Renovating beds

[Dingo]

A customer wants me to pretty much tear everything out of her beds spray, till, add soil, plant, and mulch. What would you recommend that I use to spray everything with?

 

[steveair]

Round-up would be the simplest idea. There may be others, but you really can't beat it.

 

[Lanelle]

Round-up is the popular non-selective herbicide many choose to use. It's best to wait 5-7 days after spraying before continuing the install. process.<p>----------<br>Lanelle<br>

 

[Dingo]

if you roundup then you till wont some weeds seeds be pulled up to the surface that didnt get hit by the roundup? should you spray again or is this a waste?

 

[Dingo]

Also around what would you charge to clean out,spray, add topsoil, and till?

 

[Lanelle]

Round-up won't keep out newly-germanating weeds. Using a Pre-emergent after everything else is finished is the best way to prevent new weeds. As for the bid, I would look at the time to complete each type of task, the cost needed to haul away any debris, the cost of topsoil and any other materials needed. Multiply the manhours by your hourly rate, hopefully $25 - $45/hr. Make sure that your have marked up your materials not less than 30%. Also, remember that most areas require you to have a pest. certification to apply any chemical. Good Luck.<p>----------<br>Lanelle<br>

 

[Dingo]

Yeah thats what I was planing on doing. The problem is im not to sure how long its going to take me. It's about 1,200 sq. ft. of beds and they have a pretty good amount of crap to remove. Thats whats throwing me off. I dont know how long it will take me to remove everything. I work by myself. If you guys have any comments please make them<br>thanks <br>Dingo

 

[steven Bousquet]

why would you spray anything that you are tearing out? we never kill shrubs then pull them out, we just pull them.

 

[Dingo]

Steven im not sure where you got the idea that i was going to spray something then tear it out. I first plan to tear out everything in the beds then spray.<br>Dingo

 

[steveair]

Hello,<p>I work by myself and figure a job of this scale would take about 3 to 4 days by myself with a machine. <p>I'd first figure on the cleaning out and setup of the beds. Figure a half of day just to remove existing material, and getting rid of it. Then figure a half of day prepping the beds, including renting, and using a tiller. If you gonna use soil, (i like to raise beds about 8 inches, you can get away with just round-up and not tilling, just bury the dead grass.) Also, figure some time in for edging and other misc. items, such as running gutter drains out of the beds, pulling landscape lights out, pulling exis fabric out, pulling exis sprinkler system out, etc. <p>Next, think about setting the bed up. Running all the soil to the bed, raking it out. If you deliver the soil yourself, plan on the trips to the supplier, etc. If no one is local, could spend a lot of time on the road. Also, if you rent a machine, remember your losing money on it while you are out and not using it. I try to get as much of what I need to a job site before I rent anything. A lot of valuable time is loss this way. <p>Next, is planting. Again, if you rent a machine, try to get plants there before hand. If not, you could lose a half of day just messing around the nursery picking up plants and again have the machine doing nothing. When you get the plants there, it will take the rest of a the day to get them in. Think about size of material too. If your putting in larger trees, like 2.5 cal, or 6 ft evergreens, the backhoe and tractor will be a real time saver in planting and moving them around. <p>Last, after planting, you'll need almost a day just to finish. You'll need to rake the beds out, mulch, clean the edge, and don't forget WATERING (a real time consumer sometimes). When your done, there's always the other crap too. Like raking the lawn, reseeding lawn area where tractor drove over, sweeping up drive if you dumped on it, and other misc. 'house cleaning'<p>I've been very brief here, but just wanted to give you some ideas if you haven't done anything like this. I guess there's a lot of factors involved that you need to seriously consider.<p>My best advice would be to sit down and plan the entire job out, start to finish. Don't leave out anything. If you have to run to the nursery and get peat moss, factor it in.<br>If you have to run to the hardware store to get a 90 degree elbow to use on a gutter, factor it in. Don't leave out a thing. Its important when its just you.<p>Also, please do me favor, and make sure the plant selection is nice. If you haven't given much thought of what you are going to use, PLEASE do. As a designer, nothing bothers me more than seeing guys who go to the nursery and just start throwing whatever looks good in their truck. If you need help on the design, ask around. People will help. Just don't put all this work into something and then have it turn into a jungle down the road.<p>My best advice is come up with detailed plan on everything before you even start. <p>A quick note is that usually, as a REFERNCE, jobs like this you quote out at around the 2x plant cost. But this may not be the case. Get the money you want for the job, and just use this as a quick check if you really want. It may not hold true in this case at all. However, if you are under it, it is a good sign that you are pricing incorrectly.