Installing a deck is an exciting way to upgrade your yard or home. The thing is, once you have put in a deck, you will probably want to spend time enjoying it day and night. There are few things more relaxing than kicking back on your deck on a nice summer evening. However, to do that, you will certainly need lighting for several reasons. Here are the benefits of deck lighting.
Safety
It probably goes without saying that the more light you have around your house, the safer it will be. Moving around on a deck filled with furniture and other yard items might be treacherous if it was difficult to see. More lighting can also help prevent crime, such as vandalism or burglary. Criminals are less likely to approach a deck or a house that is well lit. Besides, how successful is your deck party going to be if everyone is bumping into each other?
Aesthetics
Lighting fixtures can add to the overall aesthetic appeal of your deck, and enhance the ambiance. It can be a wonderful way to set the mood you want to set. For instance, if your deck is going to be used primarily for private time with a spouse, then the right lighting can make it more romantic. Or you can use lighting to make things more festive for a party. Another great idea is that you can use temporary lights that match up with whatever the theme is that you are going for at the time.
Day Long Comfort
The main benefit is that deck lighting will allow you and your family to enjoy the deck no matter what time of day it is. They will be able to sit quietly and read a book, or even sit and admire the stars. This may be even more important when the days get shorter. There should be no reason that you will have to avoid your deck, assuming it is warm enough, if the seasons change. Being able to use your deck more will also add value to your investment.
As you can see, there are several benefits to using deck lighting. If you are planning on installing a deck at your home, then be sure to include lighting in the blueprints.
Dean Bjorkstrand, Inc. can handle any of your landscaping needs for much needed elegance to your home. Reach out online or call 612-861-3919
As the weather gets colder and the days get shorter, our homes are more often seen in the dark. That means that what your home looks like at night becomes more important. Outdoor lighting is a great way to keep your house looking appealing, and can even change how your home looks to others. One of the ways this is achieved is through accent lighting. Accent lighting is any lighting that’s purpose is not to directly illuminate something. The amazing thing is that using accent lighting can help you completely transform the look and feel of an outdoor space.
Set The Mood
Accent lighting on the outside of your home can drastically change the mood of any space. For instance, if you have a yard that is vacant and spare, you can transform it into a comfortable looking space with some well placed lighting fixtures. Lanterns that stand on their own give off a comforting and warm vibe. Lights on the ground that lengthen the shadows of bushes or trees can make things seem more dramatic. The only limit is your own creativity, and the mood can be changed in any number of ways.
Highlights
There may be some aspects of the outside of your home that you want to highlight for visitors or passersby. For instance, in your backyard you may want to feature a pool or a gazebo. As opposed to simply having lights shining on it, you can have ground lights around the pool, or even in the water. Lights can also help define the edges of your property either by themselves or by highlighting bushes or fences that run along it.
Resale Value
There is no doubt that exterior accent lighting can also help increase the value of your home. If it is properly done and is visually appealing, it will attract potential buyers and make your home more attractive than the competition. It is also valuable as it helps reduce security risks. The more lighting there is outside of a home, the less likely burglars are to target it.
As with any home improvement project, you should always know before you start buying what you would like to accomplish. Make sure to have a plan for your lighting, and know what look you are trying to achieve. There is simply no end to the possibilities with outdoor accent lighting.
The experienced professionals at Dean Bjorkstrand, Inc. can help complete all kinds of landscaping projects to increase the value of your home. Reach out online or call 612-861-3919.
No one wants to see any abnormalities on their home lawn. There are many alarming things that can appear in the grass, including powdery mildew. Powdery mildew is a common disease caused by a fungus, Erysiphe graminis. The disease mostly affects Kentucky bluegrass and fescue. The disease starts when spores are released by the fungus. The fungus spends the entire winter resting on plants, and releases the spores during the growing season. These spores get spread around by the rain and wind and infect grass blades.
