Green Jay Landscape Design

Green Jay Landscape Design

(914) 560-6570

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Imagine a world without our beautiful trees! One of the huge natural advantages of living in Westchester or Fairfield counties is the tree dominant landscape. Our communities are not only rich in green spaces with forest matrix and secondary remnant forests but an abundance and variety of street trees. Our landscaped properties have an even more diverse collection of flowering and fruiting trees as well as mature natives inhabiting our landscape environment.

Let’s take a moment to remind ourselves of the value of the beautiful trees in our landscapes. I’ll use my own property as an example. The gorgeous mature elm tree in front of my house dominates the front landscape and looms over the ranch style house. Almost 100 years old, the high canopy stretches from over the street to the front yard and over the house itself! Considered a historic tree by the city of Rye, (which it so happens is a ’Tree City’), it lies within the curbside easement and it is considered the property of the city of Rye. As such, the town is responsible for maintenance of the tree (i.e. pruning, cabling etc.).

This tree alone provides tremendous shade during half the year. This significantly helps with cooling and reducing energy cost. Same is true when the leaves are off the tree by allowing more sunlight to warm the house in winter. In fact I am surrounded by beautiful trees including a large Japanese maple, two weeping ginkgoes over the back patio, a grove of river birch at the edge of the wetland border, several stately pine, an array of native flowering shrubs.

The trees themselves not only define the aesthetic landscape design but serve even more important ecological functions including cooling and stabilizing the soil, cleaning the air, giving precious oxygen to our breathable atmosphere, protecting against severe weather, wind etc..

We are only beginning to understand the significant biological workings of the fungus network which support our plant and animal life.  Everyday science uncovers more and more valuable connections between soil biology, plants, human health & microbiomes.

Trees and forests are biologically fungal dominant. More and more we are coming to understand the value of the natural benefits that our landscape ecosystems derive from healthy woodland species including native trees and shrubs. We are just becoming aware of the abilities of trees to communicate through their root systems and fungal networks (see ‘The Hidden Life of Trees’).

There is so much mystery to our beautiful natural world !

This is why I think it is so important to take care of our trees and landscapes. There is so much good we can do for ourselves by nurturing nature!

Plants are not completely unlike ourselves. They need love too!  Even mature trees need to have an occasional drink. They need to eat! Their environment is no longer pristine. They may not get everything they need from our less green and more urban environment. They are part of a wonderfully intricate ecosystem including a tremendous diversity of life including insect and animal life. They will grow happily and sustainably where the resources and possibilities for life exist. We ask a lot from our landscapes…to clean the water, soil and air, provide their resources to nourish us, provide building material etc.

We can make the world a better place…a healthier, happier place by increasing the ecological functions of our landscapes, to imagine and create ‘Landscapes for Better Living’. We can start by eliminating toxic pesticides and increasing the natural immune systems of our plants to insure a resilient landscape with enduring longevity. If we don’t care enough to invest in the wholistic health of our environment, if we don’t set an example for our children who do we expect will?

Be a Voice for Nature. Act Today. Care for your Plants and Trees…for all of us !

—

Jay Archer

President, Landscape Ecologist

914-560-6570

 

Will increased rainfall, more frequent and severe storms wash our sins away?

Mother nature has a way, a process for correcting and restoring the natural balance of resources in our landscape environment.

Consider the positive aspects of stormwater including flooding: recharging groundwater, hydrating and nourishing trees and plants, flushing contaminates such as gas, oil, pesticide residue, particulate deposits etc. from ground surfaces.

Another consideration is the effect this increased volume, flow, weight and velocity impacts infrastructure and landscape features.

In addition to overflowing ground water storage systems including but not limited to septics, dry-wells, french, curtain and perimeter drains, stormwater also often causes overflow discharge of untreated waste from water treatment facilities.

Many of our streams, brooks, creeks, ponds, lakes and waterways are contaminated by manmade point-source pollution as well as naturally occurring pollutants that are produced in our environment due to conditions resulting from changes in climate, topography and hydrology, as well as development of the landscape, displacing and altering surface and subsurface flow.

We can work together to significantly improve the ability of our naturally resilient landscape ecosystems to provide ecosystem services in terms of resource conservation and management. If not, we risk not doing enough, which will inevitably result in degrading of essential land, air and water quality which in turn will eventually lead to catastrophic failure of our ecosystems by under estimating damage to our natural resources.

What can we do to reduce the impact of climate change, mitigate greenhouse gases, reduce carbon emissions and create a healthier, more productive environment for human health and well being?

