Front yard plant combinations: hiring questions

What to take away

• Ask for a plant list with scientific names before you ask for a price.
• Front yards are code-sensitive, so ask who checks the ordinance and the covenants.
• Establishment care is a scope item, not a courtesy.
• The record you receive at handover is worth as much as the planting.

Questions about plants

1. Which species are you proposing, in Latin, with mature height and width?
2. Are these straight species or named cultivars, and why?
3. Where are they grown, and how far in advance do you order?
4. What happens if one is unavailable in the planting window?
5. Which of these self-seed or spread by runner in this region?

Question four is the one that separates professionals. The answer should be a substitution rule, not a shrug. A good rule names the fallback in advance: same genus, same mature size, same regional status, and your written approval before anything is planted.

Question five matters for a front yard specifically. A species that seeds itself around is an asset in a meadow and a nuisance in a five-foot band beside a walk, where every seedling in the joint of the paving becomes your Saturday. Ask which plants on the list spread, how fast, and whether the crew has seen them behave in a residential bed rather than in a restoration site. You will be doing the same accounting yourself later, marking each spring how far every plant has traveled.

Questions about the site and the rules

6. Who measures the right-of-way and confirms the sight triangle?
7. What is the maximum plant height allowed at the sidewalk here?
8. Will any work require a permit, and who applies for it?
9. Will you submit the plan to my HOA and wait for written approval?

Local expertise is available and often free. USDA's network of state and local conservation offices provides technical assistance, including resource assessment and practice design. A designer who has never used a regional resource of that kind is working from a catalog.

Questions about water and soil

10. How will these plants be watered for the first two seasons, and by whom?
11. Are you changing the irrigation, and are you licensed to do so here?
12. What soil testing are you basing the plan on?

Any recommendation to amend should come after a test, and after a hole dug a foot deep in the bed area that shows where the topsoil stops. The U.S. Botanic Garden's guidance on strengthening soil fertility points to a regional Cooperative Extension Office as the most reliable and economical source of soil testing and recommendations. That is a checkable answer.

Questions about the handover

13. What documents do I receive when the job is finished?
14. What is the replacement policy, and for how long?

Ask for a plant list keyed to a plan, so you can tell which plant is which in March. That is exactly how institutional collections work: every plant recorded with names, native range, original source and location.

Ask also for a written care sheet covering the first two seasons: how often to water and by what test, when to cut back, what emerges late, and what should be pulled on sight. That sheet is the second-year routine written down in advance. A crew that has to write that down will discover any gaps in its own plan while writing it, which is part of the point.

Finally, ask what happens at the end of the establishment period. Some firms roll into a maintenance contract, some hand the bed over, and some quietly stop returning calls. Agree on the date and the deliverable now, while the final invoice is still unpaid.

Warning signs

• promises that native plants need no water at all;
• a bid with no species names on it;
• unwillingness to put substitutions in writing;
• no interest in the ordinance or the covenants;
• a portfolio of jobs all photographed in their first month.

Before you interview anyone, decide which front-yard recipe you want, and use the broader screening steps in the contractor vetting guide.

Common questions

Designer or contractor first? For a full front yard, a designer first. You then own a plan several contractors can bid.

Should I supply the plants myself? You can, but most contractors then exclude plant warranty. Decide which matters more.

How many bids? Three, all against the same written scope and the same plant list.

What should the contract include? Plan, plant list, substitution rule, watering responsibility, replacement terms and a completion date.