Poison Ivy (Toxicodendron radicans) Poison Ivy: A Misunderstood Native Plant with Hidden Benefits Toxicodendron radicans is often much hated by humans, known for causing rashes and swelling. However, it offers surprising ecological benefits. This native species plays a vital role in New York’s ecosystems, benefiting both wildlife and the soil. For many songbirds, Poison Ivy’s […]
Garden Stewardship. The Key to Eco-Garden Success: Good Garden Stewardship Practices. The first 3 years are everything. Creating an eco-garden filled with native plants is an essential step toward restoring biodiversity and supporting local ecosystems. However, successful native species landscaping projects do not end at installation. Rather, intentional and skilled stewardship is the key to
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Monarch Butterfly Garden Creating the Perfect Monarch Butterfly Garden: Beyond Milkweed Monarch butterflies are one of the most beloved pollinators in our gardens. Of course, they are famous for their epic migration and striking orange and black color schema. To support these beautiful creatures, many people plant Milkweed (Asclepias sp.), which is the essential larval
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Urban Gardening: Transforming City Spaces with Native Plants Urban gardening is more than just a trend—it’s a movement that’s transforming concrete jungles into vibrant green spaces. For city dwellers with limited access to nature, creating an urban garden offers a unique opportunity to connect with the environment, promote biodiversity, and improve well-being. What’s so special
Tick Prevention for Yard. Tick Prevention for Yard: 8 Steps. There is nothing quite like time spent enjoying the outdoors. Exhilarating. But many of us in the northeast have one nagging fear about time in nature and that is, “how do we reduce our tick exposure? Preferably to zero?” After almost 2 decades of organic
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Natural Tick Repellent. Making your own natural tick repellent to use during gardening is extremely easy. It’s inexpensive too. You have the choice of different essential oil brands, some of them are more or less pricey. If your plan for using your blend mostly involves spraying your clothing and shoes before gardening, do you really
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Landscaping for Privacy Basically, if you’re lucky, you’ll have awesome neighbors. People who live right near you that you can share space and joy with are a blessing from God. Neighborhood barbecues and tea shared on the porch with people you actually like are amazing gifts. It’s not always that way. Additionally, even folks who
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In the northeastern US, having a butterfly garden is one of the finest life experiences possible. We need more open spaces where sun-loving butterflies can make their living. Forests cover much of the northeast. Butterflies prefer open meadows and gardens where they can sunbathe. Some people like to research how to build their own butterfly
Butterfly Gardens in Glenville, NY A year in recent history, our company was invited to design and install new butterfly gardens in Glenville, NY. The new gardens were comprised exclusively of NY native plants. The Swallowtail butterfly photo was taken by the homeowner, Mark. The following photo is from summer 2014. It was taken in
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This summer we had the privilege of doing ecological garden renovations at a farm in Saratoga. The farm is located in quintessential farm country, heading east on the way to Schuylerville, surrounded by miles on all sides of wild beauty. It’s a dream location for this exact kind of project: planting dozens of native plants
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Poison Parsnip Season. Being mid-June, it’s now the time of year that the invasive plant Poison Parsnip (aka Wild Parsnip or Pastinaca sativa) is blooming on the roadsides, ditches, marshes and forest edges of Saratoga + Albany County and much of the northeast. Many people confuse Poison Parsnip with the early blooming shade tolerant native
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Edible Gardens in Saratoga Springs, NY. Altogether, many people want to grow their own organic food and have edible gardens at home these days. The photo here shows some Saratoga Springs, NY edible gardens projects in raised beds. It is always a good idea to plant native plants near vegetable gardens to attract pollinators. Correspondingly,
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Hummingbird Gardens in the Urban Setting. Recently we were invited to design + build several urban hummingbird gardens. The urban setting is a wonderful spot to create hummingbird garden sanctuaries. The concept of giving city dwelling wildlife a safe space to feed, drink, hide and reproduce in wildlife gardens is an exceptional one. Literally a
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Organic Garden Lifestyle The Beauty and Benefits of an Organic Garden In the hustle + bustle of modern life, there’s an ever-growing yearning to reconnect with nature. Finding solace in the simplicity of greenery and soil at home is the new frontier. Enter the organic garden – a sanctuary where sustainability meets beauty. The act
Climate Resilient Landscaping Looking into the future, climate resilient landscaping is everything. Climate resilient landscaping is more than a new buzzword. Did you know we can actually affect the health of the planet with the choices we make in our gardens? Climate resiliency is a thing that humans can build. Being thoughtful about our consumption
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In Saratoga Springs, NY there is a network tapestry of beautiful native plant gardens. Our company has worked with hundreds of unique design/build projects over the past 15 years in the Albany, Saratoga Springs + Niskayuna/Altamont region. The Saratoga Racetrack Gardens are some of the most beautiful, functional and eco-productive that we have ever
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Native Landscaping in NY Recently we completed new lakeshore edge native landscaping in NY. The new garden build consisted of a home’s foundation landscape design near the shore of the lake. The house is located very close to the lake. Therefore, it was built with a high foundation to prevent flooding issues. We used New
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Municipal Gardens Project. In July 2013 a local paper, The Post Star wrote an article about our municipal gardens native landscaping project. Doing an eco-landscape renovation at such a busy site was quite an experience. Such an open, public space was a refreshing change. Cars honked their horns all day long, people came out of
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You have your gorgeous native plant landscaping system all designed, built and on its way to mature establishment. What happens now? Garden art projects. Now the exciting times really begin! “Garden art” is a vast category of creations, with a likely-to-be endless scope. Many of the plants and weeds in your garden are possibly edible.
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Best Organic Bug Spray. Making your own natural bug spray to use during gardening is extremely easy. It’s inexpensive too. You have the choice of different essential oil brands, some of them are more or less pricey. If your plan for using your blend mostly involves spraying your clothing and shoes before gardening, do you
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