Designing a Native Garden, Part V: Put Your Design on Paper and Create Your Final Plant List
Whew. It's been a long road of planning! But it will be well worth it, I promise. So far, we have studied up on native plants, drawn up a rough sketch of our planting area, been inspired by visiting other native gardens, and scouted out where to find the plants we want. Now we get back to the drawing board, literally, as we come the final step in the planning process before getting our hands dirty!
Step 5. Put your plan on paper and make your final plant list
By now, you know that salvia, manzanita and ceanothus should all do well in your sunny, well-drained garden. You've seen (and smelled!) brilliant Cleveland sage in gardens and know you want to dot a few throughout your landscape - and you know that you have space to accommodate them. You also have seen the wildly varying sizes of different cultivars of manzanita and ceanothus and understand that you need to be aware of whether you're planting a variety that will eventually become a small tree ('Dr. Hurd' manzanita and 'Ray Hartman' ceanothus), a ground cover ('John Dourley' manzanita and 'Yankee Point' ceanothus) or a mid-sized shrub somewhere in between ('Sunset' manzanita and 'Skylark' ceanothus).
Now is the time to create your final plant list, including how many of each plant you will need and where to find them. I like to use Excel for this purpose, and my final list looked something like this:
In addition to organizing your plant lists, it is immensely beneficial to draw up a scale plan of your garden. It doesn't need to be anything very fancy or neat - as long as you can interpret it, it will be fine! I recommend using graph paper, with each little square representing one square foot. Use a ruler to ensure straight lines, and draw in all existing (or planned) hardscape features first: fences, buildings, sidewalks, patios, pathways, etc. Next, draw in existing trees or other plants. It's also valuable to draw in the location of your hose bib or spigot (if applicable), and note any important areas you should not dig, like above water or gas lines.
One fun, crafty way to design your garden is to cut to-scale colored circles to represent each plant you want. For example, if you want to plant three manzanitas, each of which may be up to 4 feet wide when mature, cut three green circles that have a diameter the equivalent of four of your graph paper squares. If you want two 8-foot wide ground cover ceanothus in your design, cut two purple circles that are the equivalent of eight squares in diameter. Once you have all your "plants" cut out, you can arrange them on your graph paper into a pleasing design.
If that sounds like too much work, you can simply draw circles on your graph paper representing each plant. This is what I usually do. It generally involves much erasing and re-drawing, but it works for me!
My final plan looks like this: (Never mind its somewhat worn and weather-beaten appearance... This design has been through a lot!)
As you're drawing up your plan, keep in mind a few simple "rules" of landscape design:
- Pay attention to lines of sight. This means making sure you can see the road clearly as you're backing out of your driveway, and also ensuring that you're not completely blocking any windows (unless you want to intentionally screen an unpleasant view). Frame your windows, and think about what you see when you look out your window. It can be nice to create pleasing vignettes that can be seen through the windows from inside the house. Since our kitchen window looks out over the garden and I spend a lot of time at the kitchen sink looking out that window, it makes sense to design an area for hummingbird feeders and a bird bath just outside the window, surrounded by plants that attract birds to give me something entertaining to look at!
- Take scale into account. If you have a low one-story house like we do, you might not want to dwarf it by engulfing it in tall trees. And two-story houses look funny surrounded by low growing ground cover plants without some larger foundation trees and shrubs to anchor the house to the landscape.
- Plant in odd numbered groupings. Unless you're framing a doorway, window or path with symmetrical two-by-two plantings, odd numbers groups work best. I'm not entirely sure why, but it's more pleasing and less jarring to see a group of three or five shrubs than a group of four or six.
- Along those same lines, plant in groups or swaths of the same plant rather than individual plants. After all, this is how natural landscapes look. Massing a few types of plants together like this rather than randomly planting dots of lots of different plants gives any design a cohesive look and feel, and repeated elements in a garden visually draw us in. This can be especially difficult for plant lovers like me, who like to collect one of everything! To combat a case of one-of-each-itis, try planting a swath of one species using several different cultivars. That way, you add some differing heights and textures into your pallet, satisfy the urge to try one of each, and still get a cohesive look. If you choose to plant one 'Concha,' one 'Skylark,' one 'Joyce Coulter' and three 'Yankee Point' ceanothus, you will have a variety of sizes and shapes, but a uniform feel, since they're all dark green leafed, purple flowering evergreen shrubs of the same genus. (Just make sure you plant the largest, 'Concha,' in the back of the border and stair-step down from there.)
- Don't over plant! I can't really say this enough. The most common mistake in landscaping is over-planting. It's hard to visualize at first, but remember that the cute little 'Concha' ceanothus you brought home in a 4-inch pot will very quickly grow into a large shrub, potentially maxing out at 8 feet tall and wide!! Plan accordingly. (If you dislike the idea of so much open space between plants, a scattering of California Poppy or other annual wildflower seeds can go a long way toward temporarily filling the gaps.)
Once your design is in place, you will have a much better idea of just how many plants you need to fill - but not overfill - your space.
