Embracing the Wild: Transforming Your Landscapes into Thriving Louisiana Native Habitats

Discover the transformative power of your backyard as we're joined by Caitlin Robbins from Swampfly Native Landscapes to unravel the secrets of Louisiana's native plant ecosystