Biophilia & Civic engagement at Ursinus College Food Forest

Industries popularized equipment in suburbia such as lawn mowers and the use of herbicides and pesticides. Home appliances rose in popularity with many houses coming with microwaves, ovens, washers and dryers. People started driving from place to place, instead of having access to goods and services in walking distances (Bulldozer in the Countryside).

Conventional suburban development does not take environmental impact into consideration in some instances. For example, there is widespread use of impervious surfaces reducing absorption of rain water. Acres and acres of land were cleared before developing. Groundwater was contaminated due to faulty septic tanks. Developments were placed on floodplains and wetlands which could no longer serve as buffers to stormwater (Bulldozer in the Countryside).

The image to the right shows the developmental progression of tract housing in Ludwig's Corner, Pennsylvania.

In class we read Last Harvest by Witold Rybczynski which follows the development process of a neotraditional neighborhood called New Daleville. Throughout the book there are many different parties involved in the planning and execution of the neighborhood some include: developers, planning commison, township members and builders. The Traditional Neighborhood Development includes mixed-use zoning and a variety of sizes and styles of houses. Roads are built with parking on one or either side to decrease the speed of cars in order to respect pedestrians. There are often town centers that encourage community engagement. There are green areas that are adjacent to TND to preserve open green spaces. Parks and walking trails are included for recreation. Schools, grocery stores, libraries and other places of business are within walking distance of these communities to encourage walking and biking as opposed to driving.

“Narrow streets are a crucial ingredient of neo-traditional neighborhood design since they bring buildings closer together, creating a more intimate and defined street. Narrow streets also slow down traffic, which makes it more pleasant and less dangerous for pedestrians (a person dies if hit by a car going more than forty miles per hour) (Rybczynski, pg. 62).”

Nature can be incorporated into many aspects of TND’s. Mentioned above, the use of open spaces, parks and trails can be spaces where people can escape the routines of daily life and immerse themselves in nature. Throughout the sidewalks from homes to schools or business, species can be planted so citizens can connect with nature without having to set aside specific time to do so. Additionally, the use of native gardens instead of perfectly kept lawns can encourage homeowners to learn about and interact with native species and their environmental benefits.

In Last Harvest, Duckworth is the residential developer. He wanted to incorporate the environment and conservation into the planning of the neighborhood. His goal was to preserve open space next to the neighborhood. Zoning is created to avoid development on wetlands and slopes, which was an idea seen throughout the book. New Daleville included shared public spaces that include walking trails and green parks which is very different from previous subdivisions within the region.

The local planning commission influenced the number of houses that were built in New Daleville by altering the “As of Right” guaranteed for the land. The number was originally set to 84 homes, but Joe Duckworth fought to have it be changed to 125 homes. He managed to have it allowed as long as the space required did not change in total and houses were built on smaller plots. If the original number of houses stayed 84, there would have been more overall land to include nature trails or parks as opposed to houses which could have increased greater process towards connecting with local nature in New Daleville (Last Harvest).

Some of the infrastructures necessary for the construction of New Daleville were drainage fields, sewage systems and roads. The sewage treatment system needed to be approved by the township but this was difficult to do. The sewage treatment was not supposed to be calculated within the necessary open space area that was set aside. If the sewage was not calculated within the open space area, there would be increased open space for people to create connections with nature that would result in potential greater progress towards biophilia (Last Harvest).

Here are other ideas from Doug Tallamy's, Nature's Best Hope, that encourage biophilia.

• Invest in cheap window well covers. Toads, frogs and voles often get trapped in window wells causing uneccesary death
• Set your mower height to four inches, this will eliminate accidentally mowing over box turtles and nocturnal species
• Install a bubbler that will attract migrating and resident birds.

Traditional monoculture neighborhood designs obtained by Nassauer et. al.

