Colorado · Landscaping licensing · official-source guide
Colorado does not license landscaping contractors. The Division of Professions and Occupations licenses landscape architects only, and the statute exempts residential design for four or fewer units, irrigation design, and landscape installation. What a landscaper really needs is a Colorado Department of Agriculture pesticide applicator license to apply pesticides for hire, plus city contractor licensing.
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Colorado issues no state license for a landscaping contractor. There is no state general contractor license either. The Division of Professions and Occupations inside the Department of Regulatory Agencies runs the state boards, and its boards cover landscape architects and plumbers, not landscapers. Three other layers do reach your crews. The Colorado State Board of Landscape Architects protects the landscape architect title and the practice it defines. The Colorado Department of Agriculture licenses anyone who applies pesticides for hire, which pulls in most maintenance and turf programs. Cities and regional building departments license building contractors and the people who dig or pour in the public right of way. So a Colorado landscaping company can plant, grade, build a patio and install a sprinkler system with no state card in its pocket, and still need a Department of Agriculture business license, a city contractor license, and a certified technician for the backflow assembly. The state plumbing program sits in the same division and was established in 1917, which tells you how long the trade lines have been drawn. The practical effect for a bidding contractor is that there is no single number to put on a proposal. You assemble the credentials the job actually touches. A spring cleanup contract with weed control is a pesticide question. A retaining wall in Colorado Springs is a building department question. A sidewalk cut in Denver is a right of way question.
Sourcesdpo.colorado.gov 1ag.colorado.gov 2dpo.colorado.gov 3pprbd.org 4
The one landscaping credential Colorado does issue at state level is the landscape architect license. The Colorado State Board of Landscape Architects sits in the Division of Professions and Occupations at 1560 Broadway, Suite 1350, Denver. The board has five members. Three are licensed landscape architects with at least three years of practice, and two are public members, one of whom must be a building or landscape contractor in Colorado. Regulation of the profession has been switched on twice. Initial regulation began in 1976 and was later sunset by the General Assembly. Licensure was re-established in 2007. The Practice Act published by the division says that on and after January 1, 2008, a person shall not practice landscape architecture or represent himself or herself as a landscape architect unless the person holds a license issued by the board. That is title protection with teeth. It is not a ban on landscaping. It is a ban on calling yourself a landscape architect, and on performing the specific work the statute defines as the practice of landscape architecture, without the license. The statute defines that practice as applying education, training and experience to consult, evaluate, plan and design projects principally directed at the functional and aesthetic uses of land, collaborating with architects and engineers on public infrastructure, and assisting with construction documents and contracts for site improvements. The article is scheduled for repeal on September 1, 2028 unless the legislature renews it after sunset review.
Sourcesdpo.colorado.gov 1dpo.colorado.gov 2drive.google.com 3
The part of the Practice Act every Colorado landscaping company should read is the exemptions section. The statute exempts residential landscape design, defined as design services for single and multi family residential properties of four or fewer units, not including common areas. It exempts the design of irrigation systems by professionals qualified by appropriate experience or certification. It exempts landscape installation and construction services, including all contracting services not within the scope of the practice of landscape architecture. It also exempts licensed architects, registered professional engineers and licensed land surveyors working under their own statutes, and federal employees doing their official duties. Read those three exemptions together and the line becomes clear. Designing a backyard for a single family home in Colorado, drawing the planting plan, laying out the irrigation zones and then building the whole thing is exempt work. Designing the common areas of a large multi family community, or the site plan for a commercial or public project, is where the licensed practice begins. The statute also preserves local power. Nothing in the article stops a municipality or county from adopting codes necessary to protect its inhabitants, so a city can still require a permit, an engineered wall detail or a licensed contractor for the structural parts of a build. And nothing in the article limits or extends the rights of another profession or craft, so the plumbing and pesticide rules still apply in full on an exempt job.
If you want the credential rather than the exemption, the board sets the bar in statute and rule. There are three doors. Licensure by examination, licensure by endorsement through the occupational credential portability program, and licensure by prior practice for people who were working before January 1, 2008. For the examination route the board may require a professional degree from a program accredited by the Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board plus practical experience for a period not to exceed three years, or practical experience for a period not to exceed ten years under the direct supervision of a licensed landscape architect, or a combination of experience and education not to exceed ten years. One year of that experience may be practical field experience in construction techniques, teaching or research in an accredited program. Graduates of unaccredited programs can petition to substitute education for experience. Every examination applicant must pass an examination developed or adopted by the board, and the statute lets the board adopt the examinations, grading procedures and experience requirements of the Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Boards. The board held a rulemaking hearing in July 2026 to incorporate the CLARB Uniform Licensure Standard for Landscape Architecture 2022 into its rules. An application goes void if the applicant does not meet the licensing requirements within three years of filing, although the board may extend that for someone who retakes the exam within thirty one months of the last attempt.
