Garden maintenance on the Costa del Sol
A garden that doesn’t depend on you remembering
Mowing, pruning, irrigation and soil, spread through the year the way this coast’s climate asks, not the way the calendar does. Written quote within 24 hours.
- A plan by season, not a flat number of visits a month
- Green waste removal always included
- No tie-in
Tell us about your garden
We’ll send you a written price within 24 hours.
What’s included
The four things that have to be done right
Maintenance isn’t “coming round to cut”. It’s keeping four fronts going at once, and the one that always gets neglected is the irrigation, which is exactly the one that costs most when it fails.
Lawn and surfaces
Mowing as often as the season calls for, edging and collecting the clippings. In summer the cutting height goes up and the mowing gets less frequent; in spring and autumn, the other way round.
Pruning and trimming
Hedges, shrubs and small trees, spread over light passes through the year instead of two hard prunes. Anything that needs height or a chainsaw is quoted separately, with the right equipment and insurance for it.
Irrigation
Checking the system, cleaning drippers and sprinklers, and reprogramming for each season. Adjusting the irrigation controller to the season is one of the biggest water savings in the whole contract.
Soil and plant health
Feeding to suit each species and time of year, mulch, weed control and keeping an eye out for pests. Here that mostly means watching the palms and staying alert to whatever turns up with the heat.
How we approach it
Here the garden doesn’t stop in winter
Almost every gardening contract comes from a template designed for a climate where plants stop growing from November to March: visits from spring to autumn, one hard prune in winter and not much else. On this coast, that simply isn’t what happens.
What you get here is growth almost all year round, with a slowdown in high summer (because of the heat, not the cold) and two strong pushes, one in spring and one in autumn. A plan with the same number of visits every month is too much in January and falls short in April.
That’s why we spread the visits by season, and save the noisy, disruptive jobs (hard pruning, clearing, small building work) for the months when nobody is using the garden.
About the price
We don’t give a price without seeing the garden
And it’s worth being wary of anyone who does. Of two gardens the same size, one can take twice the work of the other, and there’s no way of telling over the phone.
- The trees. A garden with mature trees is a different job: height, cuttings, and decisions you don’t make with a strimmer.
- The slope. Wheeled machinery can’t work on a slope. It’s the factor that moves the quote most, and it doesn’t show on a plan.
- The state of the irrigation. A system that works gets maintained. A broken one turns into repair visits dressed up as maintenance.
- Access. If materials have to be carried up by hand and the cuttings carried down the same way, the time doubles and the price reflects it.
We come, take a look and send you a written price with what’s included and what isn’t. If it doesn’t suit you, no problem.
Where we work
Each town is different
A sloping garden in Benalmádena is not the same as a 2,000 m² plot down in the valley. Each page explains what changes in that area.
Do it yourself
We’d rather explain it than keep it secret
A good part of this can be done without hiring anyone. We explain it in full, in case you fancy having a go.
Why here you plant in autumn, not in spring
Spring is a good time to plant where the enemy is the cold. Here the enemy is July, and that turns the whole calendar upside down.
Read itWhat to plant here so you’re not watering all summer
August is ending, you look at the garden and the question asks itself. The answer has less to do with the list of plants than with where you put them and what you do in the first year.
Read itWinter-flowering plants: here it’s the other flowering season
Here winter isn’t the garden’s dead season: a group of plants flowers just as the rest stops. Which they are, where they don’t work, and the light that keeps a poinsettia green.
Read itBougainvillea not flowering: it’s too well looked after
It’s huge, green and lovely, and won’t produce a single flower. It’s almost never lacking anything: it lacks nothing, and for this plant that takes away the urge to flower.
Read itBrown in September doesn’t always mean dead
Half a dozen brown plants and the temptation to pull them all out before replanting. Here that’s done in October, not now: several of them aren’t dead, they’re dormant.
Read itWhen to plant tulips on the Costa del Sol, and why they go in the fridge first
Planted in October, as inland, they give leaves and a low flower or none. Here you buy them now, give them weeks in the fridge and plant them in December.
Read itStrelitzia nicolai in the garden: what the houseplant guides don’t tell you
Guides treat it as a living-room plant. In a coastal garden, with 0.2 days of frost a year, it becomes a clump of trunks 6 to 8 metres tall.
Read it
Common questions
What people ask us most
How often do you need to come?
It depends on the season, not the month. On this coast the garden grows almost all year round, with a slowdown in high summer because of the heat and a strong push in spring and again in autumn. A contract with a flat number of visits a month leaves you overpaying in the quiet months and short just when everything takes off, so we plan it by season.
Is there a minimum term?
No. We set maintenance up as an annual plan because a garden runs by seasons and skipping one costs you in the next, but that’s an argument, not a clause. If at some point it doesn’t suit you, you stop, and that’s that.
Do you take the green waste away?
Yes, and it’s included. We mention it because it’s the most common surprise in a gardening quote: the cutting comes in cheap and then the removal is billed separately. On a plot with trees, the volume of cuttings is no small detail.
Do you work with communities and property administrators?
Yes, and it works differently from a private garden: an annual contract, a written report of every visit so there’s a record for a committee that changes every year, and a single point of contact instead of a general phone number. What’s worth checking before you sign any quote, we’ve written up separately. It’s in what to check in a community garden contract.
Shall we take a look?
Tell us what you’ve got and we’ll send you a written price within 24 hours, with what’s included and what isn’t.