Desert Crest Press

Dramatic, charming or quirky - landscape boulders and rock add character to and form to your xeriscaping in Peoria, AZ

Never toss out a rock found in your yard – at least not the ones large enough to add to your landscaping in Peoria, AZ. You never know where it might be the perfect perky note for your landscape or garden. Learning how to use rocks in a way that adds beauty and value to your Arizona landscaping can alter the entire look of your property. There is one great advantage using rocks in any xeriscaping design – they are completely drought resistant. No matter how much it is neglected, you can’t kill a rock. So, unless you have some deeply rooted desire to keep your rocks sparkly clean, they never need watering.

Although it is important to pay attention to the choice of desert plants that will used to create your Peoria xeriscape design. It is just as important to put a considerable amount of thought toward the rock selection, the permanent and usually immovable aspects known as hardscaping. Incidentally, did you know that your landscaping has 3 distinct things going on? The plantings in any landscape are known as softscaping, if you add a water feature such as waterfalls in Peoria, Arizona – it is waterscaping the moment a few plants are added to soften the rocky surrounding. Hardscaping includes things like your paver patio, flagstone walkways and ramadas for shade.

Rocks can be used as a focal point in your xeriscape design through the strategic placement of single items throughout the yard. Boulders can also be incorporated where more weight, height or mass is required to offset the surrounding desert plants. Arranging smaller to medium sized landscape rocks in clusters threaded with low growing plants can create a rock garden design in Peoria, AZ. Small rocks can act as stone mulch used in all over ground cover which does more than just conserving water for the plants used in the design. Stone mulch also preserves your Arizona topsoil from blowing away and causing an effect known as desertification, if this should be allowed to take place – even cacti would not grow here. Desertification would turn the region into a waste land where nothing grows.

Xeriscape designs of cacti, shrubs, grasses and flowers arranged in different beds and areas can be instantly be more charming, even dramatic when visually enhanced through placement of complimentary colors, arresting shapes and different sizes of rocks in strategic locations.

Professional Peoria, AZ landscapers use large rocks or boulders in creating a height element in many xeriscape landscape plans. Stones are an inexpensive way of adding interest and beauty to any yard with an element that can be visually striking. They look great and compliment any plant naturally, creating a harmonious blend with the surrounding environment. Your Peoria, AZ xeriscape design, when including the natural beauty of carefully selected rocks. You may not have considered it yet, but rock-on xeriscaping is an excellent way to add interesting curb appeal to your desert home.

Instant presence and charming character found in rock on xeriscape design has a spot in your Arizona landscaping.

When adding rocks to your Peoria, Arizona landscaping, it might be best if you know that all rocks have 8 sides. In a way, they serve as a sort of sculpture carved by nature. Just plopping a boulder or rock down and calling it landscaping charm doesn’t always work out. There is a knack at times in seeing which side of the rock should be shown off and which to hide. Every rock has a place; you just have to find it. There is never waste in a rock pile, if it doesn’t fit where you want to use it first… it will be fabulous or the perfect fit in another location. Rock on Arizona, xeriscape design can be really cool.

Popularity: 49% [?]

Desert landscape design in Phoenix allows you the beauty of Red Justica whose fragrant red flowers are adored by hummingbirds too.

Homeowners looking for a low maintenance landscape design, Phoenix yards and gardens should display a stylish approach to xeriscaping.

Desert landscaping will be the least amount of work and expense for your home budget. Phoenix landscapers understand the xeriscape principles applied in landscaping that will allow homeowners to cut down on water usage. When designed properly, you will still enjoy a beautiful yard and garden. Your Arizona properly will be striking all year, as well as being vibrant, colorful and still use only drought-resistant desert plants.

What many homeowners don’t understand is that xeriscaping is neither difficult nor expensive. A properly designed xeriscaped yard actually requires less maintenance than traditional landscaping designs. While desert landscaping is highly drought tolerant, the curb appeal of your Phoenix property requires that some light, regular drip irrigation be used for utmost beauty and vigor.

