Landscaping Hacks strike again

[Breadfruit Bill]

This is my biggest pet peeve with "professional landscapers"...  I will try and be peaceable.... just know I am steaming right now.

I'm so glad I have a healthy place to vent my palm frustrations....

I planted a couple Phoenix roebelinii on the north side of my 3-story townhouse about a year ago...  because of their position they get full shade most of the day...  They used to have big full beautiful heads, lots of be-e-a-utiful fronds...  So many fronds that they obscured the trunk and created a spherical element on my teeny tiny bit of land...  I have begged the landscapers that "maintain" our community to stay out of my yard and this was the last straw...  They hurricane pruned my Pygmy Date Palms!!     The owner of the landscaping company actually had the nerve to tell me that "the weight of the fronds were making this tree grow like this."  Now I'm a pretty easy-going peaceble guy...  but I wanted to punch him square in the mouth!  Was he really that stupid?  Even worse, did he think I was that stupid?!  (breathe Bill.... Breathe)

Now since they have done that the tree doesn't have enough green surface to have photosynthesis going on at a healthy pace, so the tree has begun to grow away from the buildings... rapidly (as would be expected)... because it will get more light exposure...  Now I love a gentle curve in a palm trunk as much as the next palm-lover...  but these trees are on their way to looking really funky with a big ol' fourty five degree kink in the trunk recording the time in 2006 when they were "unintentionally" maliciously attacked...  Is there a way to "train" the growing crown and new leaf spears to grow perpandicular to the earth again? Or do I just have to wait until the tree has enough green leaves to right its growing direction on it's own?  Anyone else have this kind of headaches with professional landscapers?  

Look at the direction of the crown and new growth!  GRRRR!!!  

[Jim in Los Altos]

(PiousPalms @ Mar. 31 2007,16:35)

QUOTE

Anyone else have this kind of headaches with professional landscapers?  

In my landscape business, when we're finished installing a new landscape containing palms, we ask that the client's gardeners not touch the palms at all, ever, unless we've had a chance to educate them. Or we recommend they choose from our list of palm qualified gardeners. The first choice doesn't work if the crew changes and new laborors come into the scene.

This happened recently when one of these "gardeners" decided that all the "suckers" on the big and beautiful C. humilus 'cerifera' palms recently planted needed to be cut off! Not only that, this dork trimmed off all but three fronds on each of the remaining palms central stems, leaving almost invisible palms where once gloriously beautiful palms had existed.

When I saw that, I needed something to break! My partner, Molly handed me three large sticks. My knee still hurts a week after that. My client may fire these guys. She knew how infuriated I was and she's had her share of problems with them too. They were already told not to touch any palms.

Another gardener cut 20 fronds from a lush Butia capitata in another landscape, leaving just three!??? Then preceeded to cut between 25 and 30 green fronds off a big Cycas revoluta leaving only three. My client was fuming and asked why he did this. This obviously beauty challenged bum said the palms look great now.

 

When will they stop torturing me?

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

[Dave-Vero]

Your phoenix got off fairly light.  It's almost to the point that palms and cycads shouldn't be planted in landscapes to be maintained by landscaping crews, because they're killed off fairly rapidly, and look terrible while it's happening.  

A corollary is that crape myrtles should be avoided, too.  They shrink and finally die.

Lately, this problem has spread to bottlebrush (Callistemon).  I've seen nice big ones topped.  

And same for hollies.  They get cut into balls.  Even if the grass isn't being mowed properly or there's all sorts of more important issues.

[jrod]

I'll tell you what is sad.  I'm currently a student majoring in Horticulture w/ an emphasis on Landscape Design.  I'm a member of the Horticulture club and i'm amazed at the members in our group that have never picked up a shovel, pruned a tree, or done anything practical.  Some of them know every little fact about plants but make them do something with their hands and you might as well throw in the towel.  These are the people getting involved also, much less the ones out there who really don't care as long as they graduate.  It drives me crazy but the good news is that these are the people out there i'm competing against.

[CuriousPalm]

That sucks!!! Sorry to hear this, your trees are beautiful.

[Breadfruit Bill]

(Dave-Vero @ Mar. 31 2007,23:51)

QUOTE

Your phoenix got off fairly light.  