Appearance
When a grass blade gets infected, it gets covered by a white, powdery substance. This fungal coating can be removed with your fingers, but it will not stay away permanently. Some will mistake the disease for flour or lime. After a time, blades that have been infected can turn yellow, and eventually die. This will thin out a lawn and leave it looking splotchy.
High Concentration Periods
Powdery mildew seems to thrive in the spring and fall. This is because the temperatures are cooler, but humidity is still high. The disease likes the shade, and other spots where the air circulation isn’t good. Environment plays a big part in how well the disease spreads, so managing it is a key component for controlling the disease.
Disease Management
There are many things you can do to manage the environment to protect against powdery mildew, even in established lawns. For instance, keeping your trees and shrubs well pruned will keep light and heat shining on your lawn, and lessen the amount of dark spaces. If you’re planning a new landscaping job, then you should try to space out any plants and new shrubs. This will not only keep shade at a minimum, but it will allow for better air circulation. There are grass types that you can use that are tolerant of the shade.
You must regularly maintain the grass by watering, dethatching, and fertilizing. Make sure not to water too much, however. Overwatering can create an environment in which the mildew could flourish.
We all want to protect our lawns against disease and damage. By following these tips and knowing what to look for, you can be prepared to keep powdery mildew at bay.
Anyone who has been to a country fair or experienced Halloween knows what a pumpkin is. It’s a large orange fruit, and is most often used for pies, decorations, and entering in competitions. Many people don’t realize that there are several different types of pumpkins. There are the large ones that go in competitions and also get turned into jack-o-lanterns, and there are smaller, tastier ones that are best for baking in pies. Another thing to know is that pumpkins can grow in your garden. Here’s how.
Soil
First off, it is important that the soil you’re using to grow pumpkins has a ph level between 6.5 and 6.8. It is best to use a lot of composted manure, and plant in soil that has a good structure that not only retains moisture, but will drain well too.
Timing
Pumpkin seeds do not respond well to frost, so they should only be planted well after any possibility of frost has passed. You can start them inside if you want around 4 weeks ahead of when you think the last frost might be. If you’re transplanting, you can bring them out when leaves start appearing, and place a jar over top of the plant to protect it from the elements for the first few weeks.
Pollinating
To help the growing process along, especially if you are looking to win at the fair, you may want to try pollinating. After about 10 weeks after the seedling starts to sprout, find a female pumpkin. Females have a smaller pumpkin resting at their base. Swab the female flower with the stamen of a male pumpkin flower. This will quicken the pollination process, and hopefully allow your pumpkin to grow nice and big.
Stem Location
Stem location can go a long way towards growing a larger pumpkin. To get the stem in the right position, you will need to coach the pumpkin as it grows. This process can take weeks, but you should end up with a stem that’s perpendicular to the vine. Make sure to be gentle, however, since a pumpkin is quite delicate when it is young.
Once the vines have withered, then you know it’s time to harvest your pumpkin. Using these tips, you can make sure that your pumpkins grow up big and healthy.
Being able to pluck a crisp and tasty apple directly from a tree is one of life’s little pleasures. Apples just seem to taste better when they go right from the tree to your mouth. The great thing is that if you have the room on your Minnesota property, you can have your very own apple tree. There are just a few things you should know, however. Here are some tips to help you grow your own apple trees.
Sunshine and Cooling
Like all trees, apple trees need a certain amount of sunlight to thrive and survive. During the summer months, they should be in a spot where they get at least six hours of sunlight every day. A cooling down period during the winter is important to help encourage growth in the coming season. This need for cooling is why apple trees tend to thrive in the northern hemisphere.
Give Them Their Space
It is important to have a plan for how you will space out your trees. It takes around a decade for an apple tree to reach its largest size, so you do not want to underestimate the space needed around the spot you plant the tree. You can have them around a garden that needs shade in summer and light in winter, because they lose their leaves during the cold months. You should try to use a spot that has good drainage, although apple trees are very tolerant to different soil types and conditions.
