Conservation Tips- Your flowerbed might be a BayScape

by Judith C. Warrington, JRA's Communications Coordinator

If you have not yet done a stormwater runoff assessment of your home, fall is the perfect time to do a little river-friendly yardwork and become a certified River Hero Home. 

In fact, you may find that you have some of the landscape elements already in place. Let me give you an example. I had a BayScape in my yard and didn’t even know it! A BayScape is one of those watershed restoration terms you hear used in conjunction with rain garden and rain barrel, swale and buffer. It’s technically a “Best Management Practice” or BMP.

My BMP is a large flowerbed that conveniently catches most of the water flowing from a downspout at the corner of my house.  As a result of losing a tree in that spot last summer, my shade garden became a whole lot sunnier, so I completely re-dug the bed to a depth of about 8 to 10 inches, filled in with a mixture of soil, sand and humus to lighten the soil and planted a variety of sun-loving native plants such as black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia), butterfly weed (Asclepias), and coneflowers (Echinacea). All of which have been flourishing, despite a fairly dry summer!  The other day it occurred to me that this was no mere flowerbed; this was actually a BayScape.

That’s how everyone needs to think about JRA’s River Hero Home program. You don’t necessarily have to do a total makeover of your yard to make it more river-friendly. Do an assessment. You may be closer to certification than you think! www.jamesriverhero.org