A study done by Joan Nassauer looked into the social and cultural norms associated with lawn care in US suburban neighborhoods. The findings of this paper suggested that homeowners’ yard preferences tend to conform to broad cultural norms and tend to conform to neighborhood norms, such as a green shortly cut lawn with some shrubbery around the house. Nassauer suggests that homeowners should devidate from the conventional style of lawns, buy including more native plants to add plant diversity. By just increasing the amount of native plant species by 50% we can see an increase in plant, insect, and animal diversity, as well as better soil health and ecosystem services like flood midigation.

By reviewing Nassaur et. al we are more equipped to tackle the social and cultural barriers which may inhibit the incorpporation of more native garden elements into tract housing developments as well as supporrting wildlife and access to green spaces.

A book by Douglas W. Tallamy, which highlights our ecosystems' need for consistent habitat throughout urban spaces in order to thrive. We read this book for the class to give us the background knowledge and passion to support the shrinking-of-the-lawn mission. Pretty early on in the Urbanization class, we were informed that we were given a plot at the Ursinus College Food Forest to replicate what a native garden could look like. After reading this book, the hope was to use the principles and ideas Tallamy presented and implement them into our own garden design. Below are some of the ideas we focused on throughout the overall project.

 https://homegrownnationalpark.org/tallamys-hub-1 

The New York City High Line is a great example of biophillic retrofitting in an urban enviornment. The High Line was originally an old railway that was transformed into a public park that is full of common areas, street trees, and various other plants native to the US northeast.

Biophilia is when humans have innate affection and connection to the natural world and the organisms within it. It can deter or encourage conservation efforts, depending on what connections are fostered between humans and the natural species.

How we incorporated this into our design: Highlighted the five senses in our plant choices (desribed in detail later on)

 https://www.biophiliccities.org/the-half-earth-city  

Humans exceed earth's ability to sustain us. We use resources faster than the earth can replace them.

“Carrying capacity is the ability of a particular place to support a specific species; it refers to the number of individuals of the species that can be supported indefinitely without degrading the local resources.” ( Douglas W. Tallamy. “Nature's Best Hope.” Apple Books. )

Ways to Build Carrying Capacity:

• Always consider the amount of plants and the type of plants in a certain ecosystem
• Focus on the ecological role of plants rather than their decorative role in a garden
• Plant species that support other species
• Native plant species are generally better at serving local ecosystems niche roles than non-native species, so plant native species
• Think about the consequences of removing a species that supports other species up the food chain

“One thing that should be obvious is that we will not succeed if we confine all of our conservation efforts to patches of protected areas. Parks and preserves are central to any large-scale conservation effort, but they will never be enough, because they are not large enough and they are not connected to one another.... for now, suffice it to say that we need to practice conservation in areas outside our parks as well as inside them. And this means that we need to practice conservation where we live, where we work, and where we farm, because we humans now occupy or have seriously altered nearly all of the spaces outside of our parks and preserves" (Tallamy 2020, p. 49,50)

According to Tallamy, there are several key ways that we can help increase biophilic areas by retrofitting existing infrastructure. This will also help increase areas of habitat for native wildlife, expanding the carrying capacity. The next slides detail the different strategies that can be used to meet these goals.

(Image: The Perez Art Museum in Miami, Florida)

Shrink the lawn-- lawns do not provide habitat space and do not allow water to percolate down into the soils. By shrinking the lawn, more habitats can be created for native species (Tallamy 2020, p. 328).

Plant for specialist pollinators and be generous with your plantings. Create caterpillar pupation sites under your trees (Tallamy 2020, p. 333, 334).

Plant keystone genera-- this will help support species that depend on these plants and will expand their habitat (Tallamy 2020, p. 330).

Remove Invasive species-- this helps re-establish balance to ecosystems and allows for native species to use the space the invasive species once occupied (Tallamy 2020, p. 329).

Do not spray or fertilize-- this impacts water systems downstream as well as kill non-target species of bugs and beneficial wildlife and plantlife (Tallamy 2020, p. 335).

