Following a visioning process by the homeowner association board of directors that led the community to realize their common area landscaping was not in synch with their goal to be ”regarded as one of the most beautiful and socially inviting resorts environments anywhere,” they put Steve Hatcher, Master Gardener and former board member, in charge of a $400,000 beautification project. According to Steve, the board’s vision and support were the key enablers to the success of the project.
Steve Hatcher |
He also credits the UF/IFAS Master Gardener program as the impetus for the savings in the project. He and fellow Master Gardener Ann Butler collaborated with a team on the project. “The savings we attained are directly attributable to the training Ann and I received in the Master Gardener program, consultant Louise Leister’s advice, and proactive suggestions made by Austin Outdoor,” Steve said. “This effort never would have happened without the Master Gardener program.”
Ruth Micieli, Flagler County Horticulture Program Assistant & Master Gardener Coordinator, who along with Louise trained Steve and Ann, gives the community high marks and says she hopes other communities can learn from Ocean Hammock. “It shows what one small group of dedicated people can do,” she said. In addition, Louise said, “And it really is just the simple things they did that make a big difference.”
Among the guidelines Steve’s team developed for the landscape were to ensure it was attractive, sustainable, cost-effective and easy to maintain. By adhering to Florida-Friendly Landscaping™ principles, which include taking mature sizes of plants into consideration, the community achieved a consistent, unifying look to the landscape that is easy to maintain, and they saved significant funds in the process.
Ocean Hammock Case Study
Read on to find out more about the other Florida-Friendly principles the community used in the following in-depth case study of the community’s successes with their beautification project. The case study explores project management, goals and guidelines for the landscape, project planning, implementation, and use and consideration of best management practices for maintenance.
Project Management
Over the past four years, Steve and Ann, both Ocean Hammock residents, led the homeowner association through a collaborative, common-sense, hands-on approach that has saved thousands of dollars and converted the landscaping in common areas to a beautiful, practical and easy-to-maintain landscape.
The team reduced the cost of the project by $135,000 and used the funds for a larger project scope than what would have been possible through the original budget.
They also reduced the yearly cost for annuals by $50,000. While they increased the size of flower beds at strategic locations, they eliminated a large number of relatively small flower beds which did not provide strong visual impact.
The community realized the overall project savings by employing several Florida-Friendly Landscaping™ principles and by forming a collaborative partnership with the homeowners on the team; Austin Outdoor, the company that provided landscaping services; and Louise Leister, a horticultural consultant who provided landscaping advice to the project team and is an instructor in the Flagler County Master Gardener program.
“There are two approaches to property management,” Steve says. “You can scream and shout and have an ‘anything goes’ approach to landscape maintenance, or you can form partnerships,” he adds.
Everyone on the team made significant suggestions for improving the overall result and for finding ways to conserve dollars to ensure the landscape improvements would occur at all locations throughout the community that needed improvement.
Steve found the partnership approach and use of landscaping guidelines—such as giving it a unified look throughout the community and making it sustainable—to be very constructive throughout the project.
Unifying Themes
Two developers had used different approaches in the landscape design of the common areas in their sections of the community. The beautification team’s starting point for the project was to develop themes for unifying community landscaping and for making it more beautiful and unique.
The community’s particular physical environment—beachside properties that transition to coastal scrub hammocks in 800 yards—presented a special challenge in developing the themes. The two themes are: “Integrate the landscaping for sections of the community bordering the hammock with the natural environment found in the hammock, and use coquina boulders and colorful seaside plants such as dune sunflowers and gaillardia to tie our beach-side areas to our unique coquina sand beach.” In contrast, the original community landscaping used sand cord grass to separate landscaping along major roadways from the hammock, and very little of the beachside landscaping was tied to the natural beauty of the coquina shell beach.
Before landscaping improvements |
After--Coquina lends unifying landscape theme |
The team followed these concepts and guidelines during its design and decision-making processes:
- Emphasize superior design versus the typical plan and plants seen in most Florida developments
- Emphasize the use of colorful plants
- Improve the appearance with landscaping that is cost effective, maintainable and sustainable
- Use consistent, repetitive unifying themes.
The team also worked with Austin Outdoor to implement best practices for maintaining community landscapes.
Project Planning
Once the community agreed to the unifying themes, the project team focused on identifying the areas in the community that needed improvement. They ranked the needs and developed high-level plans and cost estimates. Goals of the initial plans were to ensure that improvements were made first to high-impact locations most in need of improvement and that the improvements were spread equitably throughout the community.
The team developed detailed project plans, and revised cost estimates and prepared work orders once the overall plan was completed and approved by the board of directors.
How the Community Realized Savings
Concentrated annuals at strategic locations
The team accepted Austin Outdoor’s proposal to increase the size of the flower beds at main entrances and street intersections to improve visual impact. Concurrently, a large number of relatively small, low visual impact beds throughout the community were eliminated. This reduced the number of flowers used in community landscapes by roughly half and saved $50,000 in yearly flower costs.
Fewer rotations of hardier annuals result in savings |
Created a flower-management process
The project team created a subcommittee to improve the flower-management process so annuals selected for each rotation would be more attractive and durable. The subcommittee successfully implemented the new process, and they have been able to reduce the number of flower rotations from four to two or three, depending on the weather.
