why your tiny garden makes a difference
why your tiny garden makes a difference
keep cool & support your local ecosystems
If you’re even slightly interested in gardening, you’re likely to have heard advice to “plant native” and cultivate a garden that centers flora native to the place you’re in. In California, the urge to plant native is accompanied with rationale that it supports local wildlife, decreases water and pesticide usage, and makes a place more resilient to warming temperatures and impacts of climate change.
As I write this, yet another increasingly intense heat wave washes across the Northern Hemisphere. The extreme heat forecasts keep becoming more extreme. With such rapidly climbing numbers, I — a definite advocate for planting native gardens — find myself struggling to remember if my silly little patch of California poppies can actually do something for our ongoing climate crisis.
So let’s soothe my anxiety talk about it.
green spaces in cities bring down temperatures
When I was a kid, we had “blacktops”/tarmac/asphalt all across our school. In the summer, we couldn’t kneel on it without pants because of how hot it would become under the sunshine. Considering even that one example, it’s unsurprising that cities — areas full of pavement and concrete — absorb heat.
In areas where urbanization completely replaces and doesn’t incorporate any trees or vegetation, this causes urban heat island effects. It increases energy costs, air pollution levels, heat-related illnesses, and mortality. And urban heat island effects are more frequently felt by lower-income neighborhoods and communities of color — I need a whole other newsletter issue to give this topic the space it deserves, but for now, this tree canopy map of Los Angeles shows the stark difference in tree cover across neighborhoods.
On the flipside, we know that green spaces in cities can have massive cooling effects. A recent study showed that even botanical gardens contribute to cooling cities during heatwaves alongside their more frequently talked-about urban green space counterparts like parks or street trees.
Trees bring shade, and plants across the board contribute to better water management (they’re like these amazing little water sinks that serve as an intermediate storage vessel, whether in times of flood or drought). In heatwaves, plants and waterways slowly and steadily evaporating can hugely cool the air and make a significant difference for the human and non-human life nearby.
so … why don’t we have more green spaces?
The answer varies across cities, of course. In Los Angeles, parks aren’t evenly distributed across the sprawling city. White neighborhoods in LA have on average more park space per person than primarily POC neighborhoods. Right now, 13% of LA’s land is being used for parks and recreational purposes, just shy of the national median. This map is a really easy way to see where parks with public access are spread throughout the city (and if you’re outside LA, just change the search toggle — this database covers practically every major urban area in the U.S. and Puerto Rico).
This piece in the LA Times outlines the three general ways parks are developed in cities:
Through regional and city planning (especially in times of expansion)
During infill development and revitalization efforts (aka, building in underused spaces with existing patterns)
Via targeted efforts to increase park access in historically redlined neighborhoods (which have a long history of being deprived of green spaces)
The biggest challenges in building park space (unsurprisingly): funding and real estate availability. Beyond these, it’s critical to ensure environmental, safety, and maintenance standards will be met after a park’s construction. While progress is being made in Los Angeles and across California to bring parks to more neighborhoods, it’s undoubtedly a glacial process.
But parks aren’t the only kind of green spaces.
garden everywhere you go
The better you know a place, the better you can grow things there. This applies to yard spaces, container gardens, and public plots alike.
People are turning their monocultured lawns into native plantscapes, their street corners into vegetable gardens. They’re bringing native plants to local businesses’ outdoor spaces and tending to them with the help of neighborhood volunteers.
From all these examples, there’s a key factor in making these kinds of urban gardening efforts successful: Community. This new guerilla gardening guide urges aspiring urban gardeners to approach their neighbors, friends, and family when scoping out places near them to plant — and to consider how to keep people engaged in community with one another when taking care of that garden patch afterward.
Whether it’s working with local governments to plant bell peppers in a sidewalk divider or sprinkling wildflower seeds into barren tree beds, communities are starting to garden everywhere they go. And added up, it makes an impact.
but how big does a green space have to be to make an impact?
If you’re like me and have, at most, a tiny balcony for outdoor gardening … well, it’s easy to feel like it won’t make a difference. But evidence shows that even tiny patches of green can contribute to a more connected ecosystem and a cooler neighborhood.
Researchers at the University of Michigan found that even more than the total area of urban green space, the shape and resulting density of green spaces must be considered in providing impactful, equitable green spaces. In other words: lots of scattered, smaller green spaces across a wide area > one big park. Especially in areas that may be farther away from the coast, even small vegetated patches can help reduce surface temperatures during heatwaves.
So alongside supporting your local park or wildlife crossing, consider planting even a small container garden — it’ll contribute to reduced surface temperatures, and you might even get to see a cute little migrating bird.
okay, that still can’t be it though.
Is gardening the end-all solution to the climate crisis? Absolutely not, there’s way more work to do. But does it make an impact? Yes, it most certainly can.
And returning to where we started: Do I think you should plant native species? Yes. Do I think you should only plant native species? Not necessarily.
Commonly cultivated edible species can also provide animal habitat and overall cooling for neighborhoods, not to mention fresh and accessible food. Please just don’t be the person that only puts non-native, water-sucking, purely decorative plants in places that may be better served by a native and/or edible species.
even more to explore
I love this graphic from browngirlgreen on mutual aid during a heatwave.
If you’re feeling inspired to start your own California native plant garden, check out Calscape, a super useful resource curated by the California Native Plant Society.
I linked this earlier, but it’s worth sharing again: This guerilla gardening guide.
in other news …
LA Zine Fest! This weekend! I’ll have a bunch of my zines and art for sale, including a physical zine of the first ten installments of a natural list. Come by if you’re in the area — I’d love to see you there.