We can start at home. Analysis of flow paths and site conditions would suggest locations for ecologically valuable and more attractive landscape features. This can be as simple as planting a rain garden or a tree. What about a water garden or water feature to attract birds and clean the air?  Any landscape can be ecologically improved to achieve not only carbon neutral but carbon positive!

We can improve our own human health by making our landscapes more attractive. It wouldn’t hurt to bring in more wild elements!

Are we not bored by our heavily manicured lawns and shrubs sheared into meatballs!

Everything is dependent and reliant upon the functionality of the soil and the plants. By increasing the biomass of planting including the root to shoot mass/ratio, we can improve the ability of each and every landscape to clean the air and water while sequestering carbon and contributing life giving oxygen to our atmosphere.

Start today to reconnect with nature and redesign your landscape for health and beauty!

—

Jay Archer, President
914-560-6570
greenjaylandscapedesign.com

This Irvington resident approached us with a driveway problem: the existing gravel driveway kept migrating – the gravel would move out of place, create holes and an overall messy aesthetic.  On the other side of the house, a former parking area was now a compacted lawn area that ponded water in storm events leading to a muddy mess.

The client wanted to restore the existing gravel driveway and create a more structured secondary parking area in the muddy lawn.  Upon completing a site visit, we determined that the existing driveway did not have a properly constructed, compacted base that is standard protocol.  This was causing the gravel to move during storms, frost heaves, heavy traffic, etc.

Watch the full video below:

Green Jay used the gravel on-site to create a new base for the new parking area and installed the existing driveway base properly.  Bedford Gravel spread the decorative gravel with ultimate efficiency (see video). We used on-site boulders for the driveway edging and as a boulder rail on a new set of outdoor steps.

We also removed a slate on concrete walk and replaced with 2’x2’ bluestone squares, culminating in a custom cut ‘square-in-circle’ bluestone landing.  The client said it reminded her of a Chinese coin from her childhood.  Love hearing how our designs resonate with clients! Repointing and expanding the existing landing helped rectify the scale of the hardscape and house. Installing edging and window wells were the finishing touches on this landscape construction project, ready for some native woodland plantings!

—

Jay Archer

President, Landscape Ecologist

914-560-6570

 

If we are going to have any positive effect on our environment we are going to need to unite the tribes!

We have a lot of work to do to improve the health of our landscape environment! It’s work! It takes focus and consistent commitment and sustained time and energy. I don’t know about anybody else, but for me, if the time I spend doesn’t involve some measure of fun, I’m probably not going to be showing up…unless I really feel I’m going to be missing something. In my case, I’m not retired and have limited free time and interest in events that aren’t in my wheelhouse of interest. I support many non-profits with time and money. I often wonder if we are making any quantifiable progress.

This is why the Federated Conservationists of Westchester County(FCWC) gets high praise for getting a diverse group of people to contribute to a cause like composting, plastic bags etc. By sheer enthusiasm and personality FCWC is creating unique, fun events in venues we might be interested in going to anyway!

If we could get all the local environmental groups together, united under one roof, we could really have a powerful impact! The cumulative effect of joint marketing and social media would certainly be a greater sum than one group or individual. I think we all share a desire to improve the health and beauty of our landscape environment.

My personal passion and mission is to be a voice for nature. To speak for the plants and animals, the insects, the earth, wetlands, fields and forest. We all need a little more wild… so we can reconnect with our own nature!

More rain gardens, native plant gardens for beneficial species, less lawn, and no more toxic pesticides!

We can do more than be carbon neutral! We can create and manage our landscape environments to support and supply highly efficient carbon positive ecosystems!

We cannot do it alone! We must educate and we must make it interesting and…FUN!

Long live the new FCWC… keep up the good work …looking forward to the next event!

https://www.fcwc.org/calendar

—

Jay Archer

President, Landscape Ecology

914-560-6570

 

We make it a practice to evaluate every feature of the landscape during the initial consultation. We look at the property as if our family owned it and lived there! We are interested in evaluating and analyzing every view, every tree and plant, drainage and flow paths; what we can see and even what we can’t.

In this case, our primary mission was to develop an ecological landscape design for the entire property in Croton-on-Hudson, NY, to be implemented in phases.  Once the design was presented and accepted with estimates and budgets for each part, we started with the demolition of a large part of the backyard. This work included carting and dumping of many tons of concrete from existing patios and walks, as well as old wooden sheds, removing electric and plumbing, base for an above ground pool, etc..

Below: Before photo. 

We were able to repurpose and recycle part of the demo material on site and the remainder off site (see SSI sustainablesites.org/about). Resource conservation, including financial resources, is part of our contracted responsibility to the client.

