Garden Care

Garden care looks simple, but it involves a great deal more than you might think. Quality garden care should always be done by a trained professional, because it involves so much more than weeding and watering plants. It is a sophisticated science of cultivation—many aspects of which must be attended to prior to planting of the garden itself.

One of these aspects is developing effective drain systems in and around the garden. Drains are much more difficult to install than you might think. It is one thing to create a method of water removal, but it is quite another to build it effectively without letting it be seen. Professionals have to do this so that pipes, gratings, and any holes in the ground are concealed. Our planning and development team puts a great deal of care and effort into building drainage systems in this manner, and they also work very hard to periodically maintain them to keep them clean and functional.

The engineering of an irrigation system is yet another crucial component of garden care. Houston often will see several months with no rainfall during the hottest time of the year. The majority of exotic and tropical species that we cultivate cannot survive these months without some type of irrigation. We strongly advise all of our clients to avoid using garden hoses to water these plants. This is because plan leaves, when wet, become vulnerable to fungal growth. Plants remain much healthier and look much more attractive when they are irrigated beneath the leaves close to the ground and the root system.

Still another important part of garden care that must be done in the very beginning is soil preparation. Many of our first time clients have already planted some type of garden that has since become unhealthy or unsatisfactory in appearance. When we go out to visit them, we often discover that the problem began in the beginning with improper soil preparation. Store-bought fertilizer is often the root cause. Not every type of fertilizer will work with every type of plant, and many people fail to read the labels on the bag that tell them just what types of plants the fertilizer is intended to nourish. Most are manufactured for popular species of flowers and plants and may not work very well at all with more exotic or tropical species that people may decide to add to the garden later. It takes knowledge of botany and what nutrients each type of plant specifically needs to create just the right soil mixture required for a diversity of plantings that may otherwise not be able to grow together at all.

The aesthetic aspects of garden care are also important. The basics of clipping, weeding, and trimming even the simplest of flower beds have to be done no matter how large or small the garden is, and no matter how simple or complex it is. Again, we recommend that people not try to do this themselves. Some plants are very sensitive and require very special trimming methods. Furthermore, specific garden designs like parterre garden, the knot garden, the English garden, the Italian garden, and the Japanese garden have to be trimmed by people who know these forms—preferably by the people that planted them.

For these reasons, and many more, we always recommend that garden care be managed as a line item on a landscaping maintenance agreement with Exterior Worlds. This allows the team who designed the garden to consistently and cost effectively maintain its vitality and health.