The Official Blog of Our City Forest offers gardening advice, tree care tips, arborist and urban forestry facts from multiple contributors. The Our City Forest Blog also shares stories from our community of volunteers and our AmeriCorps service members' experiences.
Viewing entries in
Why Series
There’s a growing anti-lawn sentiment in the drought-stricken West. Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and California each have programs in place to pay homeowners to replace lawns with xeriscaping (drought-tolerant landscapes). I’d heard of these programs when I lived in New York. Driving through trackless desert, salt flats and blonde, high-plains I couldn’t help but wonder how we ever thought to impose lawns on these landscapes in the first place. Where did lawns come from?
When we talk to people about plants, they often use “drought tolerant” and “native” interchangeably. (Sometimes we do it too) So why differentiate between them? Isn't drought tolerant enough? Everybody understands the “drought tolerant” part but what’s often overlooked is “native”.
We here at Our City Forest love talking to local residents, neighbors and random passers-by when we’re serving the communities of the Silicon Valley. We get asked a lot of questions about who we are and what we do. In general these interactions are friendly but sometimes, when the hoses are running and the water buckets are filling we get asked:
