Atlas Twp. – Patti Travioli has spent a lifetime honing her garden skills.
Like a contractor who plans and coordinates all aspects of building a house, she is uniquely qualified to organize all your garden and plant needs.
‘I don’t ever remember a time when I was not growing plants or gardening,? said Travioli, who recently opened Michigan Horticultural Services LLC in Atlas Township, a garden design and consultation service.
In high school, Travioli studied botany, greenhouse growing, and propagating. Later she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in horticulture at Michigan State University before opening Zone 5 Gardens in Atlas Township, raising organic native perennials, herbs, and vegetables.
Travioli can design complete landscape plans, but specialty gardens are her passion. Since no one pays her to use their products, she is able to refer clients to the highest quality Earth-friendly resources that enrich’rather than deplete’their soil.
Michigan Horicultural Services? garden designs are limited only to one’s imagination: Travioli designs culinary, sun-loving, medicinal, reduced-water, Biblical, deer-resistant, herb, color-themed, edible flower, salsa, shade, or habitat gardens’whether you want to attract birds, butterflies, or to provide cover and food for wildlife. She also creates plans for sustainable farms.
A 17-year resident of Atlas Township, Travioli is well acquainted with local growing conditions, and knows what plants grow best in the gardener’s soil, as well as how to rotate garden plants to prevent pest infestation and disease.
Since children often are more willing to eat fresh foods they’ve helped grow, kids? gardens’featuring crops such as pizza ingredients’are a big hit.
Travioli is also able to design gardens for those with special needs, like senior citizens or at-risk youth.
‘It’s about finding something and adapting it so seniors can do it,? Travioli says. ‘I think of my own parents, who have been gardening all of their lives, then to move to a setting without a garden??
Currently, she is working to become a horticultural therapist. Travioli serves on the board of the Michigan Horticultural Therapy Association, as well as on the board of the Wildflower Association of Michigan, and volunteers with Genesys Regional Medical Center’s EverGreen program.
Garden design clients receive a professional on-site evaluation, soil analysis, a drawn-to-scale garden plan design, step-by-step instructions on how to construct the garden, instructions on improving soil structure and fertility with sustainable methods, a complete plant list including specific varieties especially suited for your garden conditions, information on fertilizing, irrigating, and controlling pests and disease using sustainable methods, and a seasonal garden maintenance calendar tailored specifically to your garden.
‘I know how plants grow and what will thrive under your growing conditions,? says Travioli.
‘For example, you shouldn’t grow tomatoes in the same place every year. You usually rotate them every three years, putting them in spot A the first year, spot B the second year, and spot C the third year. It’s beneficial because tomato roots break up the soil.?
Each plant changes the soil in different ways, said Travioli, such as legumes’beans and peas’which naturally put nitrogen into the soil without additives that can contaminate soil and water supplies.
‘You can get an instant quick fertilizer, but the method I use is to feed the soil, which feeds the plant.?
Building soil through the use of compost, green sand, and rock phosphate enriches the soil over time so it’s more fertile, yielding thriving plants.
Extra help for individual plants can be achieved through mixes or sprays containing seaweed, or other organic fertilizers, said Travioli, who offers a host of other garden and plant services.
Garden walk-through consultations are helpful to identify and learn to manage disease and pests in a client’s existing garden or landscape, or to locate plants which can be toxic to children or pets. Travioli also teaches classes at the location of your choice, especially enjoyable for children, senior citizens, and other clubs.
Michigan Horticultural Services also offers interiorscaping, designing indoor plant schemes for aesthetic or health purposes, whether to add to the atmosphere of a restaurant, to keep fresh herbs at hand, or to decrease interior air pollution from laminates, carpeting, or paint in a home or commercial structure.
Services are charged at an hourly rate, with a two-hour minimum, although the minimum fee is waived for clients who are expanding a garden Travioli previously designed.
The cost is very reasonable, especially considering the time and resources gardeners put into their plantings, says Travioli, who takes a long-term look at clients? gardens.
‘Gardening is a big investment, it’s hard to lose it.?
To schedule an appointment or learn more about Michigan Horticultural Services, call (810) 429-5050, send an e-mail to info@mihortservices.com or go to http://www.mihortservices.com.