Step 5: Healthy and Sustainable Habitat

The fifth and final step to getting your Wildlife Habitat certified is practicing sustainable and healthy gardening habits.

Remove Non-Native Plants

You should start be removing invasive or non-native species of plants from your yard. Remember, when you become certified as a Wildlife Habitat, you're certifying your entire property. It's not enough to put things into practice only in one area of your yard.

Native plants generally thrive better and require less attention, pesticides and watering that non-native species since they're used to the climate that their found in. In some cases, non-native plants thrive much better than natives, in these cases they rob native plants of nutrients and can often take over an area if not constantly maintained.

In the long run, you'll find it easier to keep up with the demands of your native flora.

Reduce Your Lawn

One of the Facebook Foxes, sitting on some moss

Grass lawns are a pain in the butt. Not only do you have to mow them constantly, but they require frequent treatment with pesticides to keep out undesirable plants and weeds. And in order to maintain that vibrant green that's the sign of a healthy lawn you need water. And lots of it. 

The easiest option here would be to let your lawn go. Stop using pesticides, stop over watering multiple times a week, stop mowing, and let nature take its course. Of course, that's not practical for everyone. Home Owner's Associations and City Ordinances often have strict codes about lawn maintenance (where I live, grass growth over 10 inches in height is considered a fire hazard during the dry season). 

So instead of letting it all go back to nature, consider replanting sections of your yard with local plants. You could carve out chunks of your yard and replace them with shrubs and wild flowers. Another option, and one I've been considering for a while now, is to pull out your grass completely and replace it with a hearty ground cover that looks great while requiring less maintenance and no pesticides. 

Or, if you have a particularly shady yard, you could do like some homeowners have done and completely replace their lawn with native mosses. Not only does it look like grass from a distance, but moss stays short and forms a thick carpet over the ground that helps lock in water and keep it from evaporating.  

Conserve Water

Water is an important resource, but here in the States nearly 90% of all water goes to landscape and yard maintenance. That's a lot!

You can easily reduce the amount of water your plants need by covering all of your garden beds with mulch. Mulch traps water and keeps it from evaporating so that your plants can go longer before needing to be watered again. 

As mentioned above, most native plants are going to be more adapted to the local climate and are less likely to require extensive watering during warm weather. 

Composting

Starting a compost pile is not only a great way to supplement the nutrients for your garden, but it can also help reduce your garbage bill by lowering the amount of food waste you throw away each week. 

A healthy compost pile can also serve as a breeding ground for worms which will help to supplement the diets of many different species of birds that may come to call your Wildlife Habitat their home. 

In order to qualify for certification, you must be doing at least two things to help manage your habitat in a sustainable way:

• Soil and Water Conservation
• Riparian Buffer
• Capturing Rain Water
• Xeriscaping
• Soaker Hoses for irrigation
• Limit Water Use
• Reduce Erosion 
• Use Mulch
• Create a Rain Garden
• Control Exotic Species
• Integrated Pest Management
• Remove non-native plants 
• Use native plants
• Reduce Lawns
• Chemical Free Gardening
• Avoid Chemical Pesticides
• Avoid Chemical Fertilizers
• Compost