I have one of the smallest back yards in my neighborhood. But I always get rave reviews from neighbors and visitors to my home. This is because I am very big into backyard landscaping ideas, and you don’t have to put a whole lot of money into it to make your yard into something beautiful.
Backyard Landscaping Ideas
The lot that my home is on is about a half an acre. It was divided into two by the previous owner for a garage apartment in the back. He decided to put a privacy fence halfway between my house and the garage apartment. So my back yard is essentially a quarter of the size of most of my neighbors’ yards.
This has been a drawback in some ways. I cannot have a dog. And there is not a whole lot of room for my children to play. But it has also been a blessing in that back yard landscaping is made a whole lot easier because there isn’t as much area to cover.
I started by planting a garden between my fence and sidewalk. This was about a one-foot tract of dirt. I planted flowers in that area, and now it is probably the most colorful area of the entire yard. And it makes the yard smell great.
I then made a walkway of pea gravel that curves in a semicircle the length of the back yard and out to the fence that leads to the front yard, through that gate, and out to the front yard where it stops at my driveway. This makes my wife happy, because I don’t track mud into the house when I take the trash out.
The next step for me was one of the very basic elements of back yard landscaping. Planting the grass. The yard had virtually none when we first moved into the house. Now, the entire back yard is covered with thick Bermuda grass.
I planted some banana trees in one corner and started a little vegetable garden along the opposite fence of the flower garden that I planted. Then I bought some second hand lawn furniture, including a bench and two tables with umbrellas. I made the only expensive purchase when I bought to fountains for the yard.
If you exclude the fountains, the rest of the back yard landscaping probably cost less than $200, and it looks 10 times better than when I first moved in. It not only looks better, but it is also therapeutic to work hard at something like that and see the end result, especially when your back yard suddenly becomes the envy of all of your neighbors.
Back yard landscaping is something that can be done with any size yard, and I defy anyone to put some kind of effort into it and not feel a certain sense of satisfaction at the end result.