There is real relief here, which is an asset once it is structured. Slopes that are dangerous to mow become terraces, and a wall with proper drainage behind it turns dead ground into usable space.
Where we work from: our shop is at 7980 OH-249, Hicksville, OH. Johnston sits outside our home counties — call and we will confirm scheduling before you commit to anything.
Soil and drainage in Johnston
Slopes are the defining feature and the opportunity. Ground steeper than roughly three-to-one is dangerous with a walk-behind and impossible with a rider, and terracing converts it into level, plantable, usable space. Every wall we build gets drain tile at the base with a positive outlet, a minimum twelve-inch zone of clean angular stone behind the block wrapped in geotextile, and geogrid into compacted fill on anything with real height. Walls that lean forward in this county were backfilled with soil rather than stone.
On a kettle lot the low ground can be an asset rather than a defect. Species that tolerate periodic saturation — swamp white oak, red-twig dogwood, buttonbush, switchgrass, sedges and blue flag iris — turn the wet corner into the most interesting part of the property instead of the part nobody can mow.
What Johnston Township properties need
A working windbreak is worth more on an exposed township property than any ornamental planting. That means staggered rows of Norway spruce or white pine spaced for mature size, sited on the west and north — not a tight single row of arborvitae, which browns on the windward side and is the first thing deer strip in a hard winter.
We would rather talk a homeowner out of a project than sell one that will not hold. Where drainage has to be solved first, we say so, and where the honest answer is two downspouts and eighty dollars of pipe rather than a full system, we say that too.
Winter in Johnston
Snow is not a side service in this part of Ohio, it is half the year. Drive edges, walk edges and obstacles get staked in the fall so crews can clear accurately in the dark and in whiteout conditions, and pile placement gets decided at the fall site walk rather than improvised — snow stacked uphill of a drive melts back across it and refreezes with every thaw.
Most of what protects a landscape through a hard winter is done in November — leaves cleared so turf does not mat, evergreens watered deeply before the ground freezes, and drainage outlets cleared so February meltwater has somewhere to go.
What Johnston Township properties call us for
These are the services this ground actually needs, ordered by what the soil and terrain in Trumbull County demand rather than by what is easiest to sell.
- Retaining Walls & TerracingEngineered walls with real drainage behind them — turning slopes you cannot mow into space you can use.
- Drainage Solutions & Yard GradingFrench drains, swales and regrading that move water away from your foundation before it costs you a basement.
- Snow Removal & Ice ManagementPlowing, shoveling and salting on a trigger you set — residential drives and commercial lots, all winter.
- Sod Installation, Seeding & Lawn RenovationNew lawns, thin lawns and construction scars — graded, amended and established properly the first time.
- Paver Patios & HardscapingPatios and walkways set on eight inches of compacted base — the reason ours are still flat after ten Ohio winters.
- Landscape Design & InstallationA drawn plan before a shovel moves — so the beds, grades and plant choices still make sense in year ten.
Why Johnston property owners choose us
We know Trumbull County ground
Trumbull County sits in the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau, where heavy, poorly drained clay across most of the county, which is why standing water is the most common call here. We plan around that rather than applying a template written for another part of the state.
We fix the water before anything else
Every dollar spent on plants or hardscape sitting on ground that stays wet gets spent twice. On Trumbull County soil we diagnose drainage first — and often the honest answer is two downspouts rather than a system.
46 Google reviews, licensed and insured
Verbatim reviews from neighbours across the region, full coverage on every crew and machine, and financing available so a full plan can be built in one season.
One contractor for all four seasons
Landscaping April through November and snow and ice through the winter, from the same crews. The people who stake a drive in November are the people who mowed it in July.
Nearby places we also serve
Johnston sits in Trumbull County. We cover these neighbouring communities too:
