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Terra Firma Landscape and Design servicing North Texas

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Normally when I write a post on this blog I discuss my garden, the types of plants I grow, plant profiles and garden maintenance tips. Usually when I write I discuss topics as though I’m talking to fellow gardeners. However, I realize that not everyone who visits this site has already created a garden. Some of you might have just purchased a home, and or are beginning to think about landscaping your property.

I also realize that not everyone wants to get their hands dirty! Perhaps you’re interested in having a beautifully landscaped property that’s maintained regularly by a landscaping company?

Well, if you live in the North Texas area and you’re interested in having your property landscaped or maintained you might be interested in contacting Terra Firma Landscaping & Design for a free quote.

Terra Firma Landscaping and Design offers services such as maintenance, lawn renovation, landscaping and complete property or garden design. The company is run by three design experts who’ve come together to combine their 15 years of experience in lawn maintenance and landscaping design.

If you’re interested in having Terra Firma landscape your property you’ll be happy to know that they are interested in finding out what you want in a design, how you want it to function and what kinds of plants or colors interest you. They discuss all aspects of design with their clients prior to starting a project and if the client is interested they’ll maintain the garden, change flower colors with the four seasons and so on.

I found the website very easy to navigate. Whether you are just visiting to check out what services they offer, to get a free quote or to learn more about the company and the projects they’ve completed in the past most of the information is only a click away.

The site has plenty of photographs on each page to compliment the topic being discussed in each article. The photos are lovely and of good quality. The site has also been designed with what I find to be pleasant colors with a background of white in the content areas and a pleasing green for the sidebars and navigational menu.

The only real complaint I have about the site is that it’s too wide. My laptop has a widescreen and I find that the pages come up off center forcing me to scroll sideways to center the text of the article. This is probably because a background image is too large and while irritating I’m sure it can easily be fixed.

One of the site features that I liked best was the blog. I’ve already got a garden and it’s not likely that I’ll be contacting anyone in the near future about landscaping or design. However, I’m still interested in learning about what the latest gardening trends are, or how to resolve various gardening or plant related issues and that’s where the blog comes in handy.

On the blog you’ll find posts that appear to be questions that some of their clients might have asked such as Why does my Crape Myrtle look like it was set on fire?, and posts about the type of landscaping that’s done by builders, featured easy care low maintenance plants and so on.

I’m sure many of my readers could find a helpful post on the Terra Firma Landscaping and Design blog.

Overall I think that a home or business owner who is interested in having their property maintained or landscaped would find this website very helpful.

However, besides the site being too wide there are a couple of things that could be improved. There are client testimonials on the site and I’m certain that many of their lovely photographs are of projects they’ve completed, yet there isn’t a specific section that discusses past projects or shows before and after photographs. I’d love to see that on this site as there’s no better way to demonstrate your skills than by showing before and after pictures.

The only other area of the site that might be improved is the plant directory. You can reach it by clicking the Plant Directory link at the bottom right of each page.

There are two columns of plant names. Site visitors can hover over a plant name and a picture of the plant appears to the right. Below the plants photo is the name of the plant and what appears to be a link that says click here to learn more. However I haven’t found a link that’s clickable. Another problem is that when you hover over a plant name in the left most column you can’t move your mouse across the page to the right side where the photo of the plant is located because as you hover over any other plant name the photo changes. I think it would be better if the plant names in each of the columns were clickable and once clicked the photo of the plant would appear.

I’ve been viewing the site using my Firefox browser. I decided I’d better take a look at it with my Internet Explorer 7 just to see if the problems I’d pointed out on the site only affected one browser type, but I see them in IE as well.

Overall I think this website is appealing and contains enough information to interest potential clients and gardeners alike, however there are a few functional issues that need to be addressed to improve the visitors experience.

Take a look at Terra Firma Landscaping and Design if you’re in North Texas and are in need of landscaping, design or maintenance services.






No-Crank Hose reel system

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How many of you hate rewinding your hose when you’re done watering the lawn and garden? I know that I do.

We have one of those crank systems for our hose. The handle is low to ground which makes it hard on your back if you’ve been out in the garden for hours. Frankly I hate winding up the garden hose when I’m done puttering in the garden.

Good news. I’ve just been to a site that sells No-Crank hose reels. The rewinding of the hose is done using the power of water.

