Looking for a landscape designer for our front yard, any recommendations in the area? Thanks yt

Drive around the beach community and look at other houses in which you enjoy their
layout. Then draw it out and formulate a plan. Also can as the folks on this site
for feedback and best plants for your application.Good luck.

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Style is what you make it!

If you are going to stay for a while in your house refrain from putting too much in...we did not do this and 20 years later have a jungle which will be impossible to maintain as I age. Stay away from Sea grapes, Bouganvilla and be careful how many palms and fruit tress you plant...Lesson learned, we have created an amazing yard/jungle but it comes with a price of heavy pruning and back breaking work and $$$ for the heavy stuff

Edited: 03/21/2019 at 10:41 AM by SurferMic

Unless, you enjoy doing yardwork and as you age you need a forced work out! But, yeah, the more you plant the more maintenance that comes with it! That palm is pretty but rest assured it will be dropping palm fronds relentlessly. Plus, think hurricanes and big trees falling on your house. There is a lot to think about. my yard is complete jungle full of palms/ornamentals/fruit/ and towering 200 year old live oak. Yup, I have a ton of yard work to do. But, I like it. Others beware!

Great advice on sea grapes and bouganvilla. I learned early on bouganvilla, to never plant one in the ground. Sea Grapes make great hedges, but yeah, they make great hedges that don't ever stop growing.

Some natives (and exotics) are genuinely low maintenance. Lomandra hystrix from east Australia makes a good substitute for lily turf. It's becoming available. There's a bunch of good ground covers and pretty easy shrubs. Simpson stopper is pretty much bomb-proof.

Yellowtail pm sent-

Bougainvillea is a love hate relationship. If you let it get out of control pruning is a nightmare. Pruning it into a topiary with a single stem and a "head" of leaves has made it much more enjoyable for me. Once you prune it down to a single stem or two (you can weave a couple of main stems together) let it form a top about 3-4 feet in diameter. It takes about a year of keeping after the suckers that spring out of the main stem but then they give up and only a few die hards need to be pruned down. The top is easy to prune compared to the mass of stems that form in one that grows wild. I let the top "flower" then it's pretty easy to prune back head hard and repeat. It can be a beautiful plant but needs to be tamed.

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Replace turf grass with native plants that don't need irrigation and synthetic fertilizers or chemicals that can go into our waterways and ocean

^^^ nope never again...Bougainvillea can be tamed that way but just too much trouble , they also have a mild poison on the thorns that many will react to (rash/hives). We had every possible color which was really amazing and so colorful, then we slacked for just a while (went on an extended field assignment for work), next thing I knew they went crazy shooting off huge stems 40 feet. They are also very dirty dropping a ton of leaves. In Baja they use them around houses to keep intruders out "mexican barbwire" is what my CA friends call it. And it you ever fell or tried to go through a mature plant your toast. The worst is stepping on a trimmed branch barefoot...painful for both humans and animals. Hibiscus would be a better choice, no thorns , tons of colors...check out purple hibiscus and of course the popular Hula Girl.. If anyone remembers Boujeans where the mansion now is they had a really cool outsie area draped with them but I know the maint. crew must have hated it.

Edited: 04/25/2019 at 01:18 PM by SurferMic

No offense but why do people call plants "dirty" because they drop leaves? I hear people say that about Live Oaks all the time. Probably the most majestic beautiful shade trees in FL and they bunch up their nose and call them dirty. I find it so depressing the way we interpret nature like it has to look like our living room.

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Replace turf grass with native plants that don't need irrigation and synthetic fertilizers or chemicals that can go into our waterways and ocean

Edited: 04/26/2019 at 06:49 AM by daner