For the past ten years I had a landscape service mowing my lawn and take care of the landscape. This year I finally told the company to hit the bricks. The company did a very bad job of cutting my lawn and maintaining trees and shrubs.

So far mowing the lawn myself the lawn is a night and day improvement 100% improvement and I just started with fertilizers. weed control.

The exercise for me is a good thing. This year I just grew tired of a subpar landscape. It was much easier to just hire someone to maintain the landscape. However, the workmanship really sucked.

The landscape company would come in with scag lawn mowers and just spread weeds and clover around the entire lawn. As far as trimming trees and shrubs that was really a joke a hack and whack ordeal.

Now I’m back in DIY mode. Anyone else maintain their own property?

 

Really thought this was going to be about replacing your watch spring...

 

I cleaned the crevices of my watch. Meanwhile, weeds are taking over my entire lawn.

But it’s Texas, and fighting bugs and allergies in 100 degrees heat is no fun.

 

I maintain my own property, and have done most the landscaping myself. I have spent a lot of energy improving the clay soil and removing weeds. I also planted a small orchard, built planter boxes for a vegetable garden, made a little fountain/ bird bath, and landscaped a large area with mostly native plants. In the neighboring forest, I eradicated a large area of a nasty invasive plant (Pampas Grass) and replanted with native trees and other plants. I enjoy the physical labor and the results. This will be the first year that the trees and other plants will produce a significant crop, so we should have fresh cherries, plums, kiwi, guava, and apples. Also, we get to see the birds and other wildlife enjoy the area.

Usually landscapers look to get in and out as quickly as possible. For me I like to take my time, and continually improve.

 

I do not mind doing physical labor. I did the landscape around my home. My brother is an architect he owns a large firm that has a couple landscape designers on his staff. After my home was built, I met with one of his landscape architects. I had pictures of my home, lot dimensions etc. The woman drew up plans for the landscape. She even gave me the plant location and types of trees to be planted. The end result was outstanding.

When my landscape was completed many of our neighbors were copying the design and planting the same plant types. My wife was pissed off about that. I told her get over it I told her you should be proud that people want to copy our landscape. My Son and I along a few relatives did all the work. That’s how my family operates we all help each other out when we can.

 

If you have a large lawn area then seriously consider a robotic lawnmower. With a little effort (weed killer/fertiliser applications) you will never have a better lawn. I have two Husqvarna robotic mowers and the time that they free up for other garden work (which I hate by the way but I refuse to have a poor garden) is immense. This picture is one lawn area that was taken just a few months after scarifying and installing the first robotic mower.

 

first fruits






View attachment 770757

 

This reminds me of the pool company that used to come and maintain our pool on a monthly basis. It seemed like they could ‘maintain’ the pool so that precisely 3 weeks later it would be going green. So I ditched the company and now maintain it myself. Result = have never had that problem since.

 

“Wildscapes” are the best...

 

Sorry for long but a great topic that's close to my heart, even if it has nothing to do with watches.

I'm on the fifth season of a native-scaping/wildscaping rehab (thanks for the term @77deluxe!). Kids gone + retirement meant it was time to get going.

My inspiration came from a 5000+ac ranch outside Johnson City, Texas that has served as a 50 year restoration project for J. David Bamberger, a co-founder of Church's Fried Chicken. The story led me to attend his land management seminar and begin applying some large-scale restoration principles on our ~1.3ac semi-suburban Hill Country property. See https://bambergerranch.org - the video is pleasant to watch (he really is the nicest person) and while it certainly doesn't apply to all situations and locations there are still some good principles for even small plots with the right features.

Since Texas summers get brutal, I ditched a grass lawn out front and installed mulch + rock + planting islands using native drought-tolerant and deer-resistant perennials, tuft grasses, etc. We're in a neighborhood so front is kept tidy but very naturally tough. One corner area reserved as a natural seasonal wildflower zone (Lupinus Texensis or Texas Bluebonnets, of course, among others). Great bee and butterfly action much of the year from a range of flowering species. Hand watering is adequate for extreme times and I'd love to someday add a catchment system so any watering could be done with stored rain vs City water.