There’s a water-piston engine inside the No-crank hose reel casing and with the simple flip of a lever it begins to rewind the hose for you on it’s own. You don’t need to bend down and manual wind up your hose any more.

The No-Crank hose reel doesn’t use batteries or electricity either. If you’re interested in taking a look at the No-Crank system there are a number of different designs to suit your needs.

Ergonomic gardening tools – protect your hands and wrists

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A while back I wrote about my favorite “can’t live without them” gardening tools and accessories. On that list were pruners, scissors, garden ribbon or ties, stakes – wooden and bamboo, a hand trowel and a hand cultivator.

Naturally, there are many other tools that I use in the garden from time to time, but those listed above are the ones that I use almost every time I step into the garden to do some work.

The design of each tool, and how it feels in my hand as I work with it is very important. Even if I’m only using a tool for a matter of minutes it needs to feel comfortable in my hands and be easy to use. Even a few minutes use each day can add up to hours or even days worth of use by the time the gardening season ends each year and no one would want to work with a tool that they were uncomfortable with for that long.

Now I have bad knees and they bother me from time to time, which I suppose is one of the reasons why I set up my garden with raised beds. I don’t have to bend my knees as much when I’m working, and I can sit on the stones surrounding the garden beds as I work and give my knees a break.

I don’t have bad wrists or arthritis in my hands, but many people who enjoy gardening do have these disorders. Whether they come from carpal tunnel syndrome, injury or an inflammatory condition such as arthritis I can only imagine how much more important the design of the garden tools is to these people.

Even though I don’t suffer from any of these conditions it still might be a good idea to use tools that have been ergonomically designed in order to prevent conditions like carpal tunnel or injury from occurring.

I spend so many hours in the garden that it only makes sense to use well designed tools doesn’t it?

Within a months time I’ll be out in the garden again on a regular basis. Tidying up the garden and performing spring garden maintenance. Perhaps this is the right time to be looking for new tools for the garden so that I’ll be ready when the temperatures warm up and the plants begin to come out of dormancy.

I spent some time over the weekend looking at the many garden related products at OnlineDiscountMart.com. Did you know that they sell ergonomic gardening tools such as hand trowels and hand cultivators?

handgardentrowel.gif I really like the design of their hand garden trowel.

This ergonomic hand garden trowel has been engineered to save and protect your wrists from working in the garden for many hours each day. The design moves the workload from the wrist to the forearm. I think this is a great design for those with repetitive wrist injury disorders, or for those who tend to work in their garden on a regular basis in order to prevent such injuries.

The large adjustable handle would also be easy to grip which I would imagine would lessen the strain and pain for those with arthritis in their hands.

The handle can be adjusted for comfortable use, and locked into position as well. This ergonomic hand trowel also features a flexible pad for your forearm which would help make this tool comfortable to use.

I really think that anyone who loves to garden could use a hand trowel such as this. It’s well designed and made of durable steel giving it a long lifespan. This 19 inch long tool normally sells for $19.95 but right now Online Discount Mart is selling it for $14.95.

handgardencultivator.gif This hand garden cultivator is another one of the ergonomic gardening tools that Online Discount Mart sells.

It’s on sale for only $14.95 right now as well, and just like the ergonomic hand garden trowel, the ergonomic hand garden cultivator has been designed to move the workload from the wrist to the forearm. The hand cultivator also features an adjustable and lockable handle, plus a flexible pad for your forearm. The hand cultivator is 19″ in length and each prong on the cultivator is 3″ in length.

I like the fact that both of these tools are made of durable steel. I’ve gardened with my family since I was a child, but I’ve only been gardening on my own for the last five years and I’m amazed at how many poorly made tools I’ve gone through in that time. Ones that have bent or snapped when I’m digging in my sometimes dry hard clay soil. Considering that these tools are made of steel I would imagine that they would withstand the work I’d put them through in my garden.

I’d love to purchase both of these items and try them out. The price is certainly right. I also just noticed that they have a Winter coupon special allowing you to get an extra 5% off the price of both of these tools. That makes this already good price even better.

If you’re looking for well made ergonomic gardening tools, or other items for the garden or the great outdoors do take a look at OnlineDiscountMart.com.

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