Reducing the number of rotations saves the community between $5,000 and $10,000 each year.
Assessed and re-used existing vegetation
First, the community assessed what already worked in the landscape and what they wanted to keep. Such inventories are key to converting landscapes to Florida-Friendly Landscapes.
The community transplanted 16 ligustrum trees and three medjool palms from low-impact to high-impact areas. The transplanted medjools replaced three palms that had been struck by lightning, and the ligustrum trees were inconsistent with the new landscaping designs for the areas in which they were previously planted.
The transplanting cost for the ligustrum trees was $8,000 less than the cost of new trees, and savings for the medjool palms was $14,000.
Spaced plants for mature size
Landscapers generally place plants too close together to spike the visual impact of new landscapes. This practice increases initial costs and creates long-term maintenance problems.
The team followed the Florida-Friendly Landscaping™ principle of “right plant, right place,” which, among other things, recommends plants be placed according to their mature sizes. This reduced costs relative to plant spacing normally used by landscapers by $21,000.
Steve said in retrospect he could have allowed even more space in some cases and further reduced cost.
In addition, the community saved $16,000 by purchasing smaller containers of live oaks, magnolia, red cedars, yaupon hollies, and using Evergreen paspalum in lieu of other plants originally specified. They used 30-gallon trees rather than 65-gallon trees and found that over a period of two to three years, the 30-gallon trees generally grew to the same size as 65-gallon trees planted at the same time.
Dune sunflower softens coquina |
Eliminated unnecessary landscaping
The community reduced the size of a large, low-impact plant bed on a major roadway and replaced it with St. Augustine turf. This change reduced project costs by $14,000.
Negotiated plant prices
Plant prices were negotiated, and this reduced total project costs by $20,000 relative to standard prices.
Used alternative vendor for coquina boulders
Coquina boulders were purchased directly from the quarry. This reduced the cost of purchasing and installing boulders by approximately $42,000.
Best Maintenance Practices
Improving daily landscaping procedures is an ongoing integral part of the community’s landscaping improvements project. Steve and his team have been working with Austin Outdoor for the past four years to define and implement best landscaping maintenance practices.
Steve is working on a best management practices maintenance manual for the community’s landscaping. The manual is based on University of Florida publications and describes best practices for mulching, fertilizing, irrigating and pruning palms, trees and shrubs. It also includes pictures of properly and improperly pruned palms, trees, and shrubs.
The community is soliciting bids for a new landscaping contract. The request for proposals document includes best practices requirements, and the successful bidder must agree to the requirements when preparing the new landscaping contract.
Following are examples of some of the more significant best maintenance practices Ocean Hammock has undertaken:
Removed vines in trees in common areas along major roads in the community to improve the appearance of community landscapes. If this had not been done, native trees in key locations would have died.
- Removed Brazilian peppers and other invasive-exotic plants
- Retained an arborist to prune live-oak street trees planted along major roadways. None of them had been structurally pruned, even though many of them were planted 10 years ago.
- Now prune palms annually, and only dead fronds are removed during the pruning process. Previously, they were pruned twice a year, and palms were often “hurricane cut” so that remaining branches would fit between 10 and 2 o’clock on the face of an imaginary clock. The community saves approximately $25,000 by eliminating one pruning process each year.
- Sand cord grass had been planted years ago as a border between natural areas and the St. Augustine grass along major roadways. The cord grass had to be sheared frequently to mow the St. Augustine grass. The community removed significant amounts of the cord grass during the beautification project; a two-foot mulch boundary is now established between the remaining cord grass and the St. Augustine grass, so that the cord grass no longer has to be pruned to permit mowing. The mulch boundary has a functional purpose, and it improves the appearance of the landscaping.
- Sand cord grass also had been planted too close to sidewalks. The community is in the process of either removing or relocating the grass.
- Ligustrum trees are now hand pruned to attain their natural shape and form. Previously, they were sheared to look like gum drops.
- Schillings holly and Parsonii juniper are now pruned properly so the base of the shrub is wider than the top.
Award-winning Community
Landscaping wins top awards |
Such improvements have not gone unnoticed both within Florida and nationally. In 2009, Ocean Hammock and Austin Outdoor won an Award of Excellence for its landscape maintenance by the Florida, Nursery Growers and Landscape Association. The 2009 awards program had a 100 percent increase in submissions, and Ocean Hammock was still able to beat the competition. Of all the submissions, only five other properties received this prestigious award within Florida in the category of landscape maintenance.
Within the same year, Ocean Hammock and Austin Outdoor won the Professional Landcare Network Environmental Improvement Grand Award also for its landscape maintenance. This nationally recognized award is one of the highest honors received within the green industry. In fact, of the 134 projects submitted, only 37 projects won the Grand Award, which is the highest honor that can be received for first-time submitted projects. Ocean Hammock has set the landscape standard of excellence within its community.
Ocean Hammock continues to make improvements to their landscapes and plans to focus on further improvements in irrigation, fertilizer and pesticide use now that they have retrofitted most areas.
Ruth urges other communities to take a look at their landscapes as Ocean Hammock has and ask, “How can they be more sustainable and easy to maintain?” She points to the nine Florida-Friendly Landscaping™ principles, combined with a community vision of its landscaping, as important components to realize attractive and sustainable landscapes.
