Plant Label Wizard

The Plant Label Wizard is used to automatically label every plant in a landscape design. These labels appear only in the Plan view, and can be adjusted as needed after they are added. The Plant Label Wizard is a valuable timesaver, especially when working with large and complex landscape designs.

The wizard allows you to determine how the plant labels appear by modifying the label placement, the font size and style, and the information that is included with the labels.

The Plant Label Wizard can be used as many times as is necessary; running the wizard a second time will simply replace all of the previous labels with new labels. The wizard adds labels into a layer named Auto Plant Labels; this layer is created automatically if needed. We recommend only using this layer for labels which are added using the wizard.

To add plant labels using the Plant Label Wizard:

1.   Click Tools and Plant Label Wizard.

2.   Click the Next button; the dialog shown below will appear.

Common Name
Include the common name in the label.

Botanical Name
Include the botanical name in the label.

Plant key
Include the plant key in the label. Click Options to customize how the plant keys are generated. See Generating Plant Keys, below, for details.

Add quantity
Include the plant quantity in the label.

Add plant picture
Use a label which includes a picture of each plant type.

Picture size
If the Add plant picture option is checked, then you can customize how large each plant picture is.

Label Style
Select which label style you would like to use: either placed at the edge of your design with leader lines, or centered over the plants.

Maximum distance between identical plants
Determines how far apart plants of the same type need to be in order to avoid being grouped. See below for more details.

Add to left/right side
Determine whether the plant labels are added to the left of your landscape design, to the right, or to both sides. This option is only used when adding labels to the edge of your design.

Distance from left/right edge
Determine the margin between the edge of your landscape design and the plant labels. This option is only used when adding labels to the edge of your design.

3.   Set the desired plant label options and click the Next button.

4.   Click the Finish button to complete the wizard.

The following is an example of the Leader lines from edge option:

The following is an example of the Centered over plants option. The plant key options were set to the format "a,b,a1,b1" and the Plant Legend was customized to show the plant key in the first column.

Generating Plant Keys

You can choose to use the existing plant keys, or generate new keys automatically. Generating new keys is especially useful when using placing labels over the plants using the Centered over plants option.

Caution: When generating new plant keys, the existing keys will be overwritten. This is only a concern if you have entered custom values for the Key property in one or more plants.

Using the “Maximum distance between identical plants” option

The Maximum distance between identical plants option helps you control how many plant labels are added. For example, the landscape in the picture below includes three Tea Olive plants that are approximately 6 feet apart. During the Plant Label Wizard, the Maximum distance between identical plants option was set to 5 feet. Notice how each plant has a plant label.

The picture below shows the same landscape design but with the Maximum distance between identical plants option set to 10 feet, resulting in the three Tea Olives being given a grouped label.

Customizing the Plant Labels

The first time you use the wizard in a particular landscape design, the plant labels will be created using the default font, line style, and other properties. You can then edit the labels and change their appearance as desired.

To customize the appearance of the plant labels after using the wizard for the first time:

1.   Use the wizard to add plant labels.

2.   Click one of the labels to select it.

3.   Click Edit, Select, and then Select Similar. Or, press the L key. This will select all of the plant labels.

4.   Change the font, line style, and other properties as desired.

When you make changes to your design, you can re-run the wizard and update the plant labels. When you do this, don't delete the old plant labels -- let the wizard do it. The wizard will use the font, line style, and other properties from the first label in the Auto Plant Labels layer, and automatically apply these to the new labels. The old labels in the Auto Plant Labels layer will then be replaced with the new ones.

Preventing Labels for Certain Plants

If you wish to prevent certain plants from receiving labels from the Plant Label Wizard, then adjust the Advanced Object Properties as explained below. Alternately, after using the Plant Label Wizard, simply delete the unwanted plant labels. This is useful for when you wish to display plant labels for new plants, but not for plants that already exist on your client’s property.

To prevent the wizard from adding labels for certain plants:

1.   Select each of the plants that you do not wish to receive automatic plant labels. See Selecting objects for details.

2.   Click Edit and Advanced Object Properties.

3.   Click the Include in Project Material List option to uncheck it and then click the OK button.

Important: This will also prevent the selected plants from appearing in the Project Material List and the Plant Legend.

Tips:

•      If you want every plant in your landscape design to have its own label, then set the Maximum distance between identical plants value to a very high number. See above for more details.

•      The automatic plant labels that are added using the Plant Label Wizard can be edited normally. The labels are not strictly connected to the corresponding plants, meaning you can delete a label without affecting the plant.

•      The labels that are added using the Plant Label Wizard can be undone normally, meaning that if you wish to undo the wizard’s changes, just click Edit and Undo.

See also:

Adding a Label
Adding a Plant Label
Adding a Plant Legend
Adding a Plant
Adding Plan Detail
Using Layers
Selecting Objects
Editing Objects