Landscapes
Who I Am and What I Do
I've spent 35 years in the landscaping trade, 25 years of it in residential landscape design. I started my design-life in the San Francisco Bay area where I studied at UC Berkeley and moved to the county of El Dorado in the Sierra Nevada foothills 20 years ago.
The foothills encompass both cold winter and dry summer weather, and along with shallower soils makes gardening here particularly challenging. I feel fortunate to design among the natural beauty of this area. It provides a wonderful backdrop to create gardens well suited to this unique area on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada mountains.
Recently I've taken opportunities to work in the Sacramento Valley, challenging my understanding of natural systems and making them work for the landscape in suburbia. In the Sacramento Valley I also take advantage of the warmer winters and deeper soils when choosing plants.
What I Specialize In
WATERSHED APPROACH (G3 Watershed Wise Professional)
Create Habitat. Nurture the Soil.
Conserve our precious water.
Integrate the intelligence of nature for sustainability.
WATER EFFICIENCY (Qualified Water Efficiency Landscaper)
Water conscious landscapes.
Efficient irrigation design.
Landscapes that respect our local climate.
TREES (Certified Arborist)
Create spaces that feed your spirit.
Support the most important plants in our landscapes:
Nurture our trees!
CHALLENGING SITES (Certified Landscape Designer)
Deer. Poor Soil. Firescaping. Limited water.
Landscape Designs for gardening success!
Landscape Essentials
Feed Your Soul
Joy. Hope. Tranquility.
Ultimately our own landscapes should be places where our spirits can be recharged.
Our landscapes remind us that we are a part of our precious earth.
Create Living Soil
Mulch and compost help create healthy soil. Healthy soil supports a vibrant soil microbe population. Happy soil microbes contribute to healthy plants!
Organically degradable mulch (like bark mulch) supports microbes. It can cover the water-efficient drip irrigation, modulate soil temperatures, and at 3"-4" thick can suppress weeds (no weed fabric please)!
Compost and mulching are must-haves for any sustainable landscape.
TREES
Can you imagine a world without trees?
They always deserve our consideration. Careful selection of new trees, assessing health and risk of existing trees, nurturing our trees.
Capturing Water
We need to hold onto every drop of water that falls on our landscapes: our roofs, driveways, walks, even the planted areas.
Instead of allowing the water to rush off of our site, we can SLOW THAT WATER DOWN so it can soak into the soil.