Sourcesdpo.colorado.gov 1dpo.colorado.gov 2drive.google.com 3
A licensed landscape architect in Colorado must obtain a stamp of a design authorized by the board. The stamp bears the name, date of licensing and license number of the licensee, together with the legend Colorado Licensed Landscape Architect. The statute then prescribes how it gets used. The stamp, the signature and the date go on reproductions of drawings to establish a record set of contract documents. The stamp and date also go on the cover, title page and table of contents of specifications and on each reproduction of drawings prepared under direct supervision. Consultant drawings folded into the record set must be identified and dated so they can be told apart from stamped work. The record set must be kept for a minimum of three years after beneficial occupancy or beneficial use. The board may authorize an electronic stamp by rule. Renewal runs on a two year cycle. The division states that all Colorado landscape architect licenses expire on December 31 of even numbered years, and that renewals open roughly four to five weeks before the expiration date. New applicants licensed within 120 days of an upcoming expiration are issued the next expiration date instead. On insurance, the statute makes shareholders, members and partners of a firm liable for the acts and omissions of its people unless the firm carries a qualifying professional liability policy of at least seventy five thousand dollars multiplied by the number of landscape architects in the firm, capped at five hundred thousand dollars.
Sourcesdpo.colorado.gov 1dpo.colorado.gov 2drive.google.com 3
Calling your business a landscape architecture firm when nobody in it holds the license is the single easiest mistake to make in Colorado marketing, and the statute addresses it directly. Any person who practices, or offers or attempts to practice, landscape architecture without an active license issued under the article is subject to penalties under the general enforcement section of Title 12 that governs the division. The enforcement path is not limited to a board letter. A violation may be prosecuted by the district attorney of the judicial district where the offense was committed, or by the attorney general in the name of the people of the State of Colorado, and in that action the court may issue an order, enter judgment, or issue a preliminary or final injunction. An injunction is the part that should concentrate attention. It can stop the advertising, not just fine it. The safe wording for an exempt Colorado company is concrete. You are a landscaping contractor, a landscape designer, a landscape construction company, or an irrigation contractor. You design residential properties of four or fewer units and you install. You do not describe yourself as a landscape architect, you do not say landscape architecture services, and you do not let a web page, a truck wrap or a directory listing say it for you. If a licensed landscape architect stamps drawings for you as a consultant, name that person and their license, and keep your own description separate.
This is the state license most Colorado landscaping companies actually need. The Colorado Department of Agriculture licenses a commercial applicator, defined as any person other than a private applicator who engages in the business of applying pesticides for hire. The rules define engaging in the business broadly. It covers evaluating pest problems, recommending pest controls and evaluating results, mixing, loading or applying pesticides, and soliciting, advertising, offering or contracting to do any of those in return for money or anything of value, including goods or services. Advertising weed control counts even before you spray anything. The license fee is 350 dollars a year, and the department states that licenses are issued for the calendar year with no proration for a partial year. The application package has specific pieces. A licensed qualified supervisor must be linked to the business, and that supervisor must be licensed in every pest management category the business intends to work in. The applicant must obtain and show proof of liability insurance in the minimum amount of 400,000 dollars. Incorporated applicants, including corporations, partnerships and limited liability companies, must submit a Certificate of Good Standing from the Colorado Secretary of State. Each additional doing business as name carries an annual fee of 100 dollars, and separate application records must be kept for each name. The department says processing normally takes up to five business days after receipt. Limited commercial and public applicator registrations, used by golf courses, homeowner associations and local governments, are 50 dollars.
The business license is only half of it. Colorado also licenses the individuals. A qualified supervisor is an employee or agent of a commercial, limited commercial or public applicator who, without supervision, evaluates pest problems, recommends controls, mixes, loads or applies pesticides, sells application services, operates devices, or supervises others doing those things. A qualified supervisor must pass the general exam plus exams in every category applicable to the work, must meet the on the job experience requirements specified in rule for each category, and pays a 100 dollar license fee. A certified operator is an employee who uses restricted use pesticides without on site supervision of a qualified supervisor. There are no experience requirements for that license. The applicant passes the general exam plus the category exams and pays 100 dollars. Below those two sits the applicator technician, a technician whose job includes the use of pesticides. Technicians are not licensed, but they must be trained to the minimum standards in Part 5 of the rules for each specific category they work in, and the employer is responsible for keeping complete and accurate training records. A trained technician may make general use pesticide applications only under the supervision of a licensed qualified supervisor who holds that category, and restricted use applications only under direct on site supervision of such a supervisor. Commercial applicators must also notify the department and link any employee holding an individual license within 15 days of hire or release from employment, on a form signed by both the business and the licensee.