If all of this has you feeling even more at a loss than when you started, take heart! Help is at hand. Here are links to a few ready-made planting plans:
California Native Planting Plan from UC Davis
Native Planting Guides from the CNPS
The book Designing California Native Gardens also has some sample plans that might be worth perusing.
Don't be afraid to get creative and have fun!
Step 5. Put your plan on paper and make your final plant list
By now, you know that salvia, manzanita and ceanothus should all do well in your sunny, well-drained garden. You've seen (and smelled!) brilliant Cleveland sage in gardens and know you want to dot a few throughout your landscape - and you know that you have space to accommodate them. You also have seen the wildly varying sizes of different cultivars of manzanita and ceanothus and understand that you need to be aware of whether you're planting a variety that will eventually become a small tree ('Dr. Hurd' manzanita and 'Ray Hartman' ceanothus), a ground cover ('John Dourley' manzanita and 'Yankee Point' ceanothus) or a mid-sized shrub somewhere in between ('Sunset' manzanita and 'Skylark' ceanothus).
Now is the time to create your final plant list, including how many of each plant you will need and where to find them. I like to use Excel for this purpose, and my final list looked something like this:
In addition to organizing your plant lists, it is immensely beneficial to draw up a scale plan of your garden. It doesn't need to be anything very fancy or neat - as long as you can interpret it, it will be fine! I recommend using graph paper, with each little square representing one square foot. Use a ruler to ensure straight lines, and draw in all existing (or planned) hardscape features first: fences, buildings, sidewalks, patios, pathways, etc. Next, draw in existing trees or other plants. It's also valuable to draw in the location of your hose bib or spigot (if applicable), and note any important areas you should not dig, like above water or gas lines.
One fun, crafty way to design your garden is to cut to-scale colored circles to represent each plant you want. For example, if you want to plant three manzanitas, each of which may be up to 4 feet wide when mature, cut three green circles that have a diameter the equivalent of four of your graph paper squares. If you want two 8-foot wide ground cover ceanothus in your design, cut two purple circles that are the equivalent of eight squares in diameter. Once you have all your "plants" cut out, you can arrange them on your graph paper into a pleasing design.
If that sounds like too much work, you can simply draw circles on your graph paper representing each plant. This is what I usually do. It generally involves much erasing and re-drawing, but it works for me!
My final plan looks like this: (Never mind its somewhat worn and weather-beaten appearance... This design has been through a lot!)
As you're drawing up your plan, keep in mind a few simple "rules" of landscape design:
- Pay attention to lines of sight. This means making sure you can see the road clearly as you're backing out of your driveway, and also ensuring that you're not completely blocking any windows (unless you want to intentionally screen an unpleasant view). Frame your windows, and think about what you see when you look out your window. It can be nice to create pleasing vignettes that can be seen through the windows from inside the house. Since our kitchen window looks out over the garden and I spend a lot of time at the kitchen sink looking out that window, it makes sense to design an area for hummingbird feeders and a bird bath just outside the window, surrounded by plants that attract birds to give me something entertaining to look at!
- Take scale into account. If you have a low one-story house like we do, you might not want to dwarf it by engulfing it in tall trees. And two-story houses look funny surrounded by low growing ground cover plants without some larger foundation trees and shrubs to anchor the house to the landscape.
- Plant in odd numbered groupings. Unless you're framing a doorway, window or path with symmetrical two-by-two plantings, odd numbers groups work best. I'm not entirely sure why, but it's more pleasing and less jarring to see a group of three or five shrubs than a group of four or six.
- Along those same lines, plant in groups or swaths of the same plant rather than individual plants. After all, this is how natural landscapes look. Massing a few types of plants together like this rather than randomly planting dots of lots of different plants gives any design a cohesive look and feel, and repeated elements in a garden visually draw us in. This can be especially difficult for plant lovers like me, who like to collect one of everything! To combat a case of one-of-each-itis, try planting a swath of one species using several different cultivars. That way, you add some differing heights and textures into your pallet, satisfy the urge to try one of each, and still get a cohesive look. If you choose to plant one 'Concha,' one 'Skylark,' one 'Joyce Coulter' and three 'Yankee Point' ceanothus, you will have a variety of sizes and shapes, but a uniform feel, since they're all dark green leafed, purple flowering evergreen shrubs of the same genus. (Just make sure you plant the largest, 'Concha,' in the back of the border and stair-step down from there.)
- Don't over plant! I can't really say this enough. The most common mistake in landscaping is over-planting. It's hard to visualize at first, but remember that the cute little 'Concha' ceanothus you brought home in a 4-inch pot will very quickly grow into a large shrub, potentially maxing out at 8 feet tall and wide!! Plan accordingly. (If you dislike the idea of so much open space between plants, a scattering of California Poppy or other annual wildflower seeds can go a long way toward temporarily filling the gaps.)
Once your design is in place, you will have a much better idea of just how many plants you need to fill - but not overfill - your space.
If all of this has you feeling even more at a loss than when you started, take heart! Help is at hand. Here are links to a few ready-made planting plans:
California Native Planting Plan from UC Davis
Native Planting Guides from the CNPS
The book Designing California Native Gardens also has some sample plans that might be worth perusing.
Don't be afraid to get creative and have fun!
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