Does your front yard landscaping beckon in — or turn off — potential homebuyers?

Whether you’re getting ready to sell your house or not — if that’s even a remote possibility — this should be a consideration in how you plan landscaping.

Remember, most house purchasers are either sold — or not sold — on a house at first glance. So what you do “out front” is really important, and the backyard will probably cement that initial gut reaction.

Elaborate, complex landscaping might impress visitors, but will potential buyers see instead a very high maintenance situation?

It’s something to consider.  Ditto for shrubs and trees carefully pruned into exacting shapes.

Of course, if you’re in the price bracket where the new homeowner will most likely have yard crews to take care of all this, that’s another story.

But if it looks as if the homeowner will have to do it himself or herself, well . . .

That’s not to say the yard has to be a messy collection of free-growers.  Or that you’ll want to spend a lot of money on spiffing up the yard of a house you’re going to be leaving anyway.

Some tips:

1. Have some good friends come over and be honest with you about what they do and don’t like about your landscaping. Sometimes we get so used to certain things, or they have a special meaning to us but not to others, that we won’t see these as detractors.

Drive up and see where your eye goes first . . . or where you want it to go first.  Isolate the most attractive “vignette” in your front and back yard.  That’s where you should concentrate the color.

You can emphasize the positive and minimize the negatives.

2. Mulch can be one of your best friends.  It’s amazing how a layer of mulch over the soil will give a whole fresh new look to a landscape.  Mulch makes it look like you care.

3. You will, of course, want to remove all weeds. Putting 4-5 layers of newspapers right over the lower-growing weeds, and then putting a thick layer of mulch on top of these, is a great lazy gardener way to kill them. All plants require light to survive.

Besides, this is really good for your plants.

4. Use container plants to spiff up dull areas — even setting them right in the garden.  If you already have containers, make sure they’re cleaned. Fill them with colorful annuals.

5. In fact, colorful annuals, available year-round in area nurseries, are a great way to make the yard pop.  Don’t try to cover everything with color. Use pops of color to draw the eye to attributes (like a special window) or away from less attractive elements (like an ugly off-property sight).

6. In darker areas, anything white (caladiums, coleus, white-variegated ivies and other plants) will help brighten and lighten.  Tip: the houseplant sections of box stores and nurseries often care very low cost variegated plants. Many if not most of these do well in our areas as  perennial plantings as well!

7. Take background colors into consideration when selecting these annuals. Too often we forget to think our house bricks as a “color.”

8. Just as tricky pruning into exotic shapes may be a turn-off, so might plants that obviously need pruning but haven’t gotten any in a long time.  Remove those scraggly branches that contribute to a neglected look.  Especially look for tree limbs touching the house.

9. Before you start showing the house, remember to dig up and pot any plants you intend to take.  Set them out of view.  Not fair to let potential buyers assume they’re getting certain plants when they won’t.

10. If you have the time, try to get the lawn as green as possible. Mow regularly.  Mowed weeds look like mowed lawn.  Unmowed weeds look like, well, weeds.  If you have large dead areas, considering adding sod.

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UPDATE: Patty Allen of Bayou City Heirloom Bulbs is organizing a Houston Bulb Society. Interested? Email Patty at prallen2@peoplepc.com or sign up at her upcoming sale Fri. Sat, Oct. 20-21, 2012. Details on website: bayoucityheirloombulbs.com

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There are many reasons to create landscapes in our yards – to add softness to the harsh angles of a home, to make the transition from the natural environment to the built environment appear more seamless, to abide by deed restrictions for foundation planting or simply to foster a passion for gardening. What if these same landscapes could serve important functions and go beyond aesthetics? What if they could help protect water quality, recharge groundwater and provide habitat for wildlife? If this seems like a tall order, that is exactly what rain gardens can do. And a rain garden can fit into almost any landscape.