Colorado sorts pesticide work into numbered categories, and a landscaping company usually needs two or three of them. Category 206 is Turf Pest Control. It covers applications to managed turf to control invertebrate pests including insects, mites, slugs, snails and nematodes, or to control plant diseases or weeds, and applications to ornamental beds to control weeds. The rules define managed turf as ground cover that is watered, mowed, seeded or regularly maintained for defined ground cover. Category 207 is Ornamental Pest Control. It covers applications to ornamental trees, shrubs, beds, flowers and other ornamental plants, except turf and indoor ornamental plants, for invertebrate pests. Category 109 is Industrial and Right of Way Weed Control. The rules let managed turf or ornamental beds inside a zoned right of way be treated under either Category 206 or Category 109, and when you treat turf or beds in a right of way, all the notification requirements that apply to Category 206 still apply. The rules also reach across category lines. An applicator working in rangeland within fifty feet of a residential or commercial structure must also hold the turf pest control category and follow the posting and notification requirements in section 35-10-112 of the Colorado Revised Statutes. The same fifty foot rule pulls in the ornamental category for applications in forested areas near structures. Your qualified supervisor has to hold each category your crews actually work in, so category planning is really hiring and testing planning.
A Colorado commercial applicator business license runs for the calendar year and expires on December 31 regardless of when it was issued. Renewal is the business owner's responsibility. The department mails a renewal application each November as a courtesy, and tells licensees to call or email if it does not arrive. Late renewal is allowed, but only on a narrow schedule. After December 31 and before February 1, a 35 dollar late fee is due along with the normal 350 dollar fee, and a renewal application may still be used. On February 1 or later, the business must submit a new application, because renewal applications will no longer be accepted. The department warns that a business that has not renewed by February 1 and continues to advertise its services or make applications may be found in violation of the Pesticide Applicators' Act under section 35-10-117 of the Colorado Revised Statutes and face license denial and civil penalties. Advertising, again, is the trigger. Reciprocity is limited. An individual licensed in another jurisdiction as a commercial pesticide applicator may get a Colorado certified operator reciprocal license with no examination, but only for the unexpired term of the out of state credential, at a fee of 150 dollars. Colorado does not reciprocate at the qualified supervisor level, and does not offer reciprocity for business licenses at all. A reciprocal applicant submits the application and fee, copies of both sides of the current out of state license, and a letter of good standing from the issuing agency.
Colorado runs a Pesticide Sensitive Registry, and turf and ornamental work is exactly what it was built for. Licensed commercial applicators and registered limited commercial and public applicators must attempt notice at least 24 hours before turf or ornamental applications on any property abutting, or entirely located within 250 feet of, a registrant's principal residential address. The duty also attaches to turf or ornamental applications at a registrant's listed employment address or school address, and to wood destroying, residential, commercial or interior plant applications in a multi unit dwelling where a registered person lives. The notice must include the date, the approximate time, and the location or address of the application. The registry moved to an online searchable database in July 2024. It is not public. Access goes to the correspondence contact on file for each licensed or registered applicator, and the department uses mapping software to work out which properties fall entirely inside the 250 foot ring. Notice may be given by mail, phone, in person or electronically. Unless you notify electronically, you must make no fewer than two attempts, and if both fail you must attempt notice immediately before the application by placing notice on the door of the person's principal residence. Electronic notice requires only one attempt, but any change to the date, time or location has to go out as a new electronic notification no later than 24 hours before the application. Build this into scheduling rather than treating it as paperwork after the route is set.
