Couple battling municipality over ‘nuisance’ wildflower garden
Stu Mills · CBC News · Posted: Jul 20, 2020 “La Pêche, Que., couple says their vegetation is a habitat for bees and butterflies”
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When converting a lawn to a meadow is illegal
Posted in lawn, Pollinators
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There are “guerilla gardeners” and now “guerilla plant namers”
View ‘Not just weeds’: how rebel botanists are using graffiti to name forgotten flora
In the Guardian, May 1, 2020.
A rising international force of rebel botanists armed with chalk has taken up street graffiti to highlight the names and importance of the diverse but downtrodden flora growing in the cracks of paths and walls in towns and cities across Europe.
Also view their Wild Cities page.
I guess this is a next step from Guerilla Gardening!
Posted in Urban Spaces
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Early April is ideal time to overseed clover
Lawn overseeded with clover
There are many benefits to having clover in lawns:
– Combined with mulch-mowing, the clover can supply most or all of the turf’s needs for nitrogen. Clover and other legumes are infected by soil bacteria which form nitrogen-fixing nodules on the roots. Nitrogen fixation can contribute the equivalent of 2 lbs of nitrogen per 1000 square feet annually (1 kg N/100m2 ). .
– Providing nitrogen inputs via legumes and recycling of residues (grass clippings) reduces leaching of all nutrients; requirements for lime may be reduced by 75% or more.
– Grass/clover turfs maintain greenness through mid-summer droughty periods when straight bluegrass turfs go into dormancy unless well watered..
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Posted in lawn, Pollinators
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What’s ripping up the lawns?
‘Saw lots of lawns like this on May 5, 2019
Crows are said to be the culprits. Well really it’s the grubs they are after that are the problem.
I have noticed a lot more crows on peninsular Halifax this spring and am wondering if disruption of the roost at Mt. St Vincent last fall has anything to do with it.
Racoons are also reported to do it as well (at night), and we have lots of those.
One solution – let ’em do it, re-seed it when they are through, and then you shouldn’t have them the next year.
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Spreading clover seed on a Halifax lawn
Clover Lawn
It was established on shallow soil, there are tree roots through it and from late May on it is shaded by Norway Maple.
Every now and then the city digs part of it up for water and sewer stuff or sidewalsk and replaces the old topsoil with sandy “manufactured topsoil” which makes it even more droughty.
I will get around to diversifying the area with garden beds, but in the meantime, if it’s looking particularly ratty in the spring, I spread clover on it in April or early May.
A pound of Dutch white clover seed costs about 13$ at Halifax Seed; that’s enough, they say, for about 1500 sq ft of lawn.
The big challenge is how to spread the very small seed evenly and not too heavily.
Here’s my recipe:
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Recent research shows bees love naturalized yards!
Here is a coverage in the media:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/city-bees-allotments-gardens-help-arrest-decline-study
& Apr 23, 2019:
To Nurture Nature, Neglect Your Lawn
By Margaret Renkl in The New York Times. “Why poison the earth when you can have wildflowers at your feet and songbirds in your trees without even trying?”
Posted in lawn, Pollinators
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This fall, red maple matched Japanese maple for colour
The red maples were a match for the Japanese maples in Halifax on Oct 30, 2018
Red maples left, Japanese maples right, Halifax, Oct 30, 2018
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Posted in Parks, Urban Forest
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Surette on bottled water and lawn chemicals
In “Let’s stop being such environmental dunces” (Chronicle Herald, Oct 2, 2018), columnist Ralph Surette cited bottled water and our use of lawn chemicals as prime examples of “low-hanging toxic fruit that is environmentally, economically and logically idiotic — and that must be picked if we are going to make sense of anything.”
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Posted in Alternatives, lawn
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Last days of Common Roots at the QE site
Common Roots Urban Farm in Halifax on Sep 29, 2018
(Click on image for larger version)
It’s been a wonderful community resource and taught us all a lot, individually and as a community. Kudos to Jamie Melrose & Co.
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Posted in food gardens
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A short walk
Steep banks (above) are difficult to maintain in grass and can be hazardous to mow. One simple alternative we viewed on our walk: hostas (below). They are robust, requiring little care once established, and hold the soil together well; with time they will make an attractive full cover of the bank.
As a first test of an approach we may pursue, we took a couple of hours with a camera in hand to walk a neighbourhood and to talk to people about their landscapes.
Then we put together a short video from some of footage on the theme of alternatives to intensive lawncare.
We’re learning!
Posted in Alternatives
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