You can count on xeriscaping using up to 50% less water than traditional landscaping does. The best landscape design Phoenix companies understand how to group desert plants according to the same water requirements. This allows the setting of your drip irrigation clock for the most effective water usage plan while providing every plant in your yard with the right amount of moisture assistance.

Additionally, there are other xeriscape principles that can be applied to your landscape design. Phoenix residents will find are helpful in further decreasing the need for watering. To accomplish this step in water use reduction, you must know which desert plants thrive in what conditions. Knowledge of how sheltering certain plants from drying wind will decrease their need of water is important. Some desert plants used in xeriscape landscaping will flourish and require less moisture planted in areas that have less sunlight.

Professional landscapers in Phoenix will present to you a variety of different choices that you can make when selecting desert plants for your Arizona xeriscape design.

Flowering native Arizona shrubs can include plants like the Red Justica that blooms in the spring and fall. This lovely native selection’s bright red flowers are highly fragrant, attracting hummingbirds when blossoming. The native Arizona succulent known as Desert Spoon will lend to cream colored flowers to your yard or garden from late spring through summer.

Vibrant bougainvillea is amazing in creating beauty for landscape design Phoenix homeowners and Phoenix landscapers just can't resist.

Although technically not a desert plant, Bougainvillea is quite a popular choice with Phoenix landscapers and homeowners. These hardy woody vines will bloom several times per year adding magnificent color to your desert landscaping in Phoenix. While out and about driving through town vibrant Bouganvillea will be seen frothing in brilliant magenta, purple, pink and red and adding great curb appeal in the beautifully designed grounds surrounding many Arizona homes.

There are also a wide variety of trees, cacti, grasses and perennial plants that your Phoenix landscaper will introduce you to for planting in your new Arizona home’s xeriscape landscaping.

Popularity: 31% [?]

Installing a desert setting rather than a lawn is wise for landscaping in Arizona and your household budget.

Homes with lush landscaping in Arizona have one thing in common – a great deal of water being used. Accomplishing this theme is a foreign environment can be quite costly to maintain in the desert. Plants used in traditional landscape designs can be incredibly expensive and actually environmentally unfriendly. The best solution is to create a xeriscape design planned to use far less water, yet will not struggle to thrive under the hot Arizona sun.

Many people unfamiliar with xeriscaping have a misconceived notion that this type of landscaping in Arizona must be lifeless, bland and visually unappealing. Some believe desert landscaping translates into trading plants for rocks. This is so far from the truth. There is a wide variety of beautiful and vibrant flowering plants that landscapers in Arizona use to create striking residential landscapes.

Desert plants found growing naturally present a variety of drought-resistant choices. Some of the most popular ones are found in these categories:

• Cacti – This is the most obvious selection and the one that pop’s into the mind’s viewer when any discussion of desert plants is pursued. Cacti are a wonderful choice because these are the plant equivalent of camels, capable of hoarding water for months and for some, even years.
• Succulents – These types of plants also are known for their drought resistant and water storing capabilities. These include plants such as Agave, Hoya, Yucca, Aloe and Astroloba.
• Deep Rooted – There are many plants that possess long roots allowing then to access water that is deep in the ground. These savvy choices for landscaping in Arizona include plants like the leafy Acacia, with roots that can penetrate as far down as 50 feet. There are deciduous shrubs, such as the Mesquite, that manage to maintain leaves even in the driest conditions.  Mesquite also can grow tall like a tree and be used as a yard border. Cottonwood also sends its roots deep seeking water sources far below the surface. It was used by the area’s earliest settlers as an indication for locating deep spring water.

Xeriscape design is not as easy as you may think, designing a desert takes artistic talent.

The use of beautiful, useful hardscape elements in your Arizona landscape design can reduce water reliance and xeriscape maintenance. Installing natural stone and pavers for patios and courtyards, as well as walks, drives and other large paved expanses – looks great, increases property value and needs no water at all. Outdoor living rooms are perfect for Arizona lifestyles and friendly to the desert environment.

