Our second mistake; hiring a pricey landscaper.  We thought we had the best in the business, a well reputed, long established company with loads of impressive contracts in their portfolio.  Turns out we two DIY’ers would have been far better off to save our money and simply take things slowly, seek advice from neighbors, friends, and the professional/environmental enthusiasts at the DECR.  Within the first year we had; ripped out the courtyard grass the landscaper talked us into which never took and had us tracking mud into every room in the house, removed the mulch that invited termites onto the property, and transplanted dozens of ficus placed along the exterior walls when we discovered how aggressive their root systems are and that our plumbing pipes were soon to be targets.  The following two years were filled with several casualties; two large coconuts who caught lethal yellowing, $1400 worth of yellow allamanda smothered by macho ferns, and firecrackers that didn’t survive the attempt to save them from feet climbing in and out of the hot tub. There were also many more transplants, some out of  necessity such as the mahogany who began to be crowded by a large coconut, and others out of aesthetic, like the dozens of fountain grass we thought would look great near the pool until they bloomed . . . and sent their feathery seed pods swimming.   Then there was the massive undertaking of converting all of the spray-irrigation to drip-irrigation after researching ways to conserve water and finding out that the later is 90% effective in comparison to the formers 30-50%.   I strongly suggest to everyone in the Caribbean, where water is a precious resource, install drip systems to every applicable area.  It will save tons of water and a great deal of money over the course of time.