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Gazing out over your backyard landscape, you beam with pride over tender perennials blossoming beside the decorative maple you planted years back, now reaching maturity. Yet scan just past those eye-catching focal points and consternation creeps up at the encroaching crabgrass blurring bed boundaries.
Splintery old timber beams barely peek through overwhelming blankets of ivy spreading from neighbor’s fences. And is that a rogue carrot plant emerging in your supposedly reserved pansy patch?! Before frustration froths over, pause and perceive this as the perfect moment to reinforce control through compositional edging.
When garden beds morph into shapeless masses overrun with wanderers, it’s time to define new parameters. Much like framing art to accentuate the image within, edges applied thoughtfully keep chaotic nature contained. This prevents your carefully curated plants from competing with uninvited guests.
Edging assists maintenance, protects specimens, provides aesthetic elevation and lends landscapes heightened purpose. Embrace this invaluable landscaping component and unlock every flower or shrub’s beautification potential.
This guide previews common edging techniques and materials, equipping readers to reclaim gardening sanctuaries from disarray through tailored containment solutions. We’ll detail installation steps plus examine unique benefits certain borders impart depending on the varieties chosen.
Discover renewed inspiration reigning over your surroundings by taking command of edges.
What's Inside
Benefits of Garden Edging
Beyond mere aesthetic enhancement, edges deliver valuable functional advantages:
Subterranean plant roots disregard imaginary bed lines. Rigid vertical barricades halt tangled root advancement preserving soil nutrition for intended crops.
Discourage Lawn Overgrowth
Grassy pioneers constantly seek new frontiers. Barriers block invading lawn creepers and hitchhiking weeds around formal plantings.
Assist Maintenance
Edging allows mowing, aerating and fertilizing turf right up to the bed perimeter without disturbing botanicals. Trimming around trees simplifies creating mulch rings.
Provide Design Utility
Borders physically define the planting space for implementing designs, helpful when placing permanent specimens spaced appropriately.
Common Garden Edging Materials
Homeowners can select from numerous edging styles using various construction materials, each presenting unique traits.
Plastic
Inexpensive PVC/polyethylene plastic lawn strip offers simple slip-resistant installation. Thinner versions eventually deform requiring replacements.
Steel
Galvanized steel, powder coated for durability, provides a sturdy definition for decades and often contours naturally. Rust potential exists if protective coatings scrape off over time.
Aluminum
Lightweight aluminium withstands water exposure well maintaining shape. Affordability between steel and plastics makes aluminium popular for edging straight runs or smooth curves.
Wood
Naturally rot-resistant cedar proves a sound wooden choice, though pine composite also resists splintering and retains shape once anchored. Perform annual sealing to prolong service life.
Brick/Stone
Permanent masonry borders establish prominence using designer ledge stone or brick. Level excavation, gravel base and precise alignment require patience but award enduring results.
Concrete
Custom concrete edges provide smooth uniform lines, integrating color if desired. Professional equipment best handles concrete’s challenges including forming, pouring and finishing techniques.
Landscape Timbers
Heavy timber beams hammered into soil prevent existing plants from spreading beyond set positions. Best for naturalized beds where precision doesn’t matter.
Grass Restraints
Plastic or metal lawn restraints sink narrow vertical spikes into the ground along planting boundaries to discourage surface root advancement. Quick to install if a later adjustment is likely.
Hybrid Solutions
Some systems, like interlocking resin plastic panels standing atop driveway edgers, combine durable materials with easy alignment during positioning.
Selecting the Best Edging Method by Garden Context
Configuration and placement sites help determine optimal edging approaches:
Formal Gardens: Symmetrical designs deserve unifying edger treatments along all botanical boundaries. Brick, stone or concrete offer timeless architectural appeal.
Trees/Shrubs: Hard barriers that won’t warp over time work best around permanent plants. Steel, aluminium or thick rigid polymer edges deliver.
Organic Gardens: Timber beams, landscape restraints, or shovels scraped lines sport an appropriate natural look for looser growing layouts.
Waterfronts: Where constant soil moisture exists, moisture-proof concrete, stone or rot-resistant woods prove wise solutions resilient against dampness.
Slopes: Use erosion-slowing wood, masonry or fortress-like aluminium edging to fortify inclines against washout or collapse downhill.
Manual Installation Steps
Ambitious do-it-yourselfers can manually tackle installing garden edges if physical ability allows. Follow these guidelines:
- Measure perimeter footage needing enclosure.
- Dig 8-10 inch deep trenches removing turf, plants or debris.
- Compact trenches eliminate loose material.
- Position edging segments end-to-end in trenches.
- Secure borders with stakes every several feet.
- Backfill outside trench edges with excess soil.
- Fill the inside trench section with quality gardening mix.
- Allow the newly edged bed perimeter to settle completely.
- Edge immediately surrounding grass for a clean outline.
Since landscape projects often uncover unforeseen snags, first-timers may benefit from seeking professional garden edging best suiting site-specific considerations. Their wheelhouse expertise also proves invaluable when problems arise during or after establishment.
Or you can get recommendations for quality garden edging materials and installation services from knowledgeable local landscaping professionals.
Why Hiring Landscaping Crews Helps
Large border installations and complex layouts nearly always justify delegating manual labour to seasoned professionals. Tradesmen bring not only hard-won shaping and measuring proficiencies, but right-sized digging equipment plus materials transport assistance.
Most importantly, contractors recognize hidden intricacies average homeowners routinely miscalculate on initial attempts. Consider the crew’s thoughtful problem prevention worth the peace of mind gained.
Maintaining Edges over Time
Following annual seasonal lawn care scheduling also assists in keeping edges contained and tidy:
Spring: Inspect borders for heaving winter frost displacement. Reset any detached sections to proper levels before mulching beds. Fill erosion gaps with fresh soil.
Summer: Weed whack closely along edges so spreading grasses don’t overwhelm defined outlines. Re-cut trenched roots escaping deeper and seeking moisture.
Fall: Clear fallen leaves and debris smothering garden demarcation lines before heavy snows arrive. Mark any problem segments needing eventual replacement.
Winter: Utilize snow cover to note contours disappearing below drifts that must be reinforced once thawed. Edge snow piles closely during shoveling to prevent killing root systems.
The Takeaway
Crisply delineated garden parameters not only increase curb appeal through orderly composition, they grant homeowners year-round maintenance conveniences protecting delicate root zones.
Whatever edging material resonates best with existing architecture and site usage factors, committing to neat perimeter foundations unlocks every plant’s beautification potential.
Remember to periodically evaluate boundary serviceability and repair minor alignment aberrations quickly before conditions worsen. Well-framed growing spaces keep ornamentals lush and landscapes gorgeous when attention to edges cuts.
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