Well planned placement of pottery, sculpture and landscape rocks or boulders is excellent use of landscape space in your Arizona yard. Professional landscape designers in Arizona will be those who can plan desert landscaping to be more beautiful than Mother Nature could create a view on her own.

Popularity: 39% [?]

Professional landscapers in Glendale love the look of the cacti Saguaro every bit as much as homeowners do.

Many people around the world are familiar with Saguaro (sah-wah-row). These cacti have been immortalized by Hollywood, proudly portrayed as the archetypical cactus plant in hundreds of movies. We see it in old Tom Mix, Gene Autry and Hopalong Cassidy films. It’s that cactus with arms held straight up as if it is surrendering to one side of the law, or the other. Well, many Arizona homes include this slow growing plant as a central focal point for desert landscaping in Glendale, AZ. From front yard curb appeal to the patio side cactus garden, Saguaro cacti are prized for xeriscape.

Arizona law will have you sticking your arms up in surrender if you attempt to dig one up out of the desert. It is a protected species that will have you doing time planting new Saguaros for the next generations in Arizona to enjoy. Although the Saguaro cactus can be grown from seeds, it takes 10 years for the plant to grow a half foot tall. So, a nice sized specimen will be somewhat pricey, but absolutely gorgeous when landscapers in Glendale have finished installing your specimen xeriscape desert plant. A good sized Saguaro cactus is a treasure not to be toyed with in transit or planting, a job best left to your local professional Glendale landscaping company.

Cactus work well in a Glendale xeriscape design. A mature Saguaro would be the main feature, curb appeal character that you and your visitors will enjoy for years. It will take the Saguaro nearly 40 years to produce the first flower blooms and nearly three quarters of a century to sprout those famous surrendering arms. Saguaros can live to 200 years old while growing as tall as 60 feet.

Since a Saguaro cactus takes a couple of human generations to produce those majestic looking cactus plants that we all remember from classic western movies and cartoons, going the “grow-your-own” route is a long term project someday inherited by your grandchildren. Amazingly, these majestic native Arizona plants have more value and wonder than the most breathtaking of lush landscaping plants. Landscaping in Glendale, AZ with good water conservation should feature a Saguaro cactus, as it is perfect for blending with the surrounding open landscape.

Most people assume that xeriscape plants need no water at all. This is not true, unless you want your beautiful desert landscaping to struggle, instead of flourish. Once planted in your Glendale landscaping, the Saguaro cactus welcomes generous watering during the hot Arizona summer months. Water Saguaro cacti sparingly during winter months. Even slow growing plants will perform much more exuberantly to regular light watering and an occasional deep drink. It’s one of the secrets of maintaining a beautiful xeriscape design in Glendale, Arizona yards.

Popularity: 35% [?]

Santolina has many uses in drought tolerant landscape design. It is well suited to the climate in your Scottsdale landscaping.

As a perfect ground cover providing excellent contrast against an Arizona stone and stucco wall, consider using Santolina chamaecyparissus, commonly known as Lavender Cotton. Its finely-toothed foliage of striking grey color is a sub-shrub, a woody perennial that grows to about two-foot tall and one-foot in width. It is right at home is your Scottsdale desert garden and anywhere in your yard.

Shown in the foreground before a widespread Desert Willow, Santolina is a popular choice for Scottsdale landscapers used as a stable component in any flowerbed or employed as a border or possibly used as a niche plant placed between flagstones and garden rocks. Although the Santolina does flower throughout the summer months producing small, button-shaped, daisy-like blooms, it is better noted for its small-scale properties making it quite suitable for lending itself to contrast needs in any Phoenix or Scottsdale landscape design or xeriscape planting.

