TEMPE, Ariz. - The City of Tempe is offering free workshops on xeriscape landscaping. Water is precious in our desert climate and it can be expensive to grow non-native grasses and plants. At the workshops, which will be held from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., participants will learn how to plant and care for hardier, drought-resistant landscaping called xeriscape:

* Saturday, Sept. 29 - Basics of designing and converting to a xeriscape landscape.
* Saturday, Oct. 6 - How to choose xeriscape plants and how to maintain them.
* Saturday, Oct. 13 - Drip irrigation design, installation and maintenance.

Every participant will receive a free comprehensive xeriscape workbook, xeriscape brochures and information on drip irrigation and maintenance.
The first workshop will be held in the conference room of the Water Utilities South Water Treatment Plant, 6600 S. Price Rd. The last two workshops will be held in the Community Room of the south Tempe police substation, 8201 S. Hardy Dr. Registration is required by calling Richard Bond of the City of Tempe Water Conservation Office at 480-350-2627.

The city offers a rebate of up to $500 for Tempe residents who install or convert their existing lawns to low water-use landscape, xeriscape or artificial turf. The rebate is $250 for converting a front yard and $250 for converting a backyard. Download an application at www.tempe.gov/conservation/landscaperebate/program.htm

City of Tempe offers free xeriscape workshops

Maintain your plants for beautiful looking landscapes

Proper plant care will keep your landscape beautiful and looking its best throughout the year. Mesa residents are invited to attend a workshop titled, “Plant Care and Maintenance for Desert Landscapes,” to learn about typical maintenance practices such as proper watering, pruning, fertilizing, planting, and tree staking. The City of Mesa Utilities Department is sponsoring this free workshop.

The workshop will be held from 6:30 to 9 p.m. on October 11 at the Utilities Department Building – Community Room, 640 N Mesa Drive. Advance registration is required. To register, call (480) 644-4400 or e-mail your request to conservation.info@cityofmesa.org. A map and confirmation letter will be mailed approximately one week prior to the workshop.

For more information on caring for your desert landscape and other water conservation programs, visit the City’s Web site at www.cityofmesa.org/utilities/conservation. Mesa encourages all residents to use water wisely.

Tags: Landscape Maintenance, Landscape, Maintenance, landscapes, landscape, palnt, plants, workshops, desert, water conservation

Xeriscape landscaping is being encouraged in the city of Mesa.

New rebate to encourage Xeriscape landscape instead of grass

Mesa water customers that replace their water-thirsty grass with low-water using plants will now be rewarded with cash back. The new Grass-to-Xeriscape Landscape Rebate, approved by the Mesa City Council on June 25, will encourage the use of landscape plants appropriate to our Sonoran Desert climate. The current owner of a single-family home can apply for a rebate of $500 for removing at least 500 square feet of grass. The new program takes effect July 25, and customers must qualify, which includes receiving prior approval from the City before removing the grass. A yearly budget of $50,000 has been set aside for the program, to be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis.

Since more than half of the water used by homeowners can often be spent on outdoor watering, converting from grass to an attractive low-water using landscape is one of the best ways to conserve water and energy, save money on your water bill, and create a landscape that is much easier to maintain. Local studies show that a Xeriscape landscape can use 50 to 60 percent less water than turf-style landscapes.

Xeriscape (zeer-a-scape) is a term that defines a creative approach to landscaping that includes the use of well-adapted plants, efficient irrigation, careful design and proper maintenance. Xeriscape also creates or replaces habitat needed by wildlife, and helps to create shade for people, our homes and our communities.

The new Grass-to-Xeriscape Rebate program replaces City Ordinance 5-17-8 (E), which provided a rebate of 10 to 25 percent of the water impact fee (paid at the time of construction), when specific low-water using landscapes were installed. The impact fee rebate was only available to customers whose homes were built in 1984 or later, so it did not offer any incentive to residents with older homes. Performing a landscape renovation, especially when it involves grass removal, is typically more costly, complex and difficult to accomplish than simply constructing a new landscape or replacing existing plants.

The City offers a number of publications to assist customers in their conversion from grass to Xeriscape, including Converting to Xeriscape, Landscape Plants for the Arizona Desert and Xeriscape: Landscaping with Style in the Arizona Desert. For a complete listing of available publications or to find out how to qualify for the Grass-to-Xeriscape Rebate, visit www.cityofmesa.org/utilities/conservation/ or call (480) 644-3306.

