An amazing landscape, meaning one that fills your senses, can evoke a sense of happiness, relaxation, calmness, and even excitement. The fragrance of the flowers in your garden can be pleasurable and sometimes nostalgic. The colors can induce excitement or calmness depending on which colors are used and how they’re combined. The sounds such as the songs of birds, the hum of a dragonfly or hummingbird, and the movement of water can soothe and calm you. The visual pleasure of watching the wind rustle the leaves in the trees or the gracefulness of a butterfly floating through the air can feel relaxing as though you transitioned into a different world – the world of nature.
Let’s explore the many benefits of immersing in nature in your own backyard.
Experiencing Nature Can Add Positivity to Your Life
How can a beautiful landscape make a difference? Think about how you feel when you walk outside your home. Are you walking into a masterpiece created by nature’s palette, or does your landscape need a facelift to create that space for you?
Nature can inspire feelings of positivity. It can be an escape from your daily routines. If your day brings a lot of stress into your life, a quiet walk through your gardens can calm the nerves, quiet the brain, provide time for meditation or prayer, increase your appreciation for the wonders of the outdoor world, ignite creative thoughts, and place you in a state of rejuvenation.
Research has proven our visual interaction with nature reduces stress and increases healing.
A Beautiful Landscape Can Increase the Value of Your Home
Among the many benefits of having a beautiful landscape, the increased value it provides for your home is no small one.
You have one chance to make a first impression, so let’s make it a positive one. You want your landscape to elicit feelings of admiration and invitation. When selling your home, this impression is essential to attract home buyers to your property. A well-manicured landscape sends a message that the entire property is well taken care of. A poorly manicured landscape may give the impression that the home is just as poorly taken care of.
How much landscaping can add depends on where you live and the quality of the landscape. An article by Total Mortgage provides some valuable answers regarding how much increase you might expect by installing a first-class landscape. This article suggests that landscaping can add 12 to 15 percent to the property.
Landscapes Can Provide Significant Environmental Benefits
Plants take in carbon dioxide and release oxygen. There are a few plants that will release some oxygen at night, but most do not. According to the Arbor Day Foundation, one large tree can provide a day’s supply of oxygen for up to four people. In addition, during a year, a mature tree can absorb more than 48 pounds of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and release oxygen in exchange.
How do trees impact our environment? During those hot summer days, we often find refuge under the shade of trees. The air we breathe is cleaner due to the ability of the trees’ leaves to filter pollutants from the air. Wildlife seeking new habitats as construction encroaches into their native spaces can often find a home in trees.
If your property doesn’t have space for trees, all plants play their part in reducing carbon dioxide and supporting wildlife.
Water Conservation
In the regions where drought is a challenge, the landscape style you choose and the plant palette you incorporate will determine the amount of water you save. Mediterranean and Southwest landscape styles are known for using drought tolerant plants that conserve water.
Some people feel drought tolerant landscapes aren’t beautiful or appealing. But there are beautiful plants in the drought tolerant selections. There are a lot of drought tolerant plants that aren’t succulents or natives with gorgeous foliage and flowers. There are beautiful succulents and natives which can enhance the beauty of your landscape when incorporated into the non-succulent and non-native palette.
Automated irrigation is a necessary part of your landscape if you want to save time and water. Where possible, irrigate with a drip system. A drip system places the water exactly where it’s needed, and water isn’t wasted. If you’re considering adding grass or ground cover, consider subsurface irrigation. This is a drip system that’s installed underground. Also, consider a drought tolerant grass.
Wildlife Will Be Grateful
As building construction expands and encroaches into to natural habitats, many animals are displaced from their native homes. Some of this loss of natural habitat can be replaced in our landscaping.
All plants and trees contribute in some way to the habitat of animals. They provide protection from predators, food, shelter, and a place to nest and have their young. Birds, hummingbirds, dragonflies, and butterflies to mention a few not only need these new places to thrive, but they add so much enjoyment to the landscape and our outdoor experiences.
Providing this environment in your landscape will certainly promote a feeling of giving back to nature.
