A well-tended bed of flowers signifies to neighbors that owners care about the look of their property and about the neighborhood. However the typical bed is usually isolated from other plantings in a sea of lawn, or perhaps around a tree. Ecological Goals Clearly the traditional front yard has a stranglehold on the American imagination. As the numbers of humans grow and more suburbs are created to house them, wild lands and wild creatures disappear. If we are to maintain biodiversity outside parks, preserves and wilderness areas, we gardeners must take an active role.
All suburban yards have a part to play.
Summed over neighborhoods, these efforts can reconnect the fragmented landscape and heal the scars of decades of development. To be truly innovative in front yards, we must improve and expand landscape structure, increase species diversity and work to amend entire neighborhoods so that we begin to re-create habitats. In native plant communities, plants are arrayed in an organized structure creating both vertical and horizontal patterns. Vertical patterns are formed by layers of vegetation, from the tree canopy down to the wildflowers and ferns on the forest floor. In meadows and prairies the vertical patterns run from the tall grasses to ground-hugging violets.