From a pure aesthetic viewpoint, Santolina is an excellent herb addition to any desert garden as an accent or border blending well with herbs like Lavender, Sage and Thyme that possess similarly shaped foliage. When its leaves are clipped it produces an attractive fragrance making it a valuable addition to any Scottsdale landscape design incorporating the use of an herb garden. Foot-high Santolina edging an herb garden makes for a striking formal composition.

Give thought to easy to grow Santolina while considering the placement of bedding plants in association with trees such as the Desert Willow shown here in a sharp garden design. To create as much unity as possible in your desert landscape, your ground cover should link with your garden’s Arizona stone walls. As well as create good contrast with the ‘ceiling’ created by larger shrubs and trees. Santolina will work well with many different Agave shrubs such as Queen Victoria, Octopus or Huachuca as well as desert tress such as the Willows, Sycamores and Mesquites.

Low maintenance in dry calcareous or alkaline soil makes Santolina an excellent choice for any xeriscape design in Scottsdale and Phoenix.

Popularity: 31% [?]

Striking blue aloe is a winner in desert landscaping xeriscape design in Glendale and greater Phoenix homes.

Aloe is one of many desert plants growing naturally throughout the arid southwest and cultivated here by many Phoenix landscapers. The plant is a favorite choice incorporated into many different professional xeriscape designs. The blue aloe is especially ideal and beautiful residing in your Glendale xeriscaping. It remains dormant during winter requiring little water, and is very drought-tolerant once the plant is fully established.

The blue aloe in xeriscape design provides great contrast when incorporate in any Phoenix or Glendale landscape design. This striking aloe can easily grow to three feet, with its sword-like gray-blue leaves standing out brilliantly against Arizona stone and stucco. They flourish best in well-drained soil amended with a heavy dose of sand. Grow these desert plants in either full sun or partial shade. Don’t be tempted to water too much during hot summer months. This is one tough succulent that is hardly ever thirsty.

Should you to notice the leaves begin browning during extremely hot, dry weather – do cut back on sun exposure wherever possible. If you plan potting this desert plant, make sure to use crushed stone at the bottom of the container, but do not block the drainage hole. Potted giant blue aloe is mobile, allowing you to move them around. Accenting your Glendale xeriscaping a little dry blue variety offers greater dimension to your landscaping. Moving blue aloe around gives you the occasional new look to your desert landscape’s appearance.

Potted giant blue aloe is a great accent plant for Glendale patios, courtyards and decks where it can be admired by all. They prosper in hardiness zones 9-11 so are a perfect choice for your greater Phoenix area yard. Deliciously unique, giant blue aloe is easy to grow. This beautiful desert plant is perfectly at home inside the house, adding color to outdoor living rooms and very desirable in desert landscape design. They grow like weeds!

Popularity: 34% [?]

Depth, color and many layers of interest are found in this gorgeous xeriscape landscape design in Phoenix.

If you know enough about desert plants and those that will thrive in the drastic climate of Arizona, it does make selecting the right ones to create a low maintenance landscape a lot easier. Anyone can research which xeriscape plants require the least water to make them easy to grow around a home in Phoenix. Yet, not everyone can take those same desert plants and arrange them to become a work of art. Phoenix landscaping is far more than picking the easiest plants you can find. Beautifully landscaped properties will always be the work of an artistic person who is also a landscape designer.

The process of laying out the planting plan of a xeriscaped yard is just the frosting, the final touches that make your Phoenix landscape design become something attractive, let alone stunning. Every perennial flower, ornamental grass, succulent or cactus, shrub, tree and vine is an important player in a well orchestrated ebb and flow of any xeriscape design. Pulling the entire scene together also leans heavily on precisely placing the hardscape elements of pavements, stone or stucco walls, fountains, statuary and even landscape boulders.

The brightest plant on the right of the walk, Blue Agave looks even bluer with all the yellow around it.