Irrigation is where Colorado landscaping runs into plumbing law, and the rules changed recently. House Bill 25-1077, signed in 2025, rewrote the exemption in section 12-155-118 of the Colorado Revised Statutes. Individuals who install or remove backflow prevention devices are still not exempt from plumbing licensure, with a carve out for installing or replacing a device on a stand alone fire suppression system. But the licensure requirement was removed for individuals who inspect, test or repair the devices. The bill added section 25-8-107, which defines a certified cross connection control technician as an individual holding a valid backflow prevention assembly tester certification from the American Society of Sanitary Engineering or the American Backflow Prevention Association. On and after July 1, 2025, a certified technician, or a licensed plumber holding that certification, who tests or repairs a backflow prevention device must affix a tag on the device showing the name and contact information of the affiliated business, the date of service, a description of the service, and the ASSE or ABPA certification number, plus the plumbing contractor's registration number or the attached master plumber's license number where applicable. A separate provision requires a licensed plumber who installs, tests, inspects, repairs or reinstalls a device to tag it with the business name and contact details, the contractor registration or master plumber license number, the service date and a description. Multiple services may be documented on one tag.
Denver Water operates the cross connection control program for its service area, and its rules decide what an irrigation installer can put in the ground. All commercial, industrial, domestic, irrigation and fire line services are required to have an approved backflow prevention assembly installed, and requirements for single and multi family residences are assessed by site hazard. Customers with an auxiliary supply such as a well or a pond must install and maintain assemblies too. Denver Water points to the Colorado Primary Drinking Water Regulations, Regulation 11, from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment as the source of its cross connection requirements, and states there are no exemptions and no grandfathering. Device selection is not open. Assemblies must be approved by the University of Southern California Foundation for Cross Connection Control and Hydraulic Research, and approved in the orientation they are installed in. Irrigation systems must be protected with either a reduced pressure principle assembly or a pressure vacuum breaker, depending on installation conditions. Double check valve assemblies are not allowed for irrigation. Atmospheric vacuum breakers are not allowed for any containment or irrigation use. A pressure vacuum breaker must sit at least 12 inches above the highest point of use and 12 inches from a wall, and cannot take continuous backpressure. Assemblies must be tested on installation and annually after that by a certified backflow prevention assembly tester, with reports sent to Denver Water. The irrigation testing season runs May through September, and Denver Water sends a reminder 30 days before the annual test is due.
Denver licenses contractors through Community Planning and Development, and the city describes it as a two step process. A license applicant must hold a supervisor certificate, or a state electrical or plumbing license, or employ someone who holds a supervisor certificate, before applying for a contractor license. Building construction licenses renew every three years and cost 250 dollars each at the Class A general contractor, Class B building contractor, Class C residential contractor and Class D specialty levels. A supervisor certificate is 60 dollars on the same three year cycle, an operator certificate is 40 dollars, and a duplicate license or certificate is 25 dollars. The separate right of way licenses renew annually and are the ones a landscaping company is most likely to need. The Special Contractor license covers work constructing or installing traffic control devices, fencing, lighting projects, water lines and sprinkling systems in the right of way or on other public property of the city, and costs 50 dollars. Cement Sidewalk Contractor, also 50 dollars, covers laying sidewalks and driveways, curb cuts, curb and gutter and minor drainage structures. Excavator Contractor is 50 dollars, Structural Contractor is 100 dollars, Paving Contractor is 125 dollars, and the right of way General Contractor is 200 dollars. Each of these requires five years of verifiable experience in the trade, a bond form and proof of insurance, and Denver notes that no test is required. Licenses can be renewed starting 30 days before expiry and up to one year after.
El Paso County and Colorado Springs are served by the Pikes Peak Regional Building Department, which licenses contractors under the Pikes Peak Regional Building Code rather than city by city. There is no landscaping or lawn irrigation license in its list, which matters in two directions. It means routine planting, grading, sod and sprinkler work does not pull a building department license there. It also means the hardscaping side does. The Building Contractor D Specialty license, under code section RBC203.5, is issued by the Board of Review to contractors working as something other than a Building Contractor A, B or C, for labor or for labor and material involving only a single trade, and the code names foundation repair, masonry, retaining walls, roofing, siding, stucco, glazing and swimming pools. Retaining walls and masonry are the two that land squarely in a landscaping bid. Above that tier, Building Contractor C, the home builder license, allows construction, alteration and repair of one and two family dwellings up to three stories and their accessory structures, which is the category a pergola or pool house build can reach into. Building Contractor B-2 allows nonstructural remodeling plus anything a C license permits. The department also issues a special limited license through the Board of Review purely to evaluate the training and experience of an applicant who has met every other code requirement. If you install walls, patios and masonry in the Colorado Springs area, confirm which specialty license the scope demands before you sign a wall that needs engineering.
