas to consider incorporating into your design. A picture is a great way to visualize the idea in your own backyard.

Picking up some magazines can also provide ideas as well as some of the home improvement shows.

Choosing The Right Landscaping Materials

In choosing the right materials for your landscape first look at how much space you have to work with. How big is that landscape canvas? A small patio or an open backyard can dictate plant material and sizes.

When you drive around the neighborhood looking at landscapes make note of the type of plant materals used. When you're selecting plants do you want your design to use unique materials?

- What's the lighting?
- Does the space receive full or part sun?
- Do you have an area that receives only shade and no sun at all?
- Are there any drainage or watering issues?
- What kind of irrigation is available?

You want to select plants which will perform well in the conditions you plant them in.

Landscape Ideas Beyond Plants

There are all sorts of materials beside plants to make your landscape shine! Artificial walls, borders, ponds, waterfalls, benches and statues can all spice up your design.

Use lumber, railroad ties, cement blocks, stones, rocks or boulders to add layers to a flat landscape or emphasize the beauty of an existing berm or sloped area.

Creative ideas do not cost a lot and anyone can do it.

Whatever the landscape design, utilizing plants, shrubs, lumber or stone, make sure you have the tools and knowledge to maintain the design.

Don't forget the irrigation!

If your landscape includes plants and flowers, feed and water them accordingly. Don't waste your time and efforts by watching your plants turn brown or dying off.

With a little creative imagination, effort and hard work, your new landscaped front or backyard will be appreciated and enjoyed for many years - plus it will increase the property value!

For more information on landscaping ideas, landscape idea, or other house plant information visit the related links below.

source: www.plant-care.com/1601-landscaping-ideas.html

 Article 2 : Bridges

As its name suggests, Middle Bridge crosses the water race close to the middle of the property. It must have been walked over and wheeled over a million times since first constructed.

Our latest Moosey animal, Rusty the red border collie puppy, has learnt in no time where this bridge leads to (though he did fall off into the water during a lapse in concentration when he first arrived).

Rusty the New Puppy on Middle Bridge

Early Days

Early Days - Looking Upstream

Early Days - Afternoon Sun

When Stephen first brought home the huge offcuts of wooden power poles I didn't give the bridge they were to become much thought. The area over the water race was still being cleared, and there were no borders dug. The trees over there were huge - two rows of noisy twenty year-old gums.

I decided that the bridge should be reasonably central, near the big flax. I stood on the back lawn, pointed vaguely, and that was that. Middle Bridge went in very quickly, with four people pulling the big beams into place over the water race. Planks were nailed to form the "floor".

The first path leading from Middle Bridge was designed by Taj-dog. He turned sharp right and snuffled his way along the water's edge, giving me the idea of building a Dog-Path there. Later another Dog-Path was built to the left to wind its way around the established flax bush and along the water's edge. Over the years as the flaxes doubled in size this path suffered several alterations in route.

Early Days - Middle Border Foliage

Gardener Access

Humans needed access from the bridge to the grass beyond, and so Middle Path with its stone edges was built to wind around two existing Viburnums and out of sight towards the fence. The new trees in Middle Border are growing well, giving the area a woodland ambience. Each year more and more dappled shade is created in here, and any original surviving sun-lovers have to shift out.

One of my very first plantings over Middle Bridge was a green and gold flax called Yellow Wave, which I carefully dug in by the old fence post. I also added some white verbenas and tussocks to trail over the stones.

Summer 2003 on Middle Bridge

These plantings still exist, though now twice as large. You can see how much the Yellow Wave flax has grown by comparing the two photographs.

Solid and Strong

Middle Bridge is a very basic solid structure. The fern and the big species flax (phormium tenax) on the bridge's end are both impressive plants. It's an ongoing job removing the million gorse and broom seedlings and plantlings growing around them.

It may be a bare and boring design, but Middle Bridge is a successful bridge, and is enjoyed equally by cats, dogs and people. In heavy winter frosts it cannot be traversed until mid-morning, by which time the winter sun (which, of course, shines every single day) has thawed any slippery ice.

Source : http://www.mooseyscountrygarden.com/garden-bridges.