The forested hillside out back is part of a larger canyon with years of generally un-managed growth. To improve land condition here, my focus has been thinning of Ashe Juniper trees, removal of deadwood, canopy-raising, windrows on contour lines w/ deadwood to terrace and slow erosion, tree-choking vine removal, and reduction of invasives that out-compete native species. Most all work is done with manual tools + muscle, and it's helped me drop 30 pounds. Good workouts and no gym fees. I don't know what it would cost to hire it all out but as long as I can do it myself, I will do it myself.

Continued slow and steady progress/upkeep on the project has become one of life's pleasures instead of a chore. It's almost a year-round enterprise but spring shows the impact best. I'm seeing solid transformation in vegetation quality and diversity with better ground cover. Live water in the canyon below is more reliable after improving hillside spring flow. With better water comes better wildlife and last fall snagged our first Bobcat on the game camera. Satisfying to watch and help create the evolution. Stewardship on any scale can be rewarding.

 

No. I use to maintain, but spend too much time on OF. So now I pay a guy, once a week. Mows every other week and pulls weeds every other week. My wife is happy.

 

Very cool. The wildlife cams are great. Here are some from our backyard

Some of these are from when were painting our house which explains the clutter. The first is mountain lion, then a bear who is a regular, a bobcat with his head out of frame, gray fox, tree squirrel, and a buck.

Mountain Lion


Black Bear


Bobcat (too fast for the camera).



Gray fox


Douglas tree squirrel


Black-tailed deer buck

 

Hired out or not looks beautiful @Taddyangle, and wow @wagudc on the mountain lion and bear. The former has been seen in our area, allegedly, but no way on the latter. Great “catches”. Despite a fenced area I’d be nervous letting the dog out with those guys roaming around! (a stalemate against the occasional Armadillo is about the best he can muster....)

 

Let's just say outdoor cats have a shorter than average lifespan in our neighborhood. Mountain lions are known take them out. We have a sturdy dog run that the dog stays in while we are at work. We check the backyard before letting the dog out after dark.

The black bears are pretty harmless and afraid of humans as long as they don't get habituated to them by people who don't secure their trash. I am not much concerned by the fox, racoons, or the bobcat either. The mountain lions are the scariest.

 

I do my own landscaping and clean the pool. I do it because I am a cheap bastard. When I bought my house the first four months I had a pool guy come in but as I started learning more about pool maintenance (thank you youtube) I noticed he was cutting corners or not showing up when he says he will.

I have a big front yard and I would be very interested in getting a robotic lawnmower.

 

I bought this place last November and I'm slowly renovating the inside but have to constantly work on the garden. I'm seriously considering the Husqvarna @Skier rather than buying a ride-on mower. The driveway runs up the middle and that constantly requires minor weeding. I'm glad my back is still up to the job and that my kids can start earning pocket money out there!

 

We do a lot of our own maintenance around the house. For a few years we had a company cutting the lawn and doing the trimming, but over a couple of years the condition of the lawn seemed to get worse and worse, so we stopped that and started doing it ourselves again.



Fall cleanup is a big one - getting the leaves and debris off the roof, cleaning out the eaves...



Of course clearing snow in the winter...







We also have to recoat the drive every 3 years with acrylic sealer...before:



After:



And since the Emerald Ash Borer came through a number of years ago, we do a lot of wood cutting and stacking:



And even some wood chipping on occasion...

 

Hate roof work but, man, I would love a big 'ol wood-chipper.

 

Hired my landscaper, Jose back in 2007 because we were sailing all summer and I had a global job. Roll fwd to 2019. I decided to retire a bit early from my global job with an OK package, we still sail but I realized when doing my budget, how much Jose is now costing me. I love the guy, he is super nice, but I think 2020 will see me doing my own landscaping. I've never had snow removal service. My trusty old Honda takes care of that. Time value of money. I now have time.

 

I take care of the cut/landscaping —and I enjoy the work and is part of my slow-the-aging process routine, also time spent in strategic thinking I let the fertilizer and weed control details to a local/small business I have used for 15+ years — he treats the lawn 5x years always w/excellent results.