Planting a Self Conserving Native Landscape
Let Nature Happen is the story of my cavalier endeavor to convert a parcel of developed land into a self-conserving native landscape. It is also an account of how the experience upended my grand visions and transformed my approach to landscaping. As the conversion progressed, the work became an interminable wrangle with Nature, and the story became a lament on the many challenges we face when the starting ground is a lawn-dominated landscape.
Ten full moons have fallen since I published “Mother Yards and the Native Plant Sharing Network.” The ideas I proposed in that post are unfulfilled, but holding fast—assuredly waiting for warmer days to spark their emergence. Today, though, it’s cold and wintry, and I can …
“Then the thought came to me, “We are the Native Plant Nursery.” Every yard inhabited by self-conserving native plants is a birthing place, a mother yard with progeny to share freely with others.” Mother Yards Through two long torrid days of the 2016 drought, I …
I’d been imagining a native landscape-gardening school called “Working on the Edge of Nature,” a place where students learn how to work in the liminal space, the transitional threshold, where nature and human life meet. As I delved further into the idea, I recognized that …
Written in gratitude to Sara Stein, Stephen Jenkinson and Suzanne Simard, all pioneers of thought for our time, all practitioners of the things they believe in.* Early last summer, I spotted my neighbor Caroline as I was walking out to weed the front gardens. It …