First, a little background. In undeveloped areas, rainwater (also called storm water) soaks into the soil, provides water for plants and moves the remaining water far below the surface, also known as groundwater recharge. It is filtered by the plants and soil before it enters rivers, streams, bayous or lakes. As we develop the land, however, we create lots of impervious surfaces (places where water cannot penetrate), like parking lots, roadways, roofs and sidewalks. These cause water to run off more quickly – not allowing for much absorption – and to arrive at the nearest body of water in greater volume, contributing to flooding. The runoff often carries with it things that pollute our waterways such as synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, soil from erosion, oil and grease from cars, and pet waste. We created the problem but landscaping an area as a rain garden just might be a beautiful solution to effectively managing storm water where it falls.

A rain garden is a shallow excavated area in the soil (think bowl-shaped), planted as a garden and designed to capture rainfall from impervious surfaces. The storm water pools for a period of time, slowing the flow and allowing some of it to soak into the soil. The rest of the storm water is filtered through the plant material, soil and mulch. This allows us to keep more of the rain that falls on our yards while the storm water that finally enters the storm drain is cleaner. Planted with native plants, specifically those indigenous plants that can tolerate wet and dry conditions, a rain garden also can function as a habitat for wildlife such as birds and butterflies. When designed properly, water in the rain garden should stand for no more than 24 to 48 hours, too short a period for mosquitoes to breed.

Location of a rain garden can be anywhere; however, careful evaluation is necessary to make sure it slopes gently away and is at least ten feet from the foundation of any structure and is free of utility lines. Also notice how and where rainfall moves across the property during a rain event since the rain garden can capture storm water from many sources such as a roof, sidewalks and streets, or a yard.

For more detailed information regarding size, depth and soil mixture, refer to the Texas AM AgriLife Extension Service publication on rain gardens, https://agrilifebookstore.org/ and search for rainwater harvesting. Click on the rain garden publication L-5482. The download is free.

Ways to direct the flow to the rain garden can be a downspout, a downspout with a corrugated pipe extension, a swale, which is a shallow ditch, or simply the slope of the yard.

Rain gardens have planting zones. Remember the bowl shape. For the center where water pools the longest, use native plants that can stand wet feet. The sides, the median zone, need those plants that like it wet for a short time. The top edges are the third zone so plants here like it dry most of the time. The plant list is quite long and varied.

Like any other planted area, a rain garden will need regular watering during the critical establishment period, usually one to two years and, thereafter, supplemental watering during extended dry periods. As with any garden, proper maintenance is necessary.

Above all, a rain garden is a landscape amenity, blending beauty and function – a beautiful, WaterSmart solution to water pollution.

Chris LaChance is WaterSmart Coordinator for the Texas AM AgriLife Extension Service and Texas Sea Grant, part of the Texas AM University System. WaterSmart is funded by a grant from Houston Endowment, Inc. Contact Chris at c-lachance@tamu.edu. This column is sponsored by Urban Harvest. To find out more about community gardens, school gardens, farmers markets and gardening classes, visit www.urbanharvest.org.

Tibouchina ‘Little Beauty’

TIBOUCHINA. No, I’m not speaking another language, though sometimes botanical names of plants do make me feel like that.

Tibouchina, pronounced tib-oo-chee-na, is the beautiful mass purple flowering small tree that you see around the place from about autumn and all through winter.

For many years there were only a few types available and unless you wanted a tree or a very small shrub you could only admire these plants in everyone else’s yard.

Over the past few years though, plant breeders have developed a wonderful range of Tibouchinas that vary in size, from about 30cm to about 2m and vary in shades of purple, from vivid purple all the way through to lilac and white.

These amazing new Tibouchinas also flower throughout the year instead of seasonally.

So you should have shades of purple in your garden for most of the year.

Tibouchinas like very acidic soils, so if you struggle to grow things such as azaleas or camellias in your garden you may also struggle with Tibouchinas.

The good thing about Tibouchinas is that they let you know they need more acidic soil – the leaf burns at the edges, turns brown and eventually the leaf dies.

You could add sulphur to your ground to prevent this. Another, and what I think is a much easier way, is to just grow your Tibouchinas in pots.

Tibouchinas like the full sun and look much better if they get a good haircut at least once a year after flowering.