Educate your neighborhood civic association and network with neighbors. This can help create a more continuous habitat for species rather than isolated islands of biodiversity (Tallamy 2020, p. 332, 336).

Build a conservation hardscape. Garden features, like a bubbler, can attract birds and can increase the biodiversity of an area by supporting the needs of the wildlife there (Tallamy 2020, p. 332).

The first challenge is that as a part of American culture people have very busy and programmed schedules. There is not much time to invest in green features and resources that may exist in Urban neighborhoods. Secondly, some urban and biophilic design elements are still illegal in some cities. For example, on-site stormwater drainage and the use of native plant species. Next, a challenge is the fear of nature and how the media sensationalizes nature. Lastly, rethinking the school day and the work hours would be beneficial in creating more time for nature (Biophilic Cities, Beatley pgs. 311-320)

Some ways to address the problems faced could be including a retrofit of TND neighborhoods by adding elements of nature into the businesses. This could help with employees' connections to nature and also reduce fragmentation. Another way to retrofit suburbs could be by including technology in connection to nature. For example, using curated signs that lead to online guidebooks that provide information about the importance of plant and animal species. This way technology is not looked at as something against nature, but rather as something that could help with it. Additionally, in TND neighborhoods, children and their parents do not have to go out of their way to be in nature, it is accessible on walks to school and the store. This way time in nature can be fit into busy schedules easily.  In TND's, it is much easier to foster connections with neighbors and have a say in local zoning ordinances and regulations on land-use. This is because people generally have a previous notion of what sort of community values a Traditional Neighborhood Design fosters.

(Image: Google Earth 2022, Green Roofs in Freiburg, Germany)

Tallamy addresses challenges faced by suburban neighborhoods as well. First off, many individuals think their yard is too small to make a difference, yet this is not the case. Properties put together are part of a bigger ecosystem, Tallamy addresses this below:

“Many people believe that if they don’t own acres and acres, their yard is simply too small to build a forest, a savannah, or a prairie large enough to support much wildlife. That might be true if your property were an isolated island in the middle of the ocean. But it’s not. Your property abuts your neighbor’s property, which abuts another property, and so on. It is more accurate to envision your property as one small piece of a giant puzzle, which, when assembled, has the potential to form a beautiful ecological picture. If the target habitat in your area is an oak savannah, then all you need to do is create a small section of that savannah” (Tallamy 2020, p. 311).

Many people share the concern that if they plant a large tree there is a possibility it would fall on their house. While this can be risk, people with larger yards can plant the tree far enough away from their house so that if it does fall, the house is not in danger. Another solution to plant trees young, and in groups of three or more so their roots interlock, allowing a buffer to harsh weather conditions.

Another challenge is re-vamping HOA guidelines that are outdated. By joining HOA committees and educating the community on native species, it can encourage the HOA guidelines to be more up-to-date.

(Image: Google Earth 2022, Malmö, Sweden)

The hope with this project was to use the principles and ideas Tallamy presented and implement them into our own design at the Urisus College Food Forest. Hopefully, future home owners and residents of the area can view our flourishing garden and read about the process that we went through to create it. We hope that it inspires them to create their own.

The red rectangle is the Ursinus Food forest. The red circle is Ursinus college's general campus.

Campus Food Forest located at: 104 East Third Ave, Trappe, PA 19462

The footage added depicts both phase one and phase two of the food forest.

The entire food forest is comprised of native plant species to Pennsylvania as well as open to public planting and foraging.

