A beautiful yard is a reflection of its homeowners. Aren’t we striving to have it all? A great job, loving family, nice car, dream home, nice neighborhood and the icing on the cake is a beautifully maintained yard. After spending a lot of money on your residential landscape installation, it only makes sense to protect it and make sure it develops into a lush oasis away from the daily grind. A regular, well thought out landscape maintenance plan is the best way to protect your outdoor investment.

And with the summer months upon us here in Arizona, it can be a daunting task to embark on a full day of yard work when you could be enjoying your yard instead.

Landscape maintenance begins with lawn service. In Arizona, lawns typically need to be trimmed on a weekly basis throughout the spring and summer months and twice a month if not once a month through the fall and winter months. It is recommended aeration of your lawn at least once a year to ensure proper water saturation but you really can’t aerate enough.

Over-seeding with winter rye is a great addition to your maintenance program.

With winter rye you can have beautiful green grass throughout the winter. We recommend scalping, aerating, de-thatching and spreading the winter rye usually early to late October.

Your irrigation system is obviously an important tool in maintaining a beautiful yard.

Timer boxes can be tricky and difficult to program. Your professional landscaper can take the stress out of having to figure out which zone is watering what part of the yard and programming each zone to ensure the correct coverage. Trees, plants and shrubs need the right amount of water at the appropriate times to promote healthy growth. A professional will have the knowledge needed to adjust the watering schedule that’s appropriate for each plant or tree based on the season.

Fertilization is also a key to having beautiful healthy trees.

Trimming and pruning can be difficult to navigate if you’ve never done it before or aren’t sure if it’s a plant that needs to be pruned.

Some plants need to be trimmed a certain way or at certain times of the year. Here in Arizona it’s imperative that trees be thinned and/or trimmed before the monsoon season so they don’t blow over or break branches and cause damage to property.

Weeds and Bermuda grasses can be very intrusive if you don’t get a handle on them before they get out of control.

A professional can apply commercial grade chemicals that can’t be bought at your local hardware store.

It’s hard to know all this information, and having a professional to make these choices will ensure that the hard work that goes into your yard will last a long time to come.