I forgot to tell ya'll this catastrophe happened in NOVEMBER!!!  these pics were just taken yesterday.....  Ya'll would have cried had you seen them 5 months ago...  they both had about 5 leaves left poking out of the top of them...

[Rusty on Pine Is.]

I was in tree biz for 30 years, and it still surprises me how many people are in the green trade that know less than squat about plants and horticulture.

Really sorry to see the butchery.

[wendisplantation]

My "gardeners" (son and boyfriend) know not to even look like they are thinking of considering the thought of ever touching my palm fronds, or they get the look    

They have been well educated though.

Shame that there are people out there that are supposed to be pros without the knowledge of what they are doing

[Dave-Vero]

jrod, your fellow students must subscribe to the Prussian notion of gardening, where the lady of the house was never allowed to touch anything, but was expected to tell the herd of Polish peasants what to do.  

Considering that much of horticulture is technique, I wonder what's going on.  

Landscape maintenance in the US seems to rely on a bunch of highly standardized methods that have probably developed and spread via folklore, reinforced by everyone using the same equipment (especially those chainsaws on sticks for cutting all the bushes into balls).

[ed110220]

I'm sorry to hear that your palms were mutilated but at least they seem to be recovering well.

Excessive/inappropriate pruning is one of my pet hates. It pains me to see a palm that should have a nice full crown all hacked and messed about. Don't they realise that as well as harming the tree it also looks ugly?

For example though common a mature Phoenix canariensis well grown with a full, almost spherical crown is a thing of beauty. This is how you might see them outside an old town hall or somewhere else elegant. But the same can't be said of one planted at a new mall with its crown all mutilated and left looking like a giant pineapple.

I'm wondering whether it is not just ignorance but the desire of unscrupulous landscapers to create unnecessary work for themselves?

[BobbyinNY]

I tell my landscape guys from the start - Plain & Simple.. "You cut & Edge the Lawn, Period.. IF you touch ANY of my plants, You won't get paid"  It's worked so far.

[DoomsDave]

(PiousPalms @ Apr. 01 2007,07:36)

QUOTE

(Dave-Vero @ Mar. 31 2007,23:51)

QUOTE

Your phoenix got off fairly light.  

I forgot to tell ya'll this catastrophe happened in NOVEMBER!!!  these pics were just taken yesterday.....  Ya'll would have cried had you seen them 5 months ago...  they both had about 5 leaves left poking out of the top of them...

Which is why the cards for the landscapers that find their way on my door end up in the trash.

They're ALL idiots.

There is a lovely row of queen palms that are going to be destroyed by overpruning.

dave

[Daryl]

Sounds like McDonalds landscaping...

We have a company here in Oz who do garden cleanup, mowing, pruning etc...called Jim's Mowing. It is a franchise operation and all it takes to get qualified is to shell out the bucks for the franchise and some yard tools. Some of these guys are absolute butchers, ruining many gardens, and get paid good money to do so.

Mowing grass is one thing, but plants are a different game altogether.

Daryl

[rubyz]

(PiousPalms @ Apr. 01 2007,03:35)

QUOTE

I have begged the landscapers that "maintain" our community to stay out of my yard and this was the last straw....

Bill, there's something about this that I fail to comprehend. Isn't the land you planted on your own private land - or is it the common property of the community?

If the latter is correct, I think you should present your case to the commitee or whatever body it is that has legal jurisdiction over the land, and enlist their cooperation in having your plantings exempt from the landscaper's "services." You have nothing to lose!

    Case in point: About 20 years ago, I lived in an apartment in a building which was owned by a semi-government agency. Even though the garden was not my own, I tended it as if it were. I asked the agency officials to tell their gardeners to leave our garden alone. After having inspected what I had done, they agreed to my request, and continued to do so until I moved out. (Today, the garden is run down, although the palms, apple tree and olive tree I had planted are somehow still surviving.)

[Patrick]

Shame about your pigmy's - I'm sorry to see that happened.

I was Just commenting to my wife today that most landscapers have a definite technique to pruning and maintaining trees & plants. That being that they neglect and abuse a plant so much that they kill it. They then proceed to plant a bigger plant of the same species in the same spot thus making it appear as if things are growing. What a bunch of morons. My neighbor is one of these guys and this is basically how he works! I won't let them touch my yard did; and the time he DID touch my grass as a favor he messed up a couple sprinkler heads and just left them!!!    