To really have a fabulous desert landscaping display, form and line is just as important as color, texture and form. The well skilled and talented Phoenix landscape designer will be able to visualize the scene that is developing as each new item is placed on the paper that becomes a map to building a wonderful yard. Everything has a place and a color in this fine example of a lovely desert landscape. Yellows, blue and purple, earth tones and finally different shades of green are mixed and placed just right for flow and mass, accent and background. To add even more depth each area has a singular accent plant that arrests more attention than the others.

There are no vibrant flowers beyond the soft Yellow Bells along the walk. Not that this particular Phoenix xeriscape design won’t have a variety of brightly colored blooms, because in other parts of the year it will. The thing is that any landscape design that is done well, will have this much contrast and depth to it whether something is in flower at the moment or not. This is what separates a mediocre Phoenix landscape designer from the best. It doesn’t matter whether you live in the desert of Arizona or the verdant rolling valleys around the Mississippi. Landscape design is the most intricate form of art that requires more skill, knowledge and talent than most people assume. Unless of course, you don’t mind that your Phoenix landscaping isn’t anything special.

Popularity: 83% [?]

Desert landscaping doesn't have to be boring! It can be very colorful.

Your home here in Arizona can have so many different colors and textures in the landscaping design. Phoenix area homeowners can enjoy low maintenance, drought tolerant plants without giving up beauty and style. Creative use of unique colors and contrast of foliage plants and cactus carries a great deal of visual impact even when few desert plants that flower are in bloom.

It isn’t just the selection of desert plants that create a stunning and pleasing high color xeriscape design for your home. Placing the flowering plants and colored foliage must be done with some vision of how it will flow in all stages of a year’s display. To be able to do this, the landscape designer must have many plants and their attributes memorized along with each stage of their growth, the mature sizes and flowering through the months of the calendar. This ability requires far more skill in desert areas like Phoenix, than the more verdant regions.

Here we have Golden Barrel Cactus in the foreground of the xeriscape design, echoing the mounded Yellow Bells and the bright yellow variegation of the container grown Agave on the pillars. When in bloom, the Purple Prickly Pear tosses more yellow into the planting scheme, just the foliage picks up the blue flowering Creeping Rosemary and a tone in the boulders beside the sidewalk’s lower steps. The orange of the Lantana is the right hot accent to really set of this exquisite Phoenix desert landscaping design.

Vibrant xeriscape landscaping in Phoenix featuring beautiful blooming plants.

Well thought out xeriscape design for Phoenix curb appeal will be beautiful and well layered from any viewing angle. Height from great ornamental trees like Palo Verde and Acacia mixed with architectural cactus and hardscape structures like the pillars are important parts of front yard landscaping. Adding really wonderful and unusual xeriscape plant colors like the steel blue spiky leaves of the Century Plant Agave give your landscape design excellent accents of high interest. The art of beauty in Arizona landscapes always begins with the assistance of a professional xeriscape designer.

Popularity: 79% [?]

Beautiful to behold, the Ghost Gum Eucalyptus tree is great for Phoenix xeriscape design landscaping.

There are two different types of Eucalyptus that do great in Phoenix landscaping. Pay no attention to the varieties grown around old Arizona homes, they have given these lovely, evergreen trees a bad reputation from brittle wood and a messy habit. Actually there are hundreds of types of Eucalyptus, so do yourself a favor and take a good look at excellent selections for landscaping in Phoenix without the mess.

The best Eucalyptus for your xeriscape landscaping will be continually full of pretty leaves and mature rapidly to create welcome shade. These wise choices tolerate drought well, but grow more rapidly to cast shade with regular deep, wide watering to encourage rapid root development. The best way to ensure fast growing shade in your Phoenix landscaping is with the use of drip irrigation from an automatic sprinkler system.

Unlike those shady characters found in old neighborhoods around Phoenix, these three Eucalyptus trees do not get so huge they become a problem. All of the following types of evergreen shade trees are lovely in their own unique way and small enough to be just right for home landscaping in desert areas. None of these are brittle wood trees, making them great for windbreaks to shelter your home from high winds.

