Natural landscaping - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

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Natural landscaping, also called native gardening, is the use of native plants, including tree

Tree

A tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...

s, shrub

Shrub

A shrub or bush is distinguished from a tree by its multiple stems and shorter height, usually under 5–6 m tall. A large number of plants may become either shrubs or trees, depending on the growing conditions they experience...

s, groundcover

Groundcover

Groundcover refers to any plant that grows over an area of ground, used to provide protection from erosion and drought, and to improve its aesthetic appearance .- Ecosystem :...

, and grasses which are indigenous

Endemic (ecology)

Endemism is the ecological state of being unique to a defined geographic location, such as an island, nation or other defined zone, or habitat type; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. For example, all species of lemur are endemic to the...

to the geographic area of the garden.

Maintenance

Natural landscaping is adapted to the climate

Climate

Climate encompasses the statistics of temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, wind, rainfall, atmospheric particle count and other meteorological elemental measurements in a given region over long periods...

, geography

Geography

Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...

and hydrology

Hydrology

Hydrology is the study of the movement, distribution, and quality of water on Earth and other planets, including the hydrologic cycle, water resources and environmental watershed sustainability...

and should require no pesticide

Pesticide

Pesticides are substances or mixture of substances intended for preventing, destroying, repelling or mitigating any pest.A pesticide may be a chemical unicycle, biological agent , antimicrobial, disinfectant or device used against any pest...

s, fertilizer

Fertilizer

Fertilizer is any organic or inorganic material of natural or synthetic origin that is added to a soil to supply one or more plant nutrients essential to the growth of plants. A recent assessment found that about 40 to 60% of crop yields are attributable to commercial fertilizer use...

s and watering to maintain, given that native plants have adapted

Adaptation

An adaptation in biology is a trait with a current functional role in the life history of an organism that is maintained and evolved by means of natural selection. An adaptation refers to both the current state of being adapted and to the dynamic evolutionary process that leads to the adaptation....

and evolved to local conditions over thousands of years. However, these applications may be necessary for some preventative care of trees and other vegetation in areas of degraded or weedy landscapes.

Native plants suit today's interest in "low-maintenance" gardening and landscaping, with many species vigorous and hardy and able to survive winter cold and summer heat. Once established, they can flourish without irrigation or fertilization, and are resistant to most pests and diseases.

Many municipalities

Municipality

A municipality is essentially an urban administrative division having corporate status and usually powers of self-government. It can also be used to mean the governing body of a municipality. A municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district...

have quickly recognized the benefits of natural landscaping due to municipal budget

Government budget

A government budget is a legal document that is often passed by the legislature, and approved by the chief executive-or president. For example, only certain types of revenue may be imposed and collected...

constraints and reductions and the general public

General Public

General Public were a band formed by The Beat vocalists, Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger, and which included former members of Dexy's Midnight Runners, The Specials and The Clash...

is now benefiting from the implementation of natural landscaping techniques to save water and create more personal time.

Ecology and Habitat

Native plants provide suitable habitat for native species of butterflies, birds, and other wildlife. They provide more variety in gardens by offering myriad alternatives to the over-planted introduced species

Introduced species

An introduced species — or neozoon, alien, exotic, non-indigenous, or non-native species, or simply an introduction, is a species living outside its indigenous or native distributional range, and has arrived in an ecosystem or plant community by human activity, either deliberate or accidental...

, cultivar

Cultivar

A cultivar'Cultivar has two meanings as explained under Formal definition. When used in reference to a taxon, the word does not apply to an individual plant but to all those plants sharing the unique characteristics that define the cultivar. is a plant or group of plants selected for desirable...

s, and invasive species

Invasive species

"Invasive species", or invasive exotics, is a nomenclature term and categorization phrase used for flora and fauna, and for specific restoration-preservation processes in native habitats, with several definitions....

. The indigenous plants have co-evolved with animals, fungi and microbes, to form a complex network of relationships. They are the foundation of their native habitat

Habitat

* Habitat , a place where a species lives and grows*Human habitat, a place where humans live, work or play** Space habitat, a space station intended as a permanent settlement...

s and ecosystem

Ecosystem

An ecosystem is a biological environment consisting of all the organisms living in a particular area, as well as all the nonliving , physical components of the environment with which the organisms interact, such as air, soil, water and sunlight....

s, or natural communities.