There is certainly a lack of education on these "landscapers" parts and it shows every time one of us is forced to have a conversation with one. I'm sorry for your predicament.

[aussiearoids]

 those guys are not landscapers  ???

they are just mow & blow guys , and if they even look at your palms again , tell them you will 'blow them away '  

[with a Tim Allen modified V8 turbo leaf blower   ]

In Australia they are trying to bring in certified or licenced landscapers , as some true landscapers are sick of bodgy jobs done by cowboys calling themselves whatever they like without any qualifications  

Jims Mowing are really big here and are starting all sorts of other franchises , here is the latest , might buy into one  ::

[BobbyinNY]

Jims Mowing are really big here and are starting all sorts of other franchises , here is the latest , might buy into one  

I'd change occupations to get into that business

[Logolight]

Brazilians huh?

[Trópico]

Sorry to see that Pygmy Date palm having to undergo the prunes of terror!

Big Boy (Altamonte Landing) is having their first anniversary and they presented themselves with the THIRD CIDP replacement in a year; which will most likely get overpruned, then will decline, and will get replaced again and again. Good business for the pruner and the landscaper as well.

[alex_7b]

What you see with palms is the same as I see with oaks, maples and other trees. Apparently there are are a lot of ignorant folks that found their employment nitch as landscapers. Atlanta was once the most beautifully landscaped city that I'd ever seen. Now, it just looks like a bunch of white-trash inherited chainsaws and went out marauding.

I wish that this was a rare problem, but it has now become epidemic.

[BobbyinNY]

What you see with palms is the same as I see with oaks, maples and other trees. Apparently there are are a lot of ignorant folks that found their employment nitch as landscapers. Atlanta was once the most beautifully landscaped city that I'd ever seen. Now, it just looks like a bunch of white-trash inherited chainsaws and went out marauding.

I wish that this was a rare problem, but it has now become epidemic.

I just can't understand these people..... It seems like it's the same everywhere....  I've changed landscapers 3 times already for doing stuff that I didn't ask them to do... (trimming bushes, pruning trees, digging up stuff that THEY thought was dead, etc..)   What's so hard about understanding: "Cut & edge the lawn"... That sounds pretty clear to me.

[Breadfruit Bill]

I'm in agreement....  I think this is a universal problem and is not just limited...  I think the problem we all seem to be encountering is "lack of education."  All of us Palmtalk freaks are obviously passionate about our plams and other plants...  So we find ways to educate ourselves about our passion.  These (using this term very loosely... one more time) "landscapers" just seem hedgetrimmers and weedwackers as a means to a paycheck...  And as well all know...  if someone can get by with less effort than more and get the same paycheck, they will do less.  I think the best solution is to not hire them and they won't get our check.

[rubyz]

(PiousPalms @ Apr. 03 2007,17:14)

QUOTE

I think the problem we all seem to be encountering is "lack of education."

How true - but not only.

It is also a matter of  ethics and esthetics.

Just this morning, while taking my daily morning walk, I came across a plant (not a palm) which had obviously been "thrown overboard"  by my neighbor who lives directly above the spot where I found it. The plant had long, slender green leaves which were still fresh, but beginning to discolor at the tips. No big surprise, seeing that the roots had already dried up. I brought the discarded plant home, trimmed away dead and damaged parts, found a decent pot, replanted it in some good, rich soil, watered it and then sprayed its leaves for cleanliness and freshness. The result: an attractive little fellow who would not shame any garden, patio or windowsill.

    One has to wonder at the kind of person who would toss away a perfectly good plant in a public space where it becomes testimony to his vulgarity and baseness. You have to wonder if this kind of person would do the same thing to an unwanted pet, or, God forbid, a member of the family who was just diagnosed with a terminal disease.

[Breadfruit Bill]

(rubyz @ Apr. 01 2007,19:29)

QUOTE

Bill, there's something about this that I fail to comprehend. Isn't the land you planted on your own private land - or is it the common property of the community?

Reuven...

Legally I own the land...  The Homeowners Association maintains everyones plantings and all common areas...  I am even on the HOA (don't ask me how I got suckered into that position!)...  I'M IN CHARGE OF LANDSCAPING!!!  Simple matter of it all is, the landscaper will be fired.  I told him at least half a dozen times (more patient than I probably should have been) to "stay out of my yard!"  But he has continually pruned, whacked, and chopped all my plants...  I plan to contract someone to handprune our commuity...  I'

m sure it will cost more, but that way I can get the work done that I want.