Although summer was a good time for demo, masonry construction (including a patio and fire pit) and lawn installation (in this case, an eco-friendly tall fescue lawn), it was not ideal for pruning the mature, overgrown Kousa dogwood in the front yard ( see ANSI A300 pruning standards).

Winter is the ideal time for this kind of crown reduction, radical pruning and shaping.
While the tree probably will not flower as beautifully and fully as it did the year before, it was necessary to bring it back into an acceptable scale, if the tree was going to be saved as a component and feature of the new design.

—

Jay Archer

President, Landscape Ecologist

914-560-6570

Each and every landscape environment, each property, each client, each homeowner offers a unique and special opportunity to improve or downright convert the landscape into a highly efficient and productive ecological system.  In this day and age of climate change and environmental threats to our well-being and human health, we must find ways to optimize existing conditions and resources while redesigning landscapes for better living. Always our goal is not to achieve carbon neutral but a net positive.  We’ve never met a landscape that couldn’t be improved in terms of health, aesthetics, and ecological function.  To do this, we take an integrated approach, where design meets ecology.  Acknowledging the interdependence and biological relationships between soil, plants and water. This can be achieved while respecting a client’s taste, style, culture, wishes and desires.

In this case, we have a very attractive, contemporary, newly constructed home, with a formal landscape architectural sensibility.  To create a more attractive landscape, while achieving our high standard of excellence regarding sustainable ecology and ornamental horticulture, we first start off well-developed master plan. This color-rendered, scaled drawing provided an overall defined concept with individual landscape garden areas and features.

[Above Top: Front Yard BEFORE; Above Second: Front Yard AFTER; Designed & Installed by Green Jay Landscape Design]

As always, landscape construction provides fresh new challenges, problems and solutions. One of the joys of working with an invested and caring client is that they encourage creativity and innovation, such as new combinations and possibilities in plant design and hardscape construction.  From the beginning, we are aware of our responsibility to manage the full resources available including land, air, water, and financial resources. As a green design-build landscape contractor, it is an especially rewarding experience to be engaged fully in the process of conceptual design, through construction and installation through completion, to managing a property on an on-going basis. Taking a landscape which was previously treated poorly both culturally and with toxic pesticides to a completely pesticide, toxin free organically sustainable environment is a fabulous reward for our team, our client and the greater ecosystem.

[Above: BEFORE photo of Arborvitae less than thriving and hardly screening the road]

As Accredited Organic Land Care Professionals (AOLCP), it never ceases to surprise and amaze us how poorly our residential landscape properties have been treated historically. One of the prime motivations for our client to develop a plan with the intent to execute our joint vision within the same season was the feeling of an incomplete screen on the back side of the property. The client pointed out the existing single linear row of Arborvitae, which seemed to not be growing over the last three years.  Our suggestion was to remove the existing plants, add some larger specimens, and arrange the plants in a more natural, staggered and layered formation.  While we anticipated amending and improving the soil, as we consider essential to each and every landscape installation we are involved in, we did not anticipate a couple of significant factors that contributed greatly to the limited performance and overall health of the planting in this area.  For one thing, the existing Arborvitae were planted too high or too deep in insufficient soil, some with the burlap and plastic string still attached. In addition, evidently deer browse was a problem, contributing to overall health and lack of growth.  Once we excavated to expand the planting bed, construct the berm and arrange the new plants integrated with the old, we discovered in this area of the property, the soil and subsoil consisted primarily of dead sand. Dead sand was used primarily for early septic systems in agricultural or post-agricultural development. We were able to make these assumptions by touch, feel and smell.

[Above: AFTER photo of new Arborvitae hedge with hydrangea & rose underplanting]

I inevitably find on commercial projects there is little or no allocation in the budget for soil remediation.  We must always keep in mind that life begins below ground, where the resources and possibilities for life exist. The absolute essential key to success is to increasing the microbial activity and diversity of populations within of soil organisms. Our goal is to nurture life and grow plants.  We feel the best and only way to succeed is to use natural, organic source Earth products and high-grade biologicals to prepare the soil. We removed, carted and dumped 10,000 pounds of dead sand at a specially approved facility. In addition to replacing the void, we built a slight berm to elevate the planting above the roadway to improve drainage. Within six months, we enjoyed a flush of new growth.  Between the improved design of staggering heights and layering, along with regular applications of organic deer repellent, the overall effect was a substantial improvement.

One of the joys of our work is the response from the children of our clients, in this case, young Nicholas, five-years-old. When mom was reading to him in his bedroom about Monarch butterflies, he insisted they go into the backyard so he could see the real thing in his very own butterfly garden. How cool is that!