Such gardens often benefit from the plants being evolved and habituated to the local climate, pests and herbivores, and soil conditions, and so may require fewer to no soil amendments, irrigation

Irrigation

Irrigation may be defined as the science of artificial application of water to the land or soil. It is used to assist in the growing of agricultural crops, maintenance of landscapes, and revegetation of disturbed soils in dry areas and during periods of inadequate rainfall...

, pesticide

Pesticide

s, and herbicide

Herbicide

Herbicides, also commonly known as weedkillers, are pesticides used to kill unwanted plants. Selective herbicides kill specific targets while leaving the desired crop relatively unharmed. Some of these act by interfering with the growth of the weed and are often synthetic "imitations" of plant...

s for a beautiful, lower maintenance, and more sustainable

Sustainable design

Sustainable design is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of economic, social, and ecological sustainability.-Intentions:The intention of sustainable design is to "eliminate negative environmental...

landscape.

Habitat Challenges

However, while local provenance

Provenance

Provenance, from the French provenir, "to come from", refers to the chronology of the ownership or location of an historical object. The term was originally mostly used for works of art, but is now used in similar senses in a wide range of fields, including science and computing...

plants have adapted to local conditions (which includes climate, soil, and other native plants and animals), there will often be instances, especially in cities, where one or more of these will have been radically altered.

Examples include:

Building rubble used as landfill may raise soil pH (i.e. create alkaline soil), which can be problematic in regions of acidic soils (with local plants adapted to acid soils).
Buildings cast a substantial shade, this may give rise to conditions substantially shadier than needed by local plants.
Soil which is high in organic material and nutrients is often introduced into gardens, or many gardeners will have used fertilizer
Fertilizer
Fertilizer is any organic or inorganic material of natural or synthetic origin that is added to a soil to supply one or more plant nutrients essential to the growth of plants. A recent assessment found that about 40 to 60% of crop yields are attributable to commercial fertilizer use...

s. Plants from some areas may not thrive under these conditions. For example, many Australian plants are particularly sensitive to phosphorus.
Many native plants are adapted to, and benefit from, periodic wildfires that occurred before and during pre-modern settlement. These fires can be simulated in the garden by either "high mowing" or a controlled burn
Controlled burn
Controlled or prescribed burning, also known as hazard reduction burning or Swailing is a technique sometimes used in forest management, farming, prairie restoration or greenhouse gas abatement. Fire is a natural part of both forest and grassland ecology and controlled fire can be a tool for...

every few years.

Many weed

Weed

A weed in a general sense is a plant that is considered by the user of the term to be a nuisance, and normally applied to unwanted plants in human-controlled settings, especially farm fields and gardens, but also lawns, parks, woods, and other areas. More specifically, the term is often used to...

s in an area are usually the result of imported plants. These plants become invasive because there are no natural controls such as disease, weather, or fauna in their new environment. They take over native habitats, reducing shelter and food for local fauna. Using local provenance plants increases the biodiversity

Biodiversity

Biodiversity is the degree of variation of life forms within a given ecosystem, biome, or an entire planet. Biodiversity is a measure of the health of ecosystems. Biodiversity is in part a function of climate. In terrestrial habitats, tropical regions are typically rich whereas polar regions...

of and is important for the health of a region's overall ecology

Ecology

Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems...

.

Much of the wild areas have been destroyed to make room for urban development

Urban sprawl

Urban sprawl, also known as suburban sprawl, is a multifaceted concept, which includes the spreading outwards of a city and its suburbs to its outskirts to low-density and auto-dependent development on rural land, high segregation of uses Urban sprawl, also known as suburban sprawl, is a...

. Housing developments have replaced native habitats with ornamental plant

Ornamental plant

Ornamental plants are plants that are grown for decorative purposes in gardens and landscape design projects, as house plants, for cut flowers and specimen display...

s and lawn

Lawn

A lawn is an area of aesthetic and recreational land planted with grasses or other durable plants, which usually are maintained at a low and consistent height. Low ornamental meadows in natural landscaping styles are a contemporary option of a lawn...

s, pushing the wildland-urban interface

Wildland-urban interface

A wildland–urban interface refers to the zone of transition between unoccupied land and human development. Communities that are within of the zone may also be included...

further out. While development won't be stopped, gardeners can keep wild areas and green spaces filled with native species on their lots and in their communities.

