Connect with Nature this Holiday Season. Christmas is a time for giving and a time for family. What better time than now to start a family tradition of giving back to the earth and instilling the values of sustainable living to your children, friends, and community. Start an annual, earth-friendly, Christmas family tradition.
As a NOFA Certified Accredited Land Care Professional that are certain requirements I must meet to maintain and adhere to the NOFA Standards for Organic Land Care Certification. One of these is completing ongoing education by attending a minimum of 4 (four) credit hours of Organic Landscaping Education. This year I had the opportunity to attend the day long event – NOFA Annual Gathering of Land Care Professionals, held at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum located in Mashantucket, Ct.
What can I do about climate change? No matter who you are, you can take action to restore carbon to the soil and help rebuild the marvelous system that nature put in place to renew our atmosphere. Our Poor Earth – Day after day carbon dioxide gas is pumped into the air, warming up our planet and threatening our environment. Fortunately for us there is a solution, and it is right under our feet.
Winterberry (Ilex verticillata), a deciduous holly shrub with a height of approximately 6 ft to 15 ft and is native to the eastern U.S. The most important role played by Winterberry is as a fall and winter food source for songbirds: the fleshy, bright red berries of this shrub are an excellent source of sustenance for fruit-eating birds such as robins, catbirds, mockingbirds, Eastern Bluebirds, and Cedar Waxwings to name a few.
The Mission of the NOFA Organic Land Care Program is to extend the vision and principles of organic agriculture to the care of the landscapes that surround us in our daily lives. The NOFA OLC program began in 1999 with the writing of the NOFA Standards for Organic Land Care by an ad hoc volunteer committee of scientists, landscapers and activists from the Massachusetts and Connecticut chapters of NOFA.
In most neighborhoods home after home is surrounded by a carpet of emerald green grass to the point of where having a lush lawn is almost a requirement of home ownership. Lawns are excellent places to play, relax, and entertain family and friends; but last but not least lawns, being the crowning jewel of your residential landscaping can boost the value of your home, giving you a good return on investment (R.O.I.).
Forget burning bush, Itea Virginica ‘Henry’s Garnet’ is not only a native plant that is pollinator friendly, it’s just as colorful and even more useful as within the realm of landscaping! It grows in full sun to full shade.