Your home · 10 guides
Landscape Design: problems and fixes, explained by Dirk
Dirk Moser is the only landscape design member of BNI Preston Center. These guides are written for a Dallas–Fort Worth reader who has the problem right now: what is happening, what to check, when to call, and what it costs.
- What actually drives the cost of a landscape design and installation in Dallas The price of a new landscape is set less by the plants you can see than by the walls, drainage, irrigation, lighting and access underneath them. Here is how the numbers are built and how to read a proposal. The short answer on landscape pricingWhy a site visit comes before any numberThe cost drivers, roughly in order of impactThe work underneath a beautiful yard
- Site visit to final walkthrough: what happens in a landscape design-build project A landscape project runs in four stages: site visit, design and proposal, construction, and handover to ongoing care. Here is what happens in each, what decides how long it takes, and how to keep it on track. How a design-build project unfolds, in briefBefore the first meeting: what to have readyStage one: the site visitStage two: design, proposal and revisions
- Oak wilt in North Texas: how to protect the live oaks and red oaks on your property Oak wilt can kill a red oak in weeks and move through a stand of live oaks by their shared roots. Most protection comes down to timing, wound paint and acting fast when symptoms appear. Protecting oaks from oak wilt: the essentialsWhat oak wilt is, and why live oaks suffer mostHow the disease moves from tree to treeSymptoms to watch on live oaks and red oaks
- Lawn, planting beds or synthetic turf: what should cover each part of a Dallas yard There is no single best groundcover for a whole property. Lawn, planting beds and synthetic turf each win in different spots, and the deciding factors are sun, use, water and the trees above. Match the surface to the sun, the use and the waterWhere a real lawn earns its placeWhere planting beds beat grassWhere synthetic turf makes sense, and where it does not
- Is that big tree sick or just stressed? Signs a mature tree is in trouble Large trees decline slowly and then all at once. Here is how to read the canopy, the trunk and the ground around a mature tree, which signs can wait and which mean you should call an arborist this week. Stressed, sick or dangerous: the quick way to tellStart with the canopy, from a distanceThen look closely at the trunk and the baseAsk what changed around the tree in the last few years
- Fixing your own sprinklers in Texas: what you can do and when to call a licensed irrigator A clogged nozzle or a head spraying the driveway is a fair weekend fix. Backflow devices, new zones and a system that never covered the yard properly are not. Here is where the line sits in Texas. What you can fix yourself, and where the line isWhat Texas law says about working on your own systemChecks any owner can do in one early morningRepairs that are reasonable for a homeowner
- Crape murder, mulch volcanoes and daily watering: yard habits that quietly kill plants Most landscape damage is not caused by pests or bad luck but by routine habits repeated every season. Here are the ones we see most often, why they hurt, and what to do instead. The habits that do the most damageIs it true crape myrtles should be cut back every winter?Topping shade trees to make them saferMulch piled high against the trunk
- Before you hire a landscape company for a large property: the questions that matter Most landscape companies sound alike on the phone. These questions, and the way to check the answers, show which ones can actually design, build and keep a large property to a standard. The questions that separate a landscape company from a mowing crewWho designs it, who builds it and who keeps itWho will I actually talk to, and how often will they be here?Questions about your trees, and how to verify the answers
- A season-by-season care calendar for a North Texas landscape, storms and freezes included A landscape that looks right in July was set up in February and protected in December. Here is the season-by-season routine we follow on the properties we maintain, including what to do when a storm or freeze hits. The year at a glanceLate winter: structure, pruning and planningSpring: wake-up, sprinkler start-up and colorSummer: water discipline in the heat
- A big yard that never looks finished: why estate landscapes decline and how to fix it You have a mowing crew, a sprinkler company and a tree guy, and the property still never looks the way you pictured it. Here is why large North Texas landscapes decline, how to check what is really going on, and what it takes to design, build and keep one properly. Three vendors, one yard, and nobody responsibleWhy North Texas landscapes slide without a planWalk your property with these questionsWhen better care is enough, and when it is time to redesign