You have many choices when it comes to providing your property with a makeover. One set of choices relates to the beauty treatment you give to your yard. What is possible depends on many factors: your neighbourhood, your climate zone, your budget. There is also the question of your personality and your approach to such a makeover - you might be an 'all or nothing' type, or you might like to go at things in manageable bites, one bit at a time.
On this page we'll discuss an idea that costs you nothing, provides a possible overarching frame for your design ideas, and introduces a whole catalogue of questions to start off your thinking about where you want to go. The idea, borrowed from a style of sustainable living known as 'permaculture', is zonation.
In brief, it advocates that you divide your property into activity areas known as 'zones'. On a suburban lot you might have as many as five zones; but you can have fewer if that suits your circumstances better. Each zone harbours a main style of activity and a main kind of useful crop.
Zone 1 is the area you most often visit: the area near the entrances and exits you most commonly use, and any other areas, such as patios or decks, where you spend most time outdoors. These are your major relaxation and entertainment zones. Plantings in this zone will include the sorts of things you may want to snatch up at the last minute for the kitchen - herbs, salad plants, strawberries and tomatoes in season.
The second zone is slightly further removed from the house. It may include a grassed area for the children to play. In this area you can have perennial plants that require no more than occasional care, such as berrying canes (raspberries, currants) and perennial shrubs.
The third zone is, for those who like to produce food for themselves, the main production zone. Here there will be beds of brassicas (cabbage, kale, broccoli and others), potatoes and sweet potatoes, corn and other crops; and fruit trees such as apple, peach and pear. In this zone, too, there is the potential for cunningly designed pathways to suddenly reveal a 'secret' pocket of special delight: a hidden water feature, a blaze of spring or summer or fall color, or a carefully crafted sculpture. For families, the third zone can provide a place for children to work off energy in games of hide and seek or by using equipment such as swings, slides or trampolines.
On many suburban lots a fourth zone may be possible. This will include plantings designed to attract birds to visit, or even take up residence, in your garden. Larger flowering trees such as magnolias or rhodendrons can be accommodated here. This zone can also include larger nut-bearing tress (walnuts, macadamias and the like). Keen vegetable gardeners can use screens of hedge or shrubbery to hide their composting bins. You could even, depending on local regulations, consider the merits of a small livestock unit - how does a freshly laid egg appeal?
The use of zones can make your available land appear bigger than it is. It helps to create flexible use of your yard and adds far greater interest than is possible in a monoculture of mown grass.
Article written by Steve Boulden from The Landscape Design Site.com which offers free landscaping ideas, designs and advice to do it yourselfers. For more ideas see www.the-landscape-design-site.com.
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