Rain gardens and green stormwater management

03/21/2026

Managing stormwater in agriculture.

In July 2023, historic flooding swept across Vermont, devastating farms and testing the resilience of the land. This episode follows Corie Pierce of Bread & ...

10/08/2025

If you trickled water on a dry sponge and on a brick, which would have a puddle around it sooner?

Turf Grass has a place and a purpose ... Sports fields, movie-night-in-the-park, a place for dogsh*t .... But making mowed turfgrass the norm for both private residences as well as commercial properties and the margins of strip malls, retention ponds, highway embankments and all the other "nether regions" of human infrastructure is absolutely INSANE.

Even if you dislike plants or find them boring, using the native plants that evolved in your region as a "living machine" - to prevent flooding, prevent soil erosion, mitigate the effects of the urban heat island (through both evapotranspiratice cooling and shading the ground from the sun) - is just what makes practical sense.

Using native plants isn't "environmentalism", it is just *infrastructure*. The plants that spent millions of years evolving in your region are naturally going to be best suited to helping the land stay alive and intact, as well as reducing the devastating effects of heat waves and flooding.

If you don't think lawns cause flooding, then Get a penetrometer (which measures soil compaction) Stick it in the ground above turfgrass and see how deep it goes. Then do it to a native prairie planting. It'll stop at a few inches in the turfgrass (which is where the compaction starts since roots aren't breaking up the soil nor creating porosity). It'll go down a foot or two in the native prairie planting.

Encourage your local municipality to install natives along highway strips and around retention ponds and canals. It is just what makes sense.
And also...

Kill Your Lawn and Plant Native.

10/05/2025

08/21/2025

08/19/2025

For developing communities experiencing flooding and water quality issues...here is your problem.

08/11/2025

These are wonderful, but if there is no plan in place to w**d this and pull out trash and check to make sure it is operating correctly, inside of four years it will become an eyesore.

06/02/2025

A swale is a shallow and wide channel that moves water slowly from point A to point B allowing it to infiltrate or evaporate along the way, unlike a ditch; which is narrow and deep and moves water quickly from point A to point B. Swales are generally less than 12 inches deep and have vegetation growing in them. They require permeable soil, little space, grading for water flow, and maintenance to keep the vegetative cover dense and trash and debris cleaned out. Swales act like shock absorbers by reducing the initial volume and velocity of runoff flow.

More about swales: https://www.pubs.ext.vt.edu/426/426-130/426-130.html
Photo: A swale located in Seattle, Washington, note that some of these plants are not appropriate for Virginia, for demonstration purposes only.

02/15/2025

Des Moines residents are eligible for a 50% reimbursement (up to $2,000) for approved stormwater management projects like rain gardens, rain barrels, native ...

02/22/2024

Do you ever see one of these and wonder, "How can I get one of those?"

Do you want to find a tangible way to support the environment, but don't know where to start?

Does your lawnmower ever run out of gas with just two passes left,
causing you to stop to refill,
only to step on a bees nest and get stung multiple times
as you walk to get the gas can,
causing you to curse in front of your kid,
who thinks it's hilarious,
and you have to go inside to get ice for the swelling,
but you're out of ice,
so you grab whatever you have in the freezer,
only to realize it was supposed to be tonight's dinner,
so you have to go to the grocery,
and pick up a few other items (since you're there),
and you get home just in time to start dinner,
which you spend hours on,
and your kid still complains about,
and after all this you're still sweaty and dirty,
and it's dark,
and that darn grass patch STILL hasn't been mowed?

Turn your parkway into a rain garden! PCS is still looking to plant curb-cut rain gardens in the Roosevelt Park, Oakdale, Garfield Park, Burton Heights, and Alger Heights neighborhoods. These gardens provide beautiful green space, habitat for pollinators, and cleaner water going into our creek. Installation is also free!

Those who are interested can apply at the link below. Please share this opportunity with anyone you know who might be interested. After all, it might just save them a lot of trouble.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeM1gi99Rw2Dg34pRA9VupLuP_kdWylRwIu-k9MdQexTd3a0g/viewform?usp=sf_link

07/26/2023

Free prairie plant posters and a bloom progression poster, in PDF.
https://iowadot.gov/lrtf/prairieposters

02/04/2023

Turning your perfectly unnatural (yet impressively green) lawn into an imperfectly wild(ish) piece of land requires a little time and energy at first. And then...a lot less mowing.

01/29/2023

The floating home has a bright, airy feel to it, with big windows bringing in natural light, Scandinavian-themed decor, and lots of exposed wood.