Despite this, there are usually plenty of indigenous or native plants which will grow and thrive in the area one is trying to establish a native garden.

Types

fully forest
Forest
A forest, also referred to as a wood or the woods, is an area with a high density of trees. As with cities, depending where you are in the world, what is considered a forest may vary significantly in size and have various classification according to how and what of the forest is composed...

ed with leaf debris
Plant litter
Plant litter, leaf litter or tree litter is dead plant material, such as leaves, bark, needles, and twigs, that has fallen to the ground. Litter provides habitat for small animals, fungi, and plants, and the material may be used to construct nests. As litter decomposes, nutrients are released to...

on the forest floor
Forest floor
The forest floor, also called detritus, duff and the O horizon, is one of the most distinctive features of a forest ecosystem. It mainly consists of shed vegetative parts, such as leaves, branches, bark, and stems, existing in various stages of decomposition above the soil surface...

, including coarse woody debris
Coarse woody debris
Coarse woody debris is a term used in English-speaking countries for fallen dead trees and the remains of large branches on the ground in forests. Some prefer the term coarse woody habitat . A dead standing tree is known as a snag and provides many of the same functions as coarse woody debris...

if possible
desert
Desert
A desert is a landscape or region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation, less than enough to support growth of most plants. Most deserts have an average annual precipitation of less than...

with arid loving plants and succulents
grassy meadow
Meadow
A meadow is a field vegetated primarily by grass and other non-woody plants . The term is from Old English mædwe. In agriculture a meadow is grassland which is not grazed by domestic livestock but rather allowed to grow unchecked in order to make hay...

with a variety of wildflowers and water features
lowlands savanna
Savanna
A savanna, or savannah, is a grassland ecosystem characterized by the trees being sufficiently small or widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach the ground to support an unbroken herbaceous layer consisting primarily of C4 grasses.Some...

with grasses and native trees
ocean dunescape with tall, salt tolerant grasses

Wildflower gardens

Wildflower is a term used in some countries to describe the numerous showy flowers from some drier climates, most notably southwest Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

, Southern Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

and North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

Rain gardens

Rain garden

A rain garden is a planted depression that allows rainwater runoff from impervious urban areas like roofs, driveways, walkways, parking lots, and compacted lawn areas the opportunity to be absorbed...

s that absorb rainwater from gutters and impervious surfaces, work much better when planted with native plants tolerant to the alternate flooding and drying cycles.
Some wildflower gardens attempt to recreate a prairie

Prairie

Prairies are considered part of the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome by ecologists, based on similar temperate climates, moderate rainfall, and grasses, herbs, and shrubs, rather than trees, as the dominant vegetation type...

landscape, including native grass

Grass

Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae family, as well as the sedges and the rushes . The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns ...

es along with the flowering plants, or forb

Forb

A forb is a herbaceous flowering plant that is not a graminoid . The term is used in biology and in vegetation ecology, especially in relation to grasslands and understory.-Etymology:...

s. Such gardens benefit the local wildlife, often attracting bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

s, butterflies

Butterfly

A butterfly is a mainly day-flying insect of the order Lepidoptera, which includes the butterflies and moths. Like other holometabolous insects, the butterfly's life cycle consists of four parts: egg, larva, pupa and adult. Most species are diurnal. Butterflies have large, often brightly coloured...

and small mammal

Mammal

Mammals are members of a class of air-breathing vertebrate animals characterised by the possession of endothermy, hair, three middle ear bones, and mammary glands functional in mothers with young...

s. By carefully choosing the plants in the garden, the gardener can encourage some of these visitors to the garden. One popular type of wildflower garden specializes in attracting butterflies and is called a butterfly garden

Butterfly Garden

Butterfly Garden is a life simulation game by independent developer Autonomous Productions, revolving around the raising and collecting of butterflies. Initially for the Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Arcade, the developers have promised there will be a PC version and WiiWare version...

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The native plants used in wildflower gardens often have deep root systems

Root

In vascular plants, the root is the organ of a plant that typically lies below the surface of the soil. This is not always the case, however, since a root can also be aerial or aerating . Furthermore, a stem normally occurring below ground is not exceptional either...