You Can Eat the Elephant One Bite at a Time
If you’re not ready to take on an entire landscape, start small. Create a secluded outdoor room where you can escape and experience an abundance of benefits from nature. You can create an element of privacy using trees, shrubs, and/or trellises adorned with colorful flowering vines. While you’re sitting and soaking in the wonders for nature, breathe, relax, and dream. Dream about what you would love to create next in your amazing garden.
Maybe you hear water moving close by as you visualize the next addition to your garden. It could be a rushing waterfall into a pond with water lilies floating gracefully on the water’s surface. Or it could be a quiet tricking fountain with a peaceful flow into the water below.
What about a flower bed bursting with color as bees and butterflies visit the blooms and do their work. You may also feel a sense of giving back to the environment from providing flowers that attract pollinators giving them what they need for survival.
How about recreation? Can you see in your mind’s eye a lot of family and friends joining you for entertainment and fun. What do you see needs to be created to make that happen? Maybe a swimming pool, a barbecue, an outdoor kitchen, a fire pit, a patio or deck, or a game area. Think about what will fit the needs and pleasure for you and those you love.
OR You Can Take the Entire Project on All at One Time
Ready, Set, Go! If you’re in a place of wanting a landscape that will bring you, your family, and your friends years of pleasure and making memories to last a life time, and you want it done yesterday, this is completely feasible. Well, maybe not yesterday!
However, I recommend you take the necessary time to think, dream, and figure out what’s important to you in your outdoor living space. Don’t rush this process, but at the same time, don’t drag your feet. Consider the landscapes around you. If you’re located in an area where drought is common, consider the landscape style that supports your environment such as Mediterranean or Southwest. Or simply plant what you love as long as it thrives in your planting zone.
After careful consideration of all the elements you want to create and include in your outdoor living space, create a plan. A plan organizes the entire process for you. It gives you to opportunity to stage this creation in a way that you’ll know what needs to be done first and each step that follows. There is an order to this. If the installation doesn’t adhere to the correct order, this can be costly.
Where To Go From Here
If you are making changes to your existing landscape and want to upgrade to a more suitable landscape for your desires and dreams and feel you could use some ideas, we’re here to help. If you want a creative brainstorm, assessment of the property, suggestion of plant design, and how to include other elements that will accomplish your landscape goals, we provide consultations for just this purpose. We would love to meet with you and discuss the possibilities of what can be achieved in your landscape.
New construction is a larger scale project. As mentioned above, you need a plan. If you want a landscape design and you don’t have the time or inclination to do it yourself, we can assist. If you choose to work with us, a time will be scheduled to meet to assess your property, gain all your ideas, and explore what you want to accomplish in your new landscape.
Wrapping Up
Immersing in nature can enrich your life by providing a feeling of peace in a natural world. It can also offer a time of relaxation and calm as you escape the busyness around you. Being uplifted and inspired by your environment can be a catalyst to push you forward in life.
This bit of paradise can increase the value of your home, but if you’re not in the market to sell, allow it to increase the enrichment of your life. Make it one of inspiration, invitation, and significance that you can enjoy and a place where you can have happy and memorable experiences.
Giving back promotes a feeling of happiness. This is often spoke of in the realm of helping people or giving to a great cause. Happiness can also be the byproduct of giving back to nature and, in some small way, contributing to nature’s ability to keep on giving to us.
Whether you’re ready to add a new landscape, revitalized an existing landscape, or if your want to take it slower and start small, dream! Visualize what’s important to you in your outdoor living space. Who are you going to share this space with? How much time do you have to devote to it? What will your budget allow?
If you’d like some guidance to get started, consider bringing in a professional who can simply give you ideas or work with you to the completion of the project.
I work in Southern Utah and Southern California only. If you’re located in either of these areas, we would love to be part of helping you create an amazing landscape. This is our passion! Just click on the “CONTACT US” button below and send us a message.
If you feel you need help getting started and are not located in the areas we work in, contact a local professional who will consult with you and walk you through the process.
Hi. I’m Linda Rose. I have 17 years of professional experience as a landscape contractor and landscape designer. I’m passionate about nature and using nature’s palette to create beautiful gardens for my clients. I’m an advocate for the Earth with a mission to encourage people to connect with the Earth and receive the abundant gifts of beauty, health, and balance. My goal is to create your ultimate outdoor experience at home.