TAKE A LOOK OFF OUR DECK!!!
The Habitat Team is celebrating our “LEAVE THE LEAVES AREA”!
Tree leaves here are left to enrich our soil and enhance our natural environment. SGUUF is Nationally Certified by the National Wildlife Federation, and we are a community leader in planting native plants and protecting Nature.
According to Dr. Doug Tallamy, a renowned American entomologist and leading conservationist, leaves left under trees, and tree leaves placed in flower beds, degrade quite quickly and add important elements to our soil. They also protect important insects and their larvae over the winter, as well as other critical invertebrates that enhance the soil for our plants, and are vital food sources for our birds and other native animals. These animals are critical to the survival of Earth's ecosystems (Dr. Edward O. Wilson) so we also don’t use pesticides. Tree leaves also provide protection for some other larger native animals, including mammals, reptiles and amphibians. As the leaves degrade they also provide free native mulch for our congregation's native flower beds.
Why is all this important? Basically, we are increasing native habitat. One of the greatest threats facing plants and animals throughout the world, including in North America, is HABITAT LOSS, with many individual animals and even species already gone (National Geographic). For example, since the 1970s the estimate is that almost 3 billion of our breeding adult birds in the U.S. and Canada have been lost, largely due to habitat loss and ecosystem degradation (Cornell Lab of Ornithology).
SGUUF’s native gardens, established by our HABITAT TEAM, are host to myriad butterflies, moths, and bees that are vital pollinators. These and other native animals need plants that are native to our environmental region, not non-native and exotic plants that our native insects and other animals did not evolve with.
FOR MORE INFORMATION, TO ARRANGE A TOUR OF OUR GARDENS, OR IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN JOINING OUR TEAM, CONTACT BILLYE ADAMS, THE LEADER OF THE HABITAT TEAM AT habitat@sangabrieluu.org
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