If anyone tries to sell you on a landscape design that’s touted as no-maintenance, tell them you’ll swap some ocean- front property in Nebraska for their plans.  Who knows, with climate change they may come out ahead.

There are many decisions you can make during the planning phase of your garden that might help ensure you’ll have less work to do over the long run. But don’t expect a garden that will never need a bit of tweaking or upkeep over time. Nature doesn’t work that way.

Now, I’m assuming right here that you do want plants in your landscape. Otherwise you wouldn’t be reading this. Or maybe you’re just really, really bored. In that case, go to the library and find something more erudite and scintillating.

Anyway, if you don’t want plants, then go ahead and replace your flower beds with rocks and gravel. I’ve seen more than one home on the island where there’s been nary a blade of grass or vegetation to be seen.

Rest assured these people may think they’ve stumbled upon the most extreme low-maintenance landscaping there is, but instead of taking care of living plants, they’re taking care of rocks and gravel. Even if they laid steel plates they purloined from the nearest road crew and laid them end to end under those rocks, they’d still have the might of Mother Nature working against them. Without the regular use of weed killers or pre-emergents that prevent seeds from germinating, those gravel driveways and rocky reaches will eventually becomes seas of green. All it takes is a little water and the barest bit of sand or soil blown in to sift down into the cracks and your rock bed becomes a Chia Pet.

But you want plants not rocks. You just don’t want to be slaves to your landscaping. Just remember that the habitat you create for the plants you love is also the perfect habitat for many, many unwanted plants. You’ve probably already figured out you’ll have to do some weeding, but how to do less of it, as well as watering, pruning, and generally cutting back?

Your first step in going low-maintenance is to find plants that need less water once established. That will cut down on the time you spend hauling around a hose and setting up the sprinkler. Forgo having a lawn and you can save even more water, plus the expensive of installing a sprinkler system won’t even cross your mind.

Consider plants that are sterile hybrids or produce few seeds. To this end, avoid things like columbine, chives or bluebells. And find plants that stay in clumps and don’t send runners far and wide. Stonecrop is a good one, but say goodbye to many kinds of mints and lysimachia. Plant slow growing trees and shrubs that won’t need constant pruning and plants that require a single cutting back at the end of the season, no shaping that requires brain cells to perform. I’m thinking roses and lavenders would be a big no.

Another way to go low-maintenance is to hire a gardener. But it might be cheaper to marry a gardener or give birth to one. That too can take come planning!