Soil decides more about a new bed than the plant list does, which is the part of planting services in Marengo, IL that homeowners rarely hear about until a shrub struggles through its second summer. 

Before a single container comes off the truck, there is a set of questions about drainage, grade, exposure and what has been growing in that ground for the last twenty years. Answering them is unglamorous work, and it is the reason one bed fills in while a nearly identical one next door stalls.