Red Cap Gum (Eucalyptus eruthrocorys) has long, narrow foliage that is dark green and glossy, along with a nice upright natural shaping. Blooming from fall through spring, the rich red flower buds are very showy on their own, but then burst open to display clusters of brilliant yellow flowers. A great tree that is moderate to fast growing for full sun that will be right at home in the lawn areas of your Phoenix landscaping even fully mature at 25’ high and wide. You’ll also enjoy the wonderful color and texture of the bark on the Red Cap Eucalyptus Tree which is tan and white becoming interesting due to its peeling habit. No brittle qualities at all from this little shade tree that loves the full sun of Arizona.

Coolibah Tree (Eucalyptus microtheca) has handsome blue-green leaves that are long and narrow. Due to its fast growth habit and evergreen hardiness in the Phoenix climate, it is a popular addition to desert landscaping. Not only does the Coolibah tolerate that Arizona sun at full blast, it will also do just fine under the strain of reflective heat. Blooming fall through spring in your Phoenix landscaping, the white flowers are not as decorative as those on the Red Cap Gum. A multi-trunked shade tree offers your yard a beautiful shape and readily adapts to our Arizona soils. This particular Eucalyptus will give you spreading shade at 30 – 40‘ high and wide.

The beautiful, slightly weeping silhouette of the Ghost Gum (Eucalyptus papuana) is sensational looking on the powdery white trunk. Your desert landscaping in Phoenix will find wonderful accent from all parts of this gorgeous tree. The light green leaves are large and contrast just right against that ghostly trunk. You won’t have messy droppings to cleanup from the Ghost Eucalyptus, it is such a wind tolerant and great candidate for desert xeriscape it is the preferred tree for city streets and highways in Arizona. Rugged and oh so lovely, the Ghost Gum is evergreen with white flowers from fall through spring, maturing to 40’ high by 20’ wide.

Popularity: 74% [?]

There are some very lovely plants that will deal with light to moderate shade in your Phoenix landscaping.

In fact, many plants that will take full sun will be more productive at flowering and even bearing fruit if they have some shady protection from the blistering afternoon summer sun here in Arizona.

The most attractive vines for foliage and blooming will be those that prefer light to medium shade. When it comes to true Xeriscape plants that vine and do well in the shade you will want to use flowering Trumpet Vine (Campsis radicans). Depending on the selection, Trumpet Vine can bloom in soft melon to vibrant flaming red accented orange. Just as in most regions of the country, Phoenix landscaping plants that like a shadier situation do require consistent moisture.

Don’t despair, this is easily provided without you needing to remember to keep them moist with automatic drip irrigation. For moister soil and vibrant orange blooms in light shade, Cape Jasmine (Tecoma capensis) is a rambling vine that looks gorgeous cascading over walls. It is also useful for screening and will tolerate the sun so is a great candidate for creating shade and privacy beneath your patio ramada shade structure. Cape Jasmine is somewhat drought tolerant, once established in your Arizona landscaping.

Some of the most handsome flowering vines for your Phoenix courtyard walls or other shaded areas give you the choice of some really wonderful blooms and even lovely scents. For purples and lavender colored blooming, take a look at Purple Vine Lilac (Hardenbergia violacea). In bloom showy sprays of light grape hued flowers add an excellent showiness to the evergreen foliage. This particular vine does well in shade and tolerates drier conditions than many climbing plants well suited for shade plantings in your Arizona yard.

Beautiful shade landscapes in Phoenix ... visit our website.

For part shade landscape design in Phoenix, the vibrant yellow blooming Cat Claw Vine (Macfadyena unguis-cati) will create quite a show rambling along and spilling over courtyard walls or trellises. While drought tolerant, you will be far more please with the lush, shiny evergreen foliage with the addition of drip irrigation. There are other plants that can be successfully grown in light shade for climbing walls in Arizona landscaping, but the rest of them are not as hardy as these selections are.

Popularity: 88% [?]