APRIL YARD OF THE MONTH
Brooke and Jason Best expanded on what previous homeowners left in the landscape at 4433 Calmont Avenue by harmoniously updating it with native plants and even some vegetables.
When Brooke and Jason Best bought their home at 4433 Calmont Avenue in 2014, the yard was already planted with old growth crepe myrtles lining the west and north curbs. Boxwoods and trumpet creeper surrounded the porch, with dwarf roses, Indian hawthorns, and laurels filling another front facing bed. The Bests had no plans to make changes to the landscaping, except to move two Spanish dagger yuccas that were beginning to dangerously intrude into the front walkway.
With the help of friends, the northwest corner of their yard was transformed into a new xeriscape bed for the yuccas, along with new plantings of Blackfoot daisies, Skeleton-leaf goldeneye, Russian sage, red yucca, skullcap, and Mexican Feather Grass. For visual interest, the new bed was topped off with decomposed granite and a few large rocks. The goal was to fill the bed with plants that could take the full sun exposure and the brutal heat reflecting off the pavement.
That project led to several more, including adding a retaining wall, as well as several new beds lined with red bricks from the family ranch in Scurry County, a trellis along the west side of the house, and a bluebonnet patch near the corner stop sign. The bluebonnets, started from seeds from Brooke’s aunt in Lubbock, have been a big success. “The trick is to put them in rocky, poor soil and treat them poorly,” Brooke has learned firsthand. “Bluebonnets love neglect!”
Brooke and Jason, both of whom work at Botanical Research Institute of Texas at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden (BRIT), continue to work on expanding their perennial beds, using proven hardy native species when they can. They added a raised bed in the front yard for growing vegetables because their backyard is too shady to grow them. Their success with the veggies ebbs and flows, but they’ve learned “okra is tough as nails and green onions will live forever if you let them.” Their ultimate goal is “to someday have no lawn, no mowing, just plants that give back to the food web.”
Congratulations to Brooke and Jason for being selected as AHNA’s first Yard of the Month in 2025. They received a $25 gift certificate to Archie’s Gardenland and a year’s membership in Arlington Heights Neighborhood Association, courtesy of AHNA.
If you see a yard you’d like to nominate for this award, please send the address to AHNA President Lori Murray Bosken at president@arlingtonheightsna.com.
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