Oregon landscape contractor license: the work, the phases, and the sprinkler-repair conflict
Checked October 2026
Oregon's Landscape Contractors Board says planting, grading, hardscape, drainage and irrigation work for pay needs a license, including repairing sprinklers and maintaining them with compressed air. Mowing, weeding, small pruning and programming controllers do not. A maintenance business may do casual work up to $500 a job site a year for regular customers. Two licenses are required, an individual and a business, with a $500,000 liability policy, a $20,000 bond, and fees of $375 for the business and $200 for the individual.
Maintaining a customer's sprinkler system with compressed air, the way a pre-freeze blowout does, is licensed landscape work in Oregon. Adjusting heads for coverage and programming the controller is not. The Landscape Contractors Board (LCB) draws that line on its own pages, and a second one between mowing and installing, which the rest of this page follows. The board's wording is "maintaining irrigation systems using compressed air" and it never uses the word blowout, so the winter blowout is our reading of that line. We read every LCB page cited here on October 1, 2026.
Maintenance is unregulated, with a list of exceptions
The board's maintenance FAQ lists work that needs no license: mowing, edging, small shrub and tree pruning, weeding, refreshing bark mulch, adjusting sprinkler heads for coverage, programming irrigation controllers, and planting pots and containers that can be moved without power equipment. Anyone can advertise for maintenance, and the board points you to your city or county for local license or permit rules.
The license requirements page lists what does need one when done for pay: planning or installing lawns, shrubs, vines and trees; preparing property with soil amendments, rototilling or grading; installing or repairing irrigation; maintaining irrigation with compressed air; arbors, decks, patios, driveways, fences, retaining walls, walkways, edging and ornamental water features; and installing, maintaining or repairing drainage. The maintenance FAQ adds that landscape design with no construction details or specifications needs no license, and that you can't subcontract installation to anyone without an LCB or Construction Contractors Board license of your own.
The board's two pages disagree on sprinkler repair
The licensing FAQ is flat: repairing irrigation or sprinkler systems requires a license. The maintenance FAQ says a maintenance business may replace three or fewer malfunctioning heads with the same or similar type, under a hydraulic-equivalency test, as casual, minor work. The three-head allowance is the only repair the maintenance page describes. A cracked valve or a lateral line isn't on it.
Put the question to the board: is replacing up to three malfunctioning heads for an existing maintenance customer, under $500 for the year at that site, covered by the casual-work allowance, and is it the only sprinkler repair covered?
Regular customers get a $500 allowance, and you can't advertise it
A maintenance business may do a small amount of landscape work only if all of this holds: it is doing ongoing maintenance for that customer during the year, the labor and materials for that type of work stay at $500 or less per job site per year, and the work is casual, minor or inconsequential. The board's examples are replacing shrubs, vines and nursery stock with similar plants, replacing existing lawn, planting annuals, perennials and bulbs in existing beds, non-concrete edging, and the three heads. You can't advertise for this work, since it only exists for customers you already have.
Refreshing gravel on an existing path is fine, and creating a new walkway isn't. A maintenance business may not plant trees either, except to replace one for $500 or less when it mainly does maintenance on that property.
Edging is where the board's pages split. The casual list allows non-concrete edging, the gravel answer says you cannot install edging, and the license page lists landscape edging as licensed work. Ask the board whether installing non-concrete edging for a regular customer, under $500 for the year, is covered.
Two licenses, and the business must employ a licensed professional
Most people need both licenses. The individual landscape construction professional (LCP) license comes from passing the exam. The business license holds the bond, the insurance and the contract with the customer. The business must be owned by an LCP or employ one, and the business license page says that person must be on the payroll every hour landscaping work is going on, reachable by phone, and directly supervising any unlicensed employees. If the LCP's license lapses, the business license can be suspended immediately. All written advertising carries the business license number, vehicle signs and websites included.
Phases decide what you can build
The LCB issues the license in phases. Experience requirements and exam sections come from the phase flyers and the exam page.
| Phase | Experience | Exam sections | What it covers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Planting | 2 years | 3 | Lawns, shrubs, trees, turf; grading and drainage only with planting |
| Standard | 2 years | 4, adding Hardscaping | Planting plus fences, decks, patios, walkways, retaining walls, lighting, water features, drainage |
| Irrigation and Backflow | 2 years | 3 | Irrigation design and repair, backflow devices, compressed-air maintenance |
| All | 2 years | 6 | Everything above |
| Modified | 1 year, owner must be the LCP | Laws exam only | Planting and basic hardscape, $5,000 a job site, customer and year |
| Probationary | none | all 6 within a year | All-phase work with a $15,000 bond and a $15,000 job cap, until the licensee asks to have the status removed after 24 months |
| Arborist | ISA Certified Arborist | Laws exam only | Tree work only |
The Modified flyer says the cap can rise to $6,500 after 12 months with no claim or civil penalty. It bars irrigation, drainage, retaining walls, water features and piercing the dwelling. The flyer carries no printed date (its file name ends 1-22 and the PDF was created in January 2022), so confirm the cap with the board.
Two years of landscape experience in the last ten, a related degree or certificate, Landscape Industry Certified Exterior Technician status from NALP, or an Oregon backflow tester certification can qualify you to sit the exams. The exam page sends you to PSI's candidate bulletin for exam costs, and no exam fee is stated on the pages we read. Passing doesn't let you work. You still have to own or be employed by a licensed business.
The business license costs $375 a year and carries a $20,000 bond
New fees took effect October 1, 2025: the business pays $285 to apply, $375 for the initial license and $375 to renew, and the individual pays $200, $200 and $200. A late fee is $85. Both licenses are annual. LCPs report continuing education every two years, 16 hours each time while licensed under six years and 8 hours each time after that, per the CE page.
The insurance and bond page requires a $500,000 liability certificate listing the LCB as certificate holder, a $20,000 bond from January 1, 2026 ($15,000 for Probationary holders) and workers' comp if the business has employees. Coverage that expires without new paperwork can get the license suspended.
Construction contractors can do some of the work
A license from the Construction Contractors Board lets a contractor build decks, patios, fences and walls, remove trees and grind stumps, but not plant trees. A residential general contractor building a new house may add landscaping, with no irrigation. The LCB's license page caps that at $4,600 per dwelling, while its tree work FAQ says $3,850 for planting only. Ask the board which figure applies.
The certificate is a floor, and spraying belongs to another agency
A property manager or HOA can ask for more than the $500,000 on a certificate of insurance. A compressed-air blowout or an irrigation repair leaves completed-work exposure behind, the kind the landscaping insurance page explains. The mowing and edging that stays unlicensed is what the general liability guide is built around, and the irrigation license hub shows how nine other states handle sprinklers.
Spraying is a different agency's license: the Oregon Department of Agriculture exempts a maintenance service only for small residential lawn and garden applications, made without powered sprayers or spreaders and without naming pesticides in ads or contracts. The certificate has to carry the licensed business name, not an assumed business name.