There’s more to landscaping and landscape design than meets the eye. It’s about creating beautiful designs, and also an enduring vision of every possibility of growth in your garden. This means allowing for improvements and not incorporating fixtures that you intend to take out in the future.

Planting seedlings without considering the space that mature full grown trees will occupy can become expensive. For example, you build a cemented walkway too close to the place where you planted a tree seedling. In a few years, you will start to see cracks in the cement where the roots of the tree are struggling to expand. You won’t have any choice but to get rid of the walkway. I’m pretty sure you won’t choose the walkway over the tree; I sure wouldn’t.

While most elements you will establish now will probably remain what they are for years to come, the one thing that you could be missing is the space allowance for small trees that may grow in your garden at any time. When bushes grow, their root systems enlarge. You can decide to transfer them somewhere else if they interfere with the growth of your other trees. All your plants will soon become mature plants and trees, but do you have the space for all these mature plants?

Trees are essential garden elements that won’t be there when you start your garden. If you start from scratch, it may take a few years before you can enjoy the shaded garden of your dreams. Trees create shade, block wind and even reduce noise. They are also natural boundaries, and focal points that you and your family can build your dreams around.

Some trees in my land have been there since my grandfather bought the land decades ago. Preparing for the growth of the trees now that you’re just starting with your garden is a way of showing that you are optimistic about the future, and that you know your trees will always have a place where they can grow stronger. Once you establish where your trees will grow, you can go ahead and make modifications in the design.

You can plant a tree around a play area. The implements found in a play area like sand boxes and playpens can be removed and moved when the tree grows. By then you can decide to trade out the playpens for picnic groves because the kids have all grown up. One good way to get the shaded garden you have always dreamed of is to plant large shade trees a distance from the area in line with the travel of the sun.

You may want to avoid planting large trees around pools or ponds. Keeping a pool clean is difficult and leaves from shade trees may make it even harder to clean up the pond. So, plant a tree seedling a distance that is not too far from the pool area, but far enough for the leaves not to fall directly on the water.

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