I use my complete organic slow release granular fertiliser – Organic Link on mine at the turn of every season.

I find this not only keeps them looking healthy and fresh it promotes more flowering.

Some Tibouchinas don’t like the cold so if you get heavy frost they will need protection.

But which Tibouchina to choose? With nearly 10 new types being released, which one is right for you?

Here’s the quick lowdown. All the new Tibouchinas form dense shrubs. Just a small trim and fertilise in between flowering will keep them neat and compact.

 

Tibouchina

Tibouchina Groovy Baby – About 30cm high, large vibrant purple flowers most of the year, doesn’t mind the cold.

Tibouchina Little Beauty – About 1m high, large vibrant purple flowers most of the year.

Tibouchina Peace Baby – About 1m high, large white flowers with pink stamens, red tinged new growth, doesn’t mind the cold.

Tibouchina Allure – About 1m high, lilac flowers in autumn and spring.

Tibouchina Carol Lyn or Jazzie – About 1.5 – 2m high, large vibrant purple flowers with a white centre, flowers most of the year.

Tibouchina Imagine – About 1.5m high, masses of light purple flowers with a white centre cover this shrub for most of the year.

Tibouchina Chameleon – About 2m high, a unique multi-coloured flowering display with the flowers starting almost a pure white, then changing to mauve, followed by a deep pink.

Tibouchina ‘Illusion’ – About 2.5m high, perfect for hedging, the flowers open white with a blush-pink margin, then mature to deep pink tones, creating an amazing display in spring and autumn.

 

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Tea pots of floral arrangements will accent the Garden Club of Brookfield’s 50th anniversary luncheon at Fox Hill Inn on Thursday.

The luncheon theme is tea. A presentation by a representative of the Bigelow Tea Co. will share information on the healthy benefits of tea and the origin of teas in different countries. Secrets for making the perfect cup of tea will be revealed, as well as more tea facts, organizers said.

“You’re not suppose to squeeze the tea bag,” Garden Club president Joanne McKendry said, with a laugh. “That’s a no no.”

McKendry noted the goal and emphasis of the club has changed since it was first established in 1962 — keeping up with the times.

“We believe our role is to conserve our environment,” McKendry explained. “We weed out invasive species. We look for organic ways to sustain our gardens.

“Unlike years ago when chemicals were used to kill all of the insects, we now know that some insects add to the biodiversity of a garden,” she said. “Some provide nutrients for the plants. Others, nutrients for the birds that eat them.”

“Our club theme this year is `Sharing our Garden,’ sharing it with nature and letting it exist in nature’s balance,” McKendry added.

Started with 10 members, the club has grown to a membership of 40.

In 1966, it took on its first major project when the Honor Roll of Veterans plaque was installed at Williams Park and club members planted and began maintaining the Williams Park Memorial Garden there.

In 1978, the club engaged professor Rudy Faveretti, of the University of Connecticut, to design a historic Colonial garden to accent the circa 1800 museum building on Route 133.

“The club planted and began maintaining the museum garden,” club historian Jan Stanco said. “In 2002, the gazebo there was funded by Philip Bach in memory of his late wife, Arlene, who was a master gardener and past president of the club.”

The gardens and landscaping the club has done over the years include the landscaping of the Brooks Quarry senior housing complex, a “Welcome to Brookfield” sign and plantings near Kohl’s, and an America flag and pole installation with flowers planted around it at the intersection of routes 133 and 25.

“I grew up on a farm in Iowa,” Stanco said. “We have a saying there: `You can take the girl out of the farm, but you can’t take the farm out of the girl.’ When I retired 10 years ago, I joined the garden club.”

McKendry, Stanco and the other members said they strive to benefit their community, whether having an active voice in the preservation of the Still River area, maintaining gardens around the town of 16,000 or sponsoring presentations on topics from building greenways to cooking with herbs.

The Garden Club of Brookfield 50th anniversary luncheon at Fox Hill Inn, 257 Federal Road, Brookfield, Sept. 20, 11:30 a.m. Reservations $35/person, 203-775-3876.