Our Sustainable Garden : Breaking Old Ground in a New World

So much quiet magic happens around the new year in southern Louisiana. Our plants plead dormancy, the concerto of cicadas, crickets and amphibians have taken their bow. The beech trees refuse to drop their sharp caramel leaves. Our rambunctious biosphere quiets as the night sky grows brighter… leaving space for us humans to delve deeper into the more subtle aspects of our natural world. 

Immersed in the wonder of a new year, it feels as good a time as any to launch a new gardening column in Country Roads magazine. My name is Jess Cole, and starting with this first edition of "Our Sustainable Garden," I’ll be contributing insights on the subject of native plants and ecological sustainability within the framework of our personal gardens, as well as our broader local ecosystems—a topic that is central to my horticultural and naturalist work as owner/operator of Sweet Fern Landscapes and co-founder of both Meadow Creek Native Plants and our related non-profit Louisiana Wild Society.

"When these preferred habitats are taken into account, one can truly maximize  natives’ unparalleled benefits within the framework of your particular garden."

The classic definition of a native plant is: a plant that naturally occurs in a given region without human introduction, having evolved over millennia alongside native insects and fauna. These long-standing, complex relationships work symbiotically to support a functioning, immensely beneficial ecosystem. When we destroy our native habitats by such unsustainable practices as clear cutting our forests, excessive tilling of our topsoils, and poisoning our soil and waterways—we lose those intricate connections, and thus, lose diversity. Life thrives within diversity.  

[Find our Home Gardener's Guide to ReWilding and Native Plants, here.]

When we intentionally work with natives on our properties, some of the benefits we’ll see in our immediate environment include fostering beneficial habitats for wildlife, conserving water, controlling erosion, and enjoying a more low maintenance garden.

Gardeners just starting out with native plants will quickly learn the vast range of flora encompassed by the world of “Louisiana natives”. In each of our region’s wildly different landscapes are native plants best suited to it. For example, the flora in the wet and salty soils of my childhood Bayou Lacombe are not the same as the species growing in the upland hills of St. Francisville, where I currently reside. Yet, they are all “native plants” to Louisiana. When these preferred habitats are taken into account, one can truly maximize  natives’ unparalleled benefits within the framework of your particular garden.

"When I lived out west, to return to Louisiana was to come home to eighty shades of green, low lying palmettos, sprawling oaks, nocturnal creatures that animate the night. These native flora and fauna defined and colored my physical space on this earth."

As of late, I have been thinking more about the perhaps overly-simplistic definition of  “native plant” and how these ancient plants will fit into our rapidly changing environment. I find the concept itself can get caught up in fundamentalist, almost colonial, thought; and is thus incomplete, imperfect. It is worth noting that many of the plants we believe to be “native” may have been altered by humans before European records. We know that plants have been migrating and moving via wind, water, animals, and early humans long before European botanists ever found their way here to record them. 

So, while I believe that using  native plants can be the most beneficial thing someone can do for their direct environment—I do not identify as a 100% natives-only purist. Especially considering the impacts of our changing climate, I believe we cannot ignore the ecological benefits that certain non-native plants bring to the garden. Our current weather patterns are changing far more rapidly than plants can evolve, meaning our idea of what is “native” and how we can use these plants will have to be an ongoing and open-minded conversation. Take this last year for example: Record persistent freezing hours coupled with extreme drought and heat proved that just because a plant is native does not mean it will thrive in just any local environment, no matter what. All of our flora suffered, “native” and “exotic”. The more extreme and erratic our weather patterns become, I firmly encourage a  broadening of our ideas of what a sustainable planting can look like—rather than limiting it to native plants as the sole solution. Once you get past the stereotypically harmful exotics (such as the invasive Ardisia crenata, for instance), it is important to acknowledge that some exotics could be great, ecologically-valuable solutions in our near future. Some examples include the pollinator-magnet Vitex tree, which can seemingly live for ages with almost no water. Or moon vine blooms, which at dusk draw swarms of sphinx moths. Have you noticed how many tree frogs rest in banana plants? The folds of the banana leaves serve as both the sturdiest of homes and the deepest of water wells. Just because a plant is “exotic” does not mean it should be negated blindly. 

All that said, there is still one thing native plants offer that exotics simply cannot: they offer a sense  of place and connection to home. When I lived out west, to return to Louisiana was to come home to eighty shades of green, low lying palmettos, sprawling oaks, nocturnal creatures that animate the night. These native flora and fauna defined and colored my physical space on this earth. I didn’t fully realize this until I lived without it, and it’s part of what ultimately brought me home. 

Read about Jess Cole's January Plant Spotlight, the American Beech Tree, here.