How to Design a Lofty Landscape

With so many different types of plants and shrubs to choose from, designing your own lofty landscape can be exciting. Decide if your landscape will be a high maintenance garden style, one that uses mulch instead of grass, or an ornamental landscape filled with beautiful flowers.

Instructions

1. Make sure you have a large area to begin with. If there isn't already a pond or a fountain, design one. Nothing beats the tranquility of running water.

2. Grow a variety of trees around the yard. Try to find fast growing species, such as quaking aspen and weeping willow. Include conifers, Western water birch, mountain alder, and mountain maple. Add a few mountain ash trees with their colorful summer berries.

3. Cover the ground area near the rocky slopes with an evergreen such as green leaf manzanita. Other shrubs to add to your lofty landscape are rabbitbrush, serviceberry, sage, and arctic willow. Creek dogwood controls erosion in moist soil.

4. Space the shrubs and trees far enough apart to allow room for an assortment of great looking native flowers. Start by planting bright yellow evening primrose, and finish off with a colorful creation of monkey flower and sulfur flower. Add some columbine, lupine, yarrow, and blue-flowered Lewis flax.

5. Plant a low maintenance, drought resistant grass. Sheep and hard fescue needs no fertilizer. Tall and red fescues blend well together. Straw and pine needles replace grass in hot, dry areas.

Tips & Warnings

• Place large boulders and rocks around the yard before you plant the foliage. Rocks will give your lofty landscape a mountain atmosphere.

• Native plants, trees, and shrubs require little water and no fertilizer.

• Before planting your lofty landscape make sure the plants you choose grow well in your climate.

Resources

• Landscape Design