GOOD GARDENS

-The owner held herself out to be a professional, but I discovered later that she was unlicensed. The trees and shrubs were planted improperly and many died. Some trees were planted too closely together for their eventual full-grown sizes. After some trees began to fail and had to be removed, we discovered that they had been planted with wire baskets still attached to the root balls. Other materials which were difficult to see, such as small plastic tags tightly secured to branches, were never removed so that branches withered. Eleven eastern red cedar trees, which are incompatible with the fruit trees (because they transmit cedar apple rust) were planted in spite of the fact that the landscaper knew that we planned to plant apple trees. Most of these cedar trees had to be removed entirely. Almost all of the other trees had to be relocated at great expense. The planting never did what it was supposed to do, which was to screen one side of our property from a public parking lot. I attempted to negotiate a settlement and was told that the owner would look into it, but never received any response. When asked about her license, the owner refused to tell me whether she was a licensed landscaping contractor. Because she was unlicensed we were unable to collect from the fund that Suffolk County provides for homeowners' damages. I reported the company to Suffolk County Department of Consumer Affairs which opened an investigation and fined the company for being unlicensed. I wrote another letter offering to settle the matter in lieu of litigation, for far less than what it cost me to remediate; again, no response was received. I would not recommend that any homeowner utilize this landscaping business.