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Marysville spreads across flat ground north of Everett, out toward Tulalip. The lots are bigger than the city lots to the south, and the ground is slow to drain. Water does not run off a slope because there often is not a slope. Valley yards hold wet leaves in the corners and weeds in the beds that never dried out. The cleanup is haul plus a real edge, or the yard looks the same after the first rain.
Snohomish County · ZIP 98270 · 2020 population 70,714
Wet debris and overgrown beds
We pull the heavy, soggy piles, cut the obvious overgrowth, and redefine the bed lines so a mower can take it from there. Mud season means we use boards or we wait a day rather than rut the lawn we just cleared.
A fall cleanup before the leaves mat is cheaper than a spring cleanup of a black slick. We will tell you which one you are buying.
The ground in Marysville
Flat ground sounds easy until a winter storm sits on it. French drains and permeable surfaces matter here more than tall walls. Yards are family yards: room for a lawn, a play set, fruit trees that people already have and want kept, and a patio that can take a barbecue without turning into a pond.
The soil is the kind that grows a decent lawn if it can breathe, and moss if it cannot. We mow, aerate, and seed the open lawns, and we bark the beds so the weed cycle slows down. Drainage is the job we would rather do first. A new sod lawn laid over undrained flat clay is a replacement lawn in two years. Fruit trees get pruned for light and for the fruit, not sheared into balls.
How we do the work
A cleanup is debris gone, beds redefined, and the hazards cut. We haul. A pile at the curb that sits for a month is not a finish. Brush, rotten wood, the fallen fence panel, the blackberries that took the side yard: that is the work.
We do not “clean” a yard by blowing leaves into the beds and covering them with a thin coat of bark. If bark is part of the visit, the bed is weeded first. If it is not in the bid, we do not fake it.
The walk-through is the scope. A bigger pile, a surprise blackberry thicket, or a tree that needs a climber changes the day, and we say that before we start rather than after the trailer is full.
What we look at first
- What is actually being hauled
- Blackberries, downed limbs, and junk versus a normal leaf drop
- Access for a trailer
- Whether you want it bare and ready, or just safe and tidy
Blackberries
Cut to the ground and hauled, with the understanding they return from the roots. A cleanup is not eradication. A follow-up, or a dig-out if the patch is small, is how you actually get rid of them. We will say which you bought.
Ready for the next thing
A good cleanup ends with edges you can mow and beds you could bark. If the next step is renovation, we leave the yard ready for that instead of dressing it with mulch we are about to dig through.
Leaves
Off the lawn, off the beds you care about, off the walks. Into the trailer. A wooded corner can keep its duff. Blowing every leaf out of a natural area is busywork, and we will not pretend it is horticulture.
More from this crew
- Yard cleanup across Snohomish County
- Tree and shrub pruning in Marysville
- Beauty bark in Marysville
- Landscaping in Marysville
- Pressure washing in Marysville
- Yard cleanup in Everett
- Yard cleanup in Arlington
- Yard cleanup in Lake Stevens
Sources for the climate and the water
- USDA plant hardiness map for choosing plants that can take a Snohomish County winter.
- EPA WaterSense on watering less once a lawn or a new planting is established.
- EPA Soak Up the Rain on keeping roof and yard water from becoming someone else’s problem.