I would love to pursue the HOA for damages caused, but I think there is some conflict of interest in that I lie in the community and I'm on the board of directors!   ::  :laugh:

[BobbyinNY]

These (using this term very loosely... one more time) "landscapers" just seem hedgetrimmers and weedwackers as a means to a paycheck...  And as well all know...  if someone can get by with less effort than more and get the same paycheck, they will do less.  I think the best solution is to not hire them and they won't get our check.

The guys around here want to make the money the quickest way possible.. but they're really stupid, because If they were good, they could get so many houses on the block that were closer together, limiting their travel time between jobs..... While we don't really have the "HOA issue" up here, most of the people within a neighborhood have landscapers do their lawn- and if a guy is good, he will get recommended to the neighbors and be able to do  a bunch of houses all together.

[Breadfruit Bill]

Good call Bobby...  Too bad they aren't business saavy like that...  The old man that takes care of my hedges at the car lot has that mentality, consequently he has developed job relations with all the houses around my location...  He is smart for doing it that way...  It saves him a ton in transportation..  Very efficient with time and labor!

Someday for retirement I think it would be a fun job to be a gardener for wealthy people...  Like just get ONE of those big ol mansions on A1A and maintain their yard and their yard only...  They would have the best looking place around and I would get my gardening fulfillment...  Hopefully I could get their budget to fulfill my palm fantasies!  CHA-CHING!!!

[alex_7b]

I believe that there is an easy solution.

Landowners sue the landscapers for the cost of installing an equal sized tree that has not been improperly lopped off. If someone had to pay a couple grand per tree in damages, word would spread pretty damn quick!

[rubyz]

(PiousPalms @ Apr. 03 2007,18:05)

QUOTE

 I told him at least half a dozen times (more patient than I probably should have been) to "stay out of my yard!"  But he has continually pruned, whacked, and chopped all my plants...

For the next one, you could try barbed wire, a moat, an electrical fence and/or vicious pit bulls... :laugh:

[BobbyinNY]

Someday for retirement I think it would be a fun job to be a gardener for wealthy people...  Like just get ONE of those big ol mansions on A1A and maintain their yard and their yard only...  They would have the best looking place around and I would get my gardening fulfillment...  Hopefully I could get their budget to fulfill my palm fantasies!  CHA-CHING!!!

Bill,

It's funny that you say that... because that's kinda like what I wanna do when I move down there after I get established.... I think there is a TON of money to be made in designing landscapes for wealthy people...   I would like to design the yard and sort of be the general contractor - then oversee the whole planting operation from beginning to end.

[rubyz]

(BobbyinNY @ Apr. 03 2007,20:59)

QUOTE

Someday for retirement I think it would be a fun job to be a gardener for wealthy people...  Like just get ONE of those big ol mansions on A1A and maintain their yard and their yard only...  They would have the best looking place around and I would get my gardening fulfillment...  Hopefully I could get their budget to fulfill my palm fantasies!  

Make you a deal, Bobby. You get me the mansion, I'll let you be my landscaper - but on one condition: I do the planning and the work. You can be the "technical advisor!"  

If you could swing this, fulfilling your palm fantasies would be a piece of cake. ::

[BobbyinNY]

Make you a deal, Bobby. You get me the mansion, I'll let you be my landscaper - but on one condition: I do the planning and the work. You can be the "technical advisor!"  

If you could swing this, fulfilling your palm fantasies would be a piece of cake.  

Sounds good, Reuven....... I'll start looking around for mansions

[Dave-Vero]

I know a guy (cycad enthusiast, etc.) who managed an oceanfront mansion's extensive grounds in Palm Beach County as a sort of botanical garden.  Went well for a while.  Recently, what was a nice area of native vegetation in northern Indian River County got landscaped with a vast number of palms (lots of bottles on the roadside).  It would have been nice somewhere else, but that particular spot was better as it had been.  The landscaper supposedly made a huge profit off that customer.  Someone in town runs a professional gardening business.

[Billeb]

Saw this gem driving a few days ago in the hood and had to turn around to get a better look. Not really a landscaping hack but likely a prep for removal. It's a rough sight. RIP to the 3 involved. 
 

-dale