When to Plant
The best time to plant an apple tree is November, but you can wait all the way until March if you would like. If you buy a sapling, make sure that it looks healthy and strong. You should plant it in moist soil as soon as possible. If the root dries out it may hamper the tree’s development.
How to Plant
The hole you dig should be deep and wide enough to place the entirety of the roots inside without being tangled. You may have to detangle them yourself. Fill the hole, and compress the soil to make sure that its the roots are always touching the soil. The graft should be above the soil line. If you need a stake, then by all means us one, at least until the tree is better established. Give it a good watering, and you are good to go!
When the two-lined chestnut borer is around, oak trees in Minnesota are in danger. Otherwise known as Agrilus Bilineatus, the two-lined chestnut borer will attack any oak species, although red oak is its favorite. It like trees that are already weakened. If conditions like stress, construction, or drought have affected trees in a certain area, then there is a good chance that the TLCB will try to make a home and infest them.
Management
Once an infestation has started, it is difficult to fix the problem. The best way to manage TLCB is through prevention. That means keeping trees as healthy as possible. The more vigorous they are, the better equipped they will be to defend against borers. This means keeping the trees properly watered, maintaining the soil, and not damaging the bark. Anything that causes stress or damage to the tree or might weaken it will encourage the borers to strike.
How Do They Infest Trees?
A TLBC, once it is found a weak enough oak tree, will lay eggs usually in May or June. Over the summer, the larvae suck the nutrients and water from the branches as they feed. This causes leaves to turn brown. You can only see the trails the larvae cause if you cut away a piece of bark to see underneath. The larvae have enlarged heads, and are completely white. They can get up to ¼ inch in length. After a year, they develop into adult beetles and head off to infect more trees.
How to Tell if a Tree is Infected
The first thing you might notice is that the foliage has become sparse, and the leaves have gotten smaller. This usually happens within 1-2 months of larvae being hatched. As the tree gets more damaged, branches will pull back, and the infested leaves will turn red-brown. The trees will often have a pattern of live, damaged and dead leaves. Upper branches will have no leaves, as they will have died. The middle section will have the red-brown leaves, and the lower section leaves will be green. By the end of the summer, the damage stops progressing, only to pick up again the following spring. Once the tree is fully dead, the TLCB will start attacking other trees nearby.
If you suspect an infestation of two-lined chestnut borers, make sure to keep your oak trees strong and healthy to keep the bugs at bay.
Oak anthracnose is a fungal disease that infects oak trees, in particular the White oak. The fungus that causes it is apiognomonia quercinia. Each year, the plants that were infected the year previous will spread the spores from rain and moisture that gets splashed in the spring to new growth.
How Can You Spot it?
Early in the season, the immature leaves start to show infection, the disease will present itself as brown and dead looking edges of the leaves, with necrotic spots on the veins of the leaves themselves. Often what will happen is there will be a distinct separation between healthy and infected tissue on the leaf. As a leaf gets more and more infected, it will start looking misshapen and will curl in on itself. Mature leaves resist infection better than immature, but can still get infected. They will have small, brown spots, and tend to show the infection during the summer. When a tree is severely infected it can lose all its foliage, and there could be dieback of the branches as well.
Difference Between Oak Anthracnose and Oak Wilt
These two diseases are often confused, but there are some differences to help tell them apart. For one, anthracnose usually attacks white oak, and oak wilt generally attacks red oak. Also, anthracnose is signified by its splotches spread around a leaf. Wilt will cause large brown spots that sometimes combine into even larger spots. Anthracnose also generally infects the lower branches on the inside because it thrives in higher humidity levels. Oak wilt tends to stick with the extremities in the upper part of the tree.
How Devastating Is It?
Luckily, while it looks ugly, oak anthracnose will not cause any permanent damage to previously healthy and established trees. To control it, you must water, mulch, and use good sanitation. Make sure to rake leaves from the area, and prune any dead or dying branches, but only when it’s dry. These actions will help prevent the spread of infection. The best time to prune is from April to June, since the wounds inflicted by pruning can attract Nitidulid beetles, which can spread oak wilt. You can also use a fungicide to help protect new growth in the spring.
