Rewilding Part Deux - The Backyard
- sab5561
- Feb 10
- 8 min read
Updated: Feb 17
"To use the world well, to stop wasting it and our time in it, we need to relearn our being in it."
Ursula Le Guin
I got some feedback on my post about rewilding the suburban lawnscape, so I figured I’d go into a little detail. There’s a ton of information on rewilding out there; I’ll link to some sources at the bottom. I took on rewilding my backyard mostly by the seat of my pants, which may not have been the most thoroughly prepared way forward; at the same time this meant I wasn’t constrained by others’ ideas of what or how to do it. As a general mindset I was and am looking for the least amount of intervention that allows nature to sort out its own processes, leading ultimately to a self sustaining system that’s suited to soils, climate, ecoregion, social constraints, and personal values and objectives. Each situation is different, but this worked for me and delivered pretty much what I was hoping for. That said, what follows is fairly idiosyncratic and not in line with the bulk of what’s online and elsewhere, and has more in common with large scale ecosystem restoration than with the intensive ‘gardening’ approaches that dominate the internet. The two are not incompatible - for instance, if you wanted to put in a pollinator or rain garden, raised beds, or some kind of intensively constructed native based landscaping, it’s not too hard to see both approaches as complementary. But if a low resource intensive/high return approach that replicates local wild native ecosystems resonates with you, read on.
After reading Doug Tallamy’s “Bringing Nature Home,” I knew that my primary goal was to promote native plant communities, and reading from the Xerces Society website led me to the practices of leaving leaves, branches, and dead wood where they fall, mimicking natural ecological processes. I didn’t plant much in the way of shrubs and trees except for some
conifers in front of a row of oaks along the back fence - hemlock, red cedar, Frasier fir, and balsam fir, a slowly growing midstory that’ll eventually join the overhead hardwoods in the canopy - and a handful of native fruit bearing shrubs in a sunny area also along the back fence. None of this was “planned”; I’m just looking at the landscape and thinking about what I see, what’s there and what’s not, what seems like a good idea and what doesn’t, and adjusting and adapting as I go. While rummaging around in the far back corner of the parcel I found - surprise, surprise - a decently sized buckthorn, which I promptly took out and stump treated (legally, as it’s my property and I’m doing the work). This illustrates a necessary first and ongoing step in this process: removing any invasive trees, shrubs, vines, and forbs, and as many non-invasive non-natives as you’re up for. For me this included dropping and stump treating a thirty foot Norway maple; Norways are listed as invasive in a number of states (including Vermont), produce thousands of seeds, and throw far too much shade for native ecosystems. Again, the emphasis here is on “ongoing”; scouting for and removing invasives is a primary function of land stewardship. Add in a big brush pile in the back corner (that the buckthorn was hiding behind…), two large pallet sided leaf and kitchen waste compost bins in front of that, and the scene is set. So let’s take a closer look at how this backyard transformed in five years from a typical suburban turfscape to what is for all intents and purposes a native wild meadow.
Full disclosure: I was fortunate to have a backyard surrounded on three sides by mature oaks, maples, a hemlock, pin cherries, serviceberry, and mountain ash. So that helps. The turf itself was also already somewhat ‘wilded,’ with healthy patches of haircap moss and bunch grass. Otherwise it qualified as a typical suburban back yard, mowed and maintained as such for seventy (yes, seventy) years. The first concrete steps I took towards systemic change were to stop mowing and stop raking the leaves (which are considerable as the yard is surrounded by large trees). From season to season, the leaves smothered increasingly large areas of the turf while the remaining grass grew to seed head, fell, and developed thatch over increasingly bare soil underneath. (I’ve read that these two steps alone can be considered a rewilding success, and I agree, given that you’ve essentially begun the processes of natural succession.) At the same time - and this is incredibly important - I regularly scouted for invasive plants, especially in this case Asiatic bittersweet, common buckthorn, and mugwort, and pulled these whenever they showed up. I also used iNaturalist to identify plants that are non-native but aren’t considered invasive, like St. John’s Wort; I pulled those also, and as I’m allergic to ragweed I regularly pulled this as well. This, then, is the work - instead of mowing turfgrass and digging dandelions (which are, actually, non-native) to maintain a static, resource intensive, carbon positive ecosystem and biodiversity nightmare, I’m stewarding and working in partnership with a living and developing landscape.
In case it’s not apparent my approach has been a mix of active and passive rewilding, essentially using active strategies to allow a core reliance on releasing natural processes. For instance, for the first couple years I kept an ecoregion appropriate, native wildflower/wild grass seed mix on hand (from Roundstone Seed) for any bare patches I made from pulling or digging, or for just random sowing. I mixed the seed about 1:5 with sawdust to make it go farther and so I could see where I was putting it, threw some down whenever I dug or pulled, and spread it on any bare-ish areas in early spring after the snow melted. Also, anytime I dig something up (trees, whatever) I leave the open divot and throw the turf on the brush pile. Like the “pit” under an uprooted forest tree this open depression catches rain, leaves and organics, creating a “hotspot” of decomposition and soil development as well as habitat for arthropods, saprophytic fungi, and microbial activity (benefits you also get from leaving “coarse woody debris” - i.e., deadwood - where it lies, and from developing a leaf duff layer). On the other hand, I chose to not use cardboard to smother an established population of lily of the valley bordering the house; nothing wrong with cardboard (it works) but I rolled the dice and where the lilies had spread into the yard natives have outcompeted and driven them back, ultimately reducing them over time from a fairly large area to one corner stronghold (which I’m fine with). Making decisions as I go about what I do and do not want, what the land is telling me it does and does not want, and mimicking natural processes as much as possible.
