Tips for starting a low-maintenance perennial garden

This in-depth guide will show you the ropes on how to plant your own perennial garden.

Looking for a way to reduce the weed-pulling chore around your plants?

• When you start a new perennial border, spread a non-woven black landscape fabric over the soil. The fabric keeps weeds under control, holds heat in cool spring weather (giving your plants a faster start), and lets water soak through to the roots.
• At a local home or garden centre, select a non-biodegradable fabric that weighs about 100 grams (3.4 ounces) per square metre.
• U-shaped metal anchors, sold in packs of 10, are ideal to hold down the fabric.
• This system works best for plants already started; cut an "X" in the fabric and insert the plant.
• However, you can also start your perennials from seed. Simply prep the soil, plant the seed and give it a space in the fabric to grow through.
• Once plants are in place, cover the fabric with eight centimetres (three inches) of mulch.

• Stop dragging your garden hose all over the yard by attaching it to your fence with conduit straps (available in the electrical section of home centres).
• Then just hook up the hose at the spigot end, whatever sprinkler you want at the other end, and open the valve.
• It will make watering "the back 40" an easy task.

• Consider installing soaker hoses for smaller beds and sprinkler heads for larger ones.
• If you already have a sprinkler head system in place but need to move a head or two, first decide where you want it. You can move it up to 1.2 metres (four feet) with flex pipe (available at plumbing and irrigation supply stores) without affecting performance.
• Dig an 20- to 30-centimetre (eight- to 12-inch) deep trench from the current head location to the new location.
• Turn off the irrigation system at the controller.
• Unscrew the sprinkler head from the riser and then unscrew the riser.
• Insert a flex pipe elbow into the existing combination elbow or riser tee. Tighten the elbow until it's hand-tight.
• Then attach a one centimetre (3/8 inch) flex pipe to the flex pipe elbow by sliding it over the nipple (the flex pipe has a smaller diametre than the water line pipe). The connection doesn't require clamps.
• Fasten a flex pipe elbow to the other end of the pipe. Place the sprinkler head on the elbow, then turn it until it's hand-tight.
• Hold the sprinkler head in the location you want it.
• The top of the head should be at ground level. Backfill around the head with your free hand.
• Once the head is secure, fill in the trench and replace the sod.