Xeriscape landscaping Phoenix

Free Msa Arizona Landscape Watering Workshop

Take the mystery out of landscape watering at free landscaping workshop

The easiest way to save thousands of gallons of water around your home is in your landscape, because plants don’t save water, people do. The City of Mesa will take the mystery out of landscape watering by offering a free workshop to explain landscape plant water needs, how to create a watering schedule, and how to program an irrigation timer. Hands-on instruction with the timers will be provided. Proper outdoor watering and timer programming can save residents 30 to 50 percent on their landscape watering this season.

The workshop, Landscape watering by the numbers: water scheduling and controller programming, will be held from 6:30 to 9 p.m. on April 18, at Mesa Community College at Red Mountain, Mesquite Building Community Room, 7110 E. McKellips Road. Advance registration is required. To register, call (480) 644-4400 or e-mail your name, mailing address and the workshop name to conservation.info@cityofmesa.org. A map and confirmation letter will be mailed approximately one week prior to the workshop. For more information about the workshop, contact Donna DiFrancesco at (480) 644-3334.

Residents are also encouraged to visit www.wateruseitwisely.com for dozens of landscape water saving ideas. Click on “Monthly planner” to find the tools you need to keep your watering on track and your plants looking great all year long. Mesa encourages all residents to use water wisely.

Tags: phoenix, mesa, arizona, watering, landscaping, landscape, workshops, AZ, water, plants

A fairly popular plant in the Phoenix, Arizona area is the sago palm. Maintaining sago palms can be a bit tricky.

If you see a sago palm yellowing it’s most likely an iron deficiency. Browning of the plant indicates a magnesium deficiency.

One way of trying to resolve these problems is by doing a palm drench.

Here’s what you do:

1. Purchase some Iron Sulfate and straight Magnesium Sulfate (i.e. Epson Salt.).
2. With a gallon of water, mix 60/40 Magnesium and Iron (more magnesium than iron.)
3. Try the sago palm before applying the treatment, to allow sunlight to reach its base.
4. Pour the mixture on top of the sago crown.
5. Now mix dry Magnesium, Maganese and Iron Sulfate and spread the mixture quite liberally about 2-4″ around the base of the sago. With the dry mixture, use a 1 gallon container, and put in 32-48 oz of magnesium and 16-22 oz of Iron and Maganese each.

It’s going to take 30-90 days before you see the sago palms recovering. You may see results faster, but real recovery can take over a month.

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Tags: phoenix, arizona, landscaping, sago palms, plant maintenance, phoenix landscaping, palm trees

Buying plants isn’t as straightforward as going to the store, picking what looks nice and walking out. You want to make sure that the plants are healthy and fit. This is part of the reason we go with you as a client to the nurseries to help pick out the best possible plants and shrubs.

I recently came across a great post at My Landscaping Expert that provides some tips on buying healthy plants:

1. Check out the leaves and stems to make sure there are no plagues or diseases. Look for stained leaves or holes in the leaves. You definitely don’t want to purchase ill plants, they could infect the rest of the plants in your garden.
2. Check if the roots are coming through the drainage holes of the flowerpots. This is an indication that the plants have been sitting around too long. They might not transplant well into your garden if they’ve been sitting in their pots for too long a time.
3. Check for plants that are equally developed on each side. A healthy plant is one that’s well developed everywhere, on all sides. Plants that are growing too much or too little on one side should be avoided.
4. Check the roots. Remove the root ball from the pot to look at the roots. The root ball shouldn’t fall apart when removing, because that’s a sign of bad rooting. Roots also shouldn’t be blackish, that’s a bad sign. And while you want to see plenty of roots, too many and it means the plant’s been sitting too long.

These are just some of the tips provided at My Landscaping Expert. You’ll find more there, and Infiniti Landscaping will always help pick the best, healthiest plants available.

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Tags: phoenix, arizona, phoenix landscaping, gardening, landscaping, picking plants, healthy plants

Judy Hedding, author of the Phoenix Guide for About.com recently ranked the oleander plant as the #1 desert plant for landscaping.

Ok, not a big deal right? Wrong.

When it comes to landscaping people have strong opinions.

After Judy wrote her article on the oleander, she received the following e-mail:

Oleander? I was amazed you listed this nasty toxic tree as #1 on the desert landscape list. These trees are highly toxic and a major allergy problem for many people. Their pollen and leaves get in your pool and the oil sheen floats on the top of the pool. I poisoned my neighbor’s privacy row of oleanders with HCL over a year or so time frame so he would take them out. This weed should be outlawed in the state. The cheap cost is the only reason it is used. NASTY NASTY NASTY Tree. Please don’t promote this nasty tree as there are so many much better alternatives to it.

He was poisoning his neighbors oleander plants! That’s incredible.

Judy provides a very reasonable response to this fellow, which you can read here.

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Tags: phoenix landscaping, oleander, judy hedding, plants

Photo by nyome wallen.