>> We built about 6 years ago. My wife announced she wanted minimal lawn and the rest in natural areas. We ended up with tiny areas at the front and rear steps with "lawn" and the rest in what most would call "pine islands". But it's reversed. The grass is what is the "island", while the natural areas fill the remainder. Furthermore, the grassed areas are not rectangular, but fancy kidney-shaped with curved edges. I thought she had lost it, but it's really gorgeous. And because there are no corners, it's really easy to cut. Mowing is reduced to simply walking around and around. There is no stopping or backing up as there would be in a traditional rectangular plot of grass.
To minimize maintenance in the non-lawn areas, she laid down pasteboard (flattened shipping boxes) and then puts down pine straw or wood chips over that. In this way the areas at the edge of the forested areas that would normally be growing briers, blackberry thorns and other trashy volunteers simply do not grow anything. It also eliminates the need for herbicides and poisons in trying to control types of "brush" common in border areas. Amazon Prime sends us all these landscaping control boxes about twice a week for FREE, and there's always a nice gift inside too !! Pine straw and wood chips also lasts longer since it's not touching dirt. The boxes last about 5 years, at which time we simply cover the old with another layer of pasteboard and pine straw. Autumn leaves are blown off the small grassed areas onto the mulched areas using the mower, by simply starting in the center of the grassed areas. The yard and border areas look perfectly manicured all year round, except that we do less yard work than ever. The overall effect is that it looks as if a lawn care team spends 3 days a week in our yard, when in truth we have never had a pro on the property.
>> You'll want to check the "grass" that your lawn guy put down. In the SE, Fescue grass is planted in the Fall because July heat will burn it up. A better lawn choice might be Centipede, which should be planted in Spring. Once started, Centipede spreads by itself and needs zero fertilizers and other chemical treatments through the year. IOW, less expensive to maintain. The only encouragement it needs is to be cut short, which makes it want to spread. We are in a colder area, and so we planted a cold-tolerant centipede called TifBlair.
>> We have slowly weeded out all the wild cherry trees and other native trash trees. In their place we have about 20 different types of conifers, the most prevalent being Red Cedar. This has 2 HUGE benefits: 1) Year round privacy. 2) Cedars send their roots deep. This keeps tree roots out of our septic system. If you have a septic tank, then you must cut back trees like maples... OR keep the septic maintenance guy on a retainer.
Hope this helps.