Ecosystem services like color, root depth, water filtration, pollution, food, medicinal, and others were essential elements of our planning process. We initially picked 13 herbaceous species native to Pennsylvania to plant in our plot. This design was meant to be pleasing to multiple senses. This technique was to hopefully add incentive for homeowners to include a side yard garden like this one.

smell: By including many different types of flowering species and herbs, we hope to engage the visitors through several avenues of scented features.

feel: The plants we included have a variety of textures and tactile differences in their leaves and plant structures. We also used the hardscape of the garden design to use smooth, metallic textures, grainy wood textures, and cool rough stone textures throughout our design.

taste: We added North-Eastern Mountain Mint to our plot as a harvestable herb. The apricots will also be a harvestable fruit product that people can eat. 

sight: the apricot trees and the Jacob's Ladder that we planted will eventually create great color contrast. Jacob's Ladder blooms with a dainty violet flower and will pair nicely with the white and pink blooms of the apricot tree. We also included many different colors of plant species that vary in height to draw the eye to different areas rich in color and variety. 

Sadly, some of the plants we picked were not able to be included. This was due to plant avaiblilty. In the future, if home owners try to plan and implement a garden like this one, this could prove to be a major issue. Native Plants sellers often do not sell to individuals, but instead to companies or businesses. This could limit the options for future home grown national parks.

Root depth can stabilize, add nutrients and bacteria, and promote water renteniton in soils. It is always beneficial to know the root depth of the plants being introduced. Deeper roots can stabilize soils on hills, muddy, or rocky areas. It is also essential to know about the species picked:

• soil preference
• sun/shade preference
• expected height of plants
• expected width of plants

These elements can make or break a garden and the survival of the plants.

We made the map pictured to solidify the location of each of our species before we planted them. We accounted for height as well as width. We made sure plants that would be taller in the future would be in the center of our garden. They would block the smaller plants from sight if they were put on the edges of the plot. It was essential to have plants with significant root depth in our boxes to anchor them. We also made sure that the apricot trees would be fairly accessible for harvest. We kept harvest in mind for our other edible plants like mountain mint. It was important to keep the mint on the edges of the plot for easy access.

On the day of planting we needed to make some adjustments to our original planting map. This was due to not all of our plants being avalible. The plants that we included were the two apricot trees, black-eyed susans, jacobs ladder, monkey flower, Northeastern Mountain Mint, golden alexander, and irises. We also substitutede some iris for the butterfly weed we did not receive. Unfotrunaltey did not receive bee balm, swamp milkweed, or butterfly weed.

"On the day of the planting, we had gorgeous weather and were able to enjoy the sunshine (and get a little burned by the end of the day!) It was warm and windy, and everything seemed to be ready for spring. It was so exciting to see all the flowers and colors on the site so early in the season and see which trees had survived yet another winter. This was the first planting I have done where I did not wear my gardening gloves, and I thought that it was really fun to get my hands dirty and feel the soil get cooler and moister as I dug the holes for our new plants.

I also loved hearing all the birds flying around the site as we planted and the excitement of the Urbanization students as we planted. I snacked on the pungent onion grass, lemony wood-sorrel, and peppery mountain mint as we continued our planting, all washed down by my Wawa ice coffee and water. The air smelled like crisp rain and dew on grass, further convincing me that spring had truly arrived at the food forest." --Lexi Fowler

We were a special group as we needed raised beds for the roots of our Apricot trees.They do not flourish in clay soil, which is what we have. There shallow root systems would benefit from better drainage and nutrient rich soil contained in our boxes. This meant our planting process took a little longer than other groups. One of our boxes needed to be assembled and then both needed to be filled. We used rocks to anchor the sides of the boxes. Then we filled them the rest of the way with a layer of dirt and potting soil mixed.

Another challenge that was highlighted above, was the limited access to native plant species. We were lucky and our group had most of the plants we requested. Other groups only had a few species.

We also had challenges with some of our plant choices. There were some species we picked that were more shade preferring plants. Our apricot trees are not large and do not provide much shade as of now. Our shading-loving choices might not make it to see the shade of the apricot trees.

We learned throughout this process that communication is key. We are all busy people and it was essential for us to be able to let each other know what our expectations were for the garden and each other. We also learned that it can be very satisfying to see a project through the full cycle. It was rewarding to actually have finished the garden we had planned with intention. Hopefully, we will get to visit our garden in the years after we graduate to see the legacy we left behind!