Fall is Finally Here!

Fall is officially here! Malco has been working through the various weather conditions to complete projects of all sizes. One of our larger projects took place at a residence in Carlisle. For this job, we needed to turn an existing concrete patio, into a paver patio. In addition to the paver patio, we needed to add a walkway from the patio in the rear of the home, to the driveway. Our first order of business was to relocate a Japanese maple tree. This was very challenging, due to the age of the tree. This tree couldn’t be dug with a spade machine, because it was too wide. We used our excavator to dig around the tree root ball, as meticulously as possible. Once we had soil removed around the entirety of the tree, we used our skid loader with a set of forks to begin prying up the tree from underneath the roots. This process took about 15 minutes until we finally were able to remove the tree from its original place. Next it was time to transplant the tree to a new location. After the new area was dugout, we were able to plant the tree. When transplanting a tree like this, a lot of water is critical to the survival of the tree. Luckily for us, our area received a very large rain event, where we got 4-5 inches of rain. The tree was transplanted successfully! Our next order of business was to begin the paver patio. Unlike most jobs, the existing concrete pad was in perfect condition. Instead of removing the concrete pad, we decided to adhere the pavers on top of this pad. For this job we used techo bloc blu 60 pavers in chestnut brown with the chocolate brown villagio edging. Once we covered the old concrete pad, we could excavate the remaining area for the paver patio. Once excavated, we compacted the soil, and then could add our 2a modified stone. After compacting the 2a stone this stone at grade, we added a thin layer of bedding sand for the pavers. Before we started bring out the pavers, we begun adding our sitting wall that went around the outside of the pavers. Our sitting wall used the same stone base as our pavers. In addition to the sitting wall, we had two pillars that needed to be installed. Once we located the appropriate area, we build these up quickly. These pillar block need to be glued together for every course. After the patio and sitting wall was constructed, we could then tie in our walkway, and start working out towards the driveway. Essentially, we used the same process of excavating and stone compaction as the main patio. Once we had all of the pavers properly placed and cut, we could then add steps going to the homeowner’s doorway. We used two rocka steps from techo bloc. We installed the first step, then created a small landing with pavers. Next, we added the second step, and added another landing with the pavers. After all of the hardscaping was completed, we used plastic edging to retain all of the pavers. From this point, we added topsoil to all of the disturbed areas. For the finishing touches, we added a small mulch bed behind the sitting wall, and put down sod in the disturbed areas. Take a look at the job with all the lighting!