. This makes them good plants for absorbing runoff

Surface runoff

Surface runoff is the water flow that occurs when soil is infiltrated to full capacity and excess water from rain, meltwater, or other sources flows over the land. This is a major component of the water cycle. Runoff that occurs on surfaces before reaching a channel is also called a nonpoint source...

and allowing the water to filter back into the local water table

Water table

The water table is the level at which the submarine pressure is far from atmospheric pressure. It may be conveniently visualized as the 'surface' of the subsurface materials that are saturated with groundwater in a given vicinity. However, saturated conditions may extend above the water table as...

. Wildflower gardens that focus on capturing runoff in this fashion are called rain gardens.

Advantages

no fertilization required
no additional water
more water available for other uses and other people
zero to near zero work needed for maintenance
no lawn mowing
erosion reduced to a minimum
natural landscaped plants take full advantage of rainfall
when water restrictions are implemented, natural landscaped plants will survive, while more traditional plants may not
increased habitat for native flora and fauna
where heavily forested, provides shade on homes and businesses saving energy
native plants rarely become invasive

Disadvantages

not good for outdoor games that require a manicured turf.
increased wild animal intrusion
in certain areas, wildfires or brushfires may be of great concern.
may look less attractive due to reduced available range of plants to choose from.
may be hard to find native plants which produce adequate quantities of edible matter.

Effect of new construction

In new construction, builders can either avoid clear cutting or clearing an entire property and disturbing other large flora or builders can completely clear an area of all flora to save construction time and replace the clearing with juvenile specimens once the job is complete. The downside to this is additional costs involved with purchasing replacements. The builder may also choose to plant additional native trees and other flora after construction to help the property blend with natural surroundings.

In some planned developments

Private community

A private community is a residential community that can be an association or a proprietary organization. Associations can include condominiums, homeowner associations or cooperatives....

, natural landscaping is the requirement. Builders may not remove trees larger than a specific diameter and owners may not arbitrarily cut trees without a permit.

Land reclamation

Throughout the world, forested areas were turned into cattle

Cattle

Cattle are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos primigenius...

grazing

Grazing

Grazing generally describes a type of feeding, in which a herbivore feeds on plants , and also on other multicellular autotrophs...

or farmland. Often this land is then turned into residential or commercial use property. By returning the land back to its original state prior to human disturbance, vast amounts of energy usage and increasing pollution can be reduced. Natural landscaping costs less to install than traditional landscaping and, after the initial few years, reduces maintenance costs, combats erosion

Erosion

Erosion is when materials are removed from the surface and changed into something else. It only works by hydraulic actions and transport of solids in the natural environment, and leads to the deposition of these materials elsewhere...

, and accommodates storm and flood waters better.

Native plant societies

In many parts of the world, there are societies, clubs or local groups, such as Bushcare

Bushcare Group

A Bushcare Group is a volunteer group that conducts bush regeneration to aid biodiversity conservation on public or private bushland in Australia...

or ASGAP

Association of Societies for Growing Australian Plants

The Australian Native Plants Society is a federation of seven state-based member organizations for people interested in Australia's native flora, both in aspects of conservation and in cultivation....

in Australia or the North American Native Plant Society, which are made up of gardeners interested in growing plants local to their area, state or country. They can be the best way to find out about (and to obtain, by buying or swapping) local native plants. Many members have spent years or decades cultivating local plants or bushwalking in local areas.

Additional sources

Bringing Nature Home, by Douglas Tallamy, Timber Press
Wildflowers and Weeds, by Booth Courtenay and James Zimmerman. paperback
Plants of the Chicago Region, by Floyd Swink and Gerould Wilhelm.
Field Guide to Wildflowers of Northeastern and North-central North America, by Roger Peterson.
Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Wildflowers; Eastern Region, by William A. Niering. Alfred A. Knopf. Soft Cover.
Newcomb's Wildflower Guide, by Lawrence Newcomb. Little. Paperback.
Field Guide to Trees and Shrubs, by George A. Petrides. Houghton., paperback.
Field Guide to the Ferns, by Roger Tory Peterson. Paperback.
Kane County: Wild Plants and Natural Areas, by Dick Young. 3rd ed. Kane County Forest Preserve District, 2007
Peterson First Guides: Caterpillars. Trees. Shrubs.
A Georgia Native Plant Guide, Tina M Samuels, Mercer University Press, 2005

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.