This was not a single season turnaround; the initial transformation took about 2-3 years. But what ended up happening is much more interesting than my loosely (dis)organized plans.
Black raspberry volunteered in force and now dominates the sunny center of the yard, the seed (apparently) provided by birds rummaging through the tall grass and thatch (this past year the berry harvest hit its stride, producing too much to eat for all us critters). Canadian goldenrod colonized the southwest corner and has since meandered throughout the yard. Common blue wood aster appeared in numbers in both the back and front yards, providing abundant late season pollinator habitat. Other persistent volunteers include pale sunflower, great blue lobelia, white avens, common yarrow, lance leaved coreopsis, Devil’s beggarticks, eastern black nightshade, sensitive fern, maidenhair fern, sedges I can’t identify, and trees, lots of ‘em, a rocketing paper birch (fortunate meeting of seed and mineral soil), dozens of red maples, many dozens of red oaks, many white pines, and too many pin cherries (which will root sucker and take over, so I pull them). As part of my business I’ve transplanted a number of the tree saplings and given away some others; as they mature I’m thinking of listing my ‘inventory’ on Front Porch Forum or the like. In total I’ve documented over fifty tree, shrub, and herbaceous species and there are certainly more, the majority of them volunteers; all that growth energy just looking for a place to express and boy, has it expressed. With prejudice.
The time frame for all the above was 2019-present. I haven’t done any major work in the past 4+ years except scouting for invasives/non-natives, digging up and transplanting tree seedlings and saplings, pulling crowding forbs away from the conifers (they seem to like the hemlock), and eating black raspberries. And then there are the bees. From May through October I can count at least a half a dozen species at any given time from my sit spots; a nearly bee-free turfscape has evolved into a bee bonanza, almost entirely due to the natural succession of native species I did not plant or plan on. In retrospect and knowing what I know now, I would have chosen an initial seed mix more representative of the grasses, forbs, and sedges of wild Vermont meadows; removing more chunks of turfgrass and leaving the open, bare soil “divots” (as above) would have increased topographical heterogeneity and rain infiltration, and expedited soil development. What’s remarkable to me even now is the speed and efficiency of natural succession that took over when I stopped mowing and raking; my role became largely one of keeping undesired things out (invasives, etc.) instead of putting things in and trying to control their growth and development. As a bonus, there’s very little that I find more meditative, in an unhurried but apparently very productive way, than assuming this role of selective caretaker, moving slowly through my little patch of meadow, learning how to tell the difference between native and invasive seedlings, noting the seasonal changes in the plants and their communities, and seeing this collection of living things as exactly that: a community, an interdependent whole of which I am a part. Nature knows how to take care of business; sometimes it just needs a little help.
Some caveats: this was (and is) a good sized backyard, privacy fenced on two of four adjoining properties. I live in an area obviously not far from seed sources; there’s a richly forested park with meadow nearby, the neighborhood has significant mature tree and shrub growth, and the native trees and shrubs that surround the yard (some very large) are perfect for mast and seed production as well as bird roosting (and therefore seed dropping…). So if you live a long ways from any wild or cultivated native seed sources it might take a more active approach to achieve your objectives. The flowers in the seed mix I used were resplendent for a few years, but have largely (but not entirely, they seem to have found their niche) been supplanted by the native volunteer forbs. I also reside in a very live and let live city and neighborhood; no HOA’s breathing down my neck or city officials issuing tickets.
In my opinion, though, reserving at least some of your yard as truly “rewilded” as I’ve described above is extremely important. Ecologists, restorationists, and land managers have found, through decades of trial and error, that in many if not most cases a “follow the land” mindset - as opposed to a “command and control” approach - is less disruptive, less resource intensive, and ultimately more successful in terms of ecological suitability and sustainability. Succession is how nature works when left to its own devices; an intuitively appropriate strategy of smaller changes over time - again, mimicking natural processes - allows the land to sort out what works and what doesn’t, an ongoing and always changing process. My role then becomes one of following this lead through multiple rounds of seeding, planting, and management; in other words, an ecologically robust outcome with less work, which works for me. But what makes it happen is stewardship, your presence on the land, whether it’s a 7,000 square foot back yard or 70 acre parcel. It’s a partnership, sometimes at odds with but always working towards building rich, self sustaining ecosystems, in which my job is to help the land become what it needs to be in this place and at this time. In other words, rewilded.
Much of the above has been (intentionally and unintentionally) based on the concepts of ecosystem self organization and self design; there are a couple related links below.
Rewilding and Biodiversity
Designing with the Ecosystem: Don’t Reinvent the Wheel, Catch a Ride on It
Homegrown National Park (Doug Tallamy)
Xerces Society
A Reverence for Dead Wood
The shaping role of self-organization: linking vegetation patterning, plant traits and ecosystem functioning
National Wildlife Federation - Certify Wildlife Habitat
Comentarios