Landscaping with Nature

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When landscaping with nature, eco-landscapers prepare a parcel of land so that a new building will behave as architects and the homeowners intend, but also reduce its effects on air, land, and water. To preserve air quality, the landscaper designs planting arrangements that prevent dust. Dust-preventing tactics consist of groundcover plants, such as low-growing evergreen shrubs or herbs, ground vines, or pebbles. The landscaper also considers ways to minimize noise from nearby roads or neighbors and reduce disturbance from city lights at night. To preserve the quality of the land, the design should retain much of the natural vegetation, restore ground cover to prevent soil erosion, and avoid landscaping that could lead to mudslides, flooding, or trees downed by severe storms. Water quality preservation can be accomplished by preventing erosion that pollutes streams with silt, retaining the natural course of streams, leaving wetlands undisturbed, and creating a natural buffer zone around flowing waters, lakes, or shorelines.

Biodiversity gardens filled with a variety
of native vegetation at varying ages and
heights made good artificial habitats
for birds, small mammals, reptiles, and
amphibians. This type of garden requires
clean freshwater in a pond or fountain.
Native vegetation gardens need minimal
care, and they will not lead to rodent
infestation as some people fear because
they draw a variety of predators: hawks,
owls, and foxes. (Oregon State University)

The table on page 136 highlights the main ways that environmental engineers who specialize in landscaping create space that works well for a new home and for the local environment.

Habitats, Inc., is an eco- landscaping company in Eugene, Oregon, that has promoted all of the methods listed in the table on page 136 for building landscapes that blend with nature. The

company expresses the following viewpoint: “Landscapes are part of a living ecosystem, exposed to the elements and forces of nature, and are therefore in a constant state of dynamic equilibrium in the cycles of growth and decay. Creating and maintaining healthy ecosystems reduces the need for intensive routine maintenance.” Eco-landscaping therefore has advantages beyond the ones mentioned here. That is, eco-landscaping reduces a property owner’s costs and labor because it reduces the need for applying chemicals, pesticides, fertilizers, intense watering, and—because the landscape blends with the natural contours of the land—the need to build retaining walls, drainage ditches, or other structures that try to hold back the forces of nature. The sidebar on page 138 “Frank Lloyd Wright” relates how one architect introduced the concept of designing with nature.

City residents can also participate in ecological landscaping with a bit of inventiveness. Some city townhouses and apartments include small backyards. Owners can plant these backyards with native shrubs and plants rather than cover the ground with concrete. One native tree fit into even a small yard helps to draw native birds, insects, and other life that bring nature into the city. Plant life additionally removes carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere, a process that aids the air quality of traffic-clogged cities. Some city dwellers with a serious commitment to the environment build permaculture farms inside their properties. A permaculture farm uses sustainable practices such as composting, rainwater collection, and cultivation of vegetables and fruits. Some city permaculture farms may even raise animals such as chickens if local ordinances allow it.
Cities would benefit from ecological landscaping because the trees and vegetation that are part of an ecological landscape help clean the air and regulate temperatures. But today’s metropolitan areas have lost most of their connection to nature so ecological landscaping may not be a practical undertaking. To return even a small parcel of land to the environment requires a landscaper to remove pavement, return streams to their natural shape and condition, and plant native vegetation. The brownfields program administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and similar programs in other countries consist of voluntary agreements in which landowners return polluted property to safe use. Sometimes the owner works with the local community to return the cleaned-up brownfield to its natural condition. Once urban brownfields have been restored with natural vegetation and landscaping, they are called green spaces.