If you suspect trees on your Minnesota property have been infected by oak anthracnose, then follow this handy guide to identify it and to help prevent the spread of infection.
You may have heard of the Asian long-horned beetle, but have not really paid attention to what you’ve heard other than enough to know it’s not good. If you are in an area that is in danger of losing trees to this invasive beetle, like New York City, Chicago, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Ohio, and Toronto, then you’ll want to know a little more. Here’s what you need to know.
What Trees Does it Infest?
Hardwood trees, such as Maples, elms, willows, and birches seem to be the trees of choice for the Asian long-horned beetle. There is an area roughly 48 acres large that’s currently threatened by the beetle. This stretches all the way from the Great Lakes to New England. If these forests are damaged too much, then drinking water quality will be at risk, as well as several rare species. The red maples and the sugar maple would be particularly devastating to lose, as they are crucial for the maple syrup industry.
What Impact? Could the Asian long-horned beetle Have in Minnesota?
The beetle could destroy trees in any type of community, from rural to urban. If an infested tree is not removed right away, then it will become a breeding ground, and more trees will get infested. The USDA estimates that if the Asian long-horned beetle were to establish itself across the country, then 30% of all trees in urban areas could be at risk. Estimates show the damage could cost around $669 billion.
The beetle could completely annihilate the maple syrup industry, which is valued at $73.5 million. It is a major economic driver in several states, stretching from Maine to Wisconsin. It could have an impact on tourism. The fall colors and foliage on the East Coast and in the Midwest are big attractions. In New England, this type of tourism is estimated at $1 billion of revenue a year.
How to Prevent the Spread
As an individual, there is a couple of thing you can do. For one, if you go camping, do not move firewood from place to place. Burn it where you buy it. Inspect your trees. If you see small holes the size of dimes, or the shiny black beetles themselves, then you have a problem and should report it to the appropriate authorities in your area.
Following a two-year renovation, the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden reopened on June 10, 2017. Its renovations include new artwork, an underground water system to reduce pollution and a restructured arrangement of its art.
About the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
The Minneapolis Sculpture garden is truly one of Minnesota’s gems. It’s the result of cooperation between the Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board, and houses some of the most beautiful sculptures in the United States. The park is 11 acres, and is home to 40 permanent art installations. It also temporarily holds pieces that rotate through on occasion.
Location
The park is located in Minneapolis near Loring Park and the Basilica of Saint Mary. The park board purchased the land over a hundred years ago. At the time, the land was called “The Parade”, because the military used to run drills there. The name was changed to the Armory Gardens as it contained a National Guard Armory.
Uses
The Armory Gardens became a cultural center until 1913, at which point it became floral gardens. For 50 years it operated as such. During this time, a new armory was built downtown, and the Armory in the gardens was demolished. It was at this point that the land was taken over by the Minneapolis Park Board. It was used primarily for recreation and sports fields, until 1988, when it was renamed and the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden was opened.
Design and Features
The park was designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes, a well-known designer and architect. The landscape was designed by the noted landscape architect Peter Rothschild. A final 3.5 acres were added to the North of the gardens in 1992. This expansion is more open than the original, and features a 300 foot long arbor and flower garden in memory of Alene Grossman.
Notable Works
There are many notable sculptures within the gardens. Standing Glass Fish, by Frank Gehry is located in the Cowles Conservatory. The Irene Hixon Bridge is a pedestrian walkway that crosses over the I-94 and connects to Loring Park. It was designed by Siah Armajani. Perhaps the most notable is the Claes Oldenbur and Coosje van Bruggen’s Spoonbridge and Cherry Fountain, which is known as a centerpiece of the gardens.
The MInneapolis Sculpture Gardens combines two things that Minnesota is known for: natural beauty and rich culture. There is no downside to getting lost amongst its visual delights.
Reference:
“Walker’s sculpture garden re-opens, a week behind schedule.” Mndaily.com – The Minnesota Daily. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 July 2017.