Sourcespprbd.org
Aurora runs its own program. The city states that to work in Aurora as a contractor you need the appropriate license to build, construct, alter, repair, add to, demolish or move any building or structure, and that electricians and plumbers must have a current State of Colorado master and contractor license on file with the Building Division because Aurora issues no separate plumbing or electrical contractor license. Aurora licenses both companies and supervisors, and the application carries two duties worth noting. City ordinance 22-96 requires notice, in person or by mail, within five business days after a supervisor's termination or change of status, and failure to do so is cause for suspension or revocation. A supervisor renewing must certify active engagement as a qualified supervisor in the original category during the three year period since issuance or last renewal. Aurora also warns that it does not mail renewal letters. Verification runs through public search tools, and you should expect customers to use them. The Division of Professions and Occupations publishes a license verification site for professional and business licenses, which is where a homeowner confirms a landscape architect or a plumber. The Department of Agriculture publishes a Pesticide Applicator Search with an applicator tab for qualified supervisors, certified operators and private applicators and a business tab for commercial, limited commercial and public applicators, filterable by category and county. It shows only current valid credentials, so an expired license simply disappears from the results. Aurora runs its own contractor lookup for city licenses.
Sourcesauroragov.org 1auroragov.org 2apps2.colorado.gov 3ag.colorado.gov 4
These are common details other guides publish about Colorado, but we could not verify them from the agency source. Confirm them directly before relying on them.
No. Colorado issues no state landscaping contractor license and no state general contractor license. The credentials that bind you are a Department of Agriculture pesticide applicator license if you apply pesticides for hire, a city or regional building department license for building and right of way work, and plumbing or backflow certification for irrigation connections.
Only if a licensed landscape architect is behind it. The Practice Act says that since January 1, 2008 nobody may practice landscape architecture or represent himself or herself as a landscape architect without a board license. Unauthorized practice can be prosecuted by a district attorney or the attorney general, and a court can issue an injunction.
The Colorado State Board of Landscape Architects, inside the Division of Professions and Occupations at the Department of Regulatory Agencies, at 1560 Broadway, Suite 1350, Denver. The board has five members, three licensed landscape architects and two public members, one of whom must be a building or landscape contractor in Colorado.
Not for a house. The statute exempts residential landscape design for single and multi family residential properties of four or fewer units, excluding common areas. It also exempts irrigation system design by professionals qualified by experience or certification, and exempts landscape installation and construction services outright.
All Colorado landscape architect licenses expire on December 31 of even numbered years, so the cycle is two years. The division opens renewals roughly four to five weeks before expiration. New applicants licensed within 120 days of an upcoming expiration are issued the following expiration date instead of the imminent one.
The Department of Agriculture charges 350 dollars a year for the commercial applicator business license, issued for the calendar year with no proration. Each extra doing business as name costs 100 dollars a year. Limited commercial and public applicator registrations are 50 dollars. A licensed qualified supervisor must be linked to the business.
The Department of Agriculture requires a commercial applicator applicant to obtain and show proof of liability insurance in the minimum amount of 400,000 dollars. Incorporated applicants must also submit a Certificate of Good Standing from the Colorado Secretary of State. Aerial applicators submit the relevant Federal Aviation Administration certificate.
Category 206 Turf Pest Control covers managed turf and weeds in ornamental beds. Category 207 Ornamental Pest Control covers trees, shrubs, beds and flowers. Category 109 Industrial and Right of Way Weed Control covers right of way work. Your qualified supervisor must hold every category your crews actually work in.
If a neighbor is on the Pesticide Sensitive Registry, you must attempt notice at least 24 hours before a turf or ornamental application on property abutting or entirely within 250 feet of their principal residence. Give the date, approximate time and address, and make two attempts unless notifying electronically.
No, not since House Bill 25-1077. The bill removed the licensure requirement for individuals who inspect, test or repair backflow prevention devices. A certified cross connection control technician holding a valid ASSE or ABPA backflow prevention assembly tester certification can do that work. Installing or removing devices still requires plumbing licensure.
Since July 1, 2025 the tag must carry the name and contact information of the affiliated business, the date of service, a description of the service, and the ASSE or ABPA certification number, along with the plumbing contractor's registration number or the attached master plumber's license number where applicable. Multiple services may share one tag.
Denver has no landscaping license, but its annual right of way Special Contractor license at 50 dollars covers fencing, lighting projects, water lines and sprinkling systems in the public right of way, and the Cement Sidewalk Contractor license at 50 dollars covers driveways and curb cuts. Both require five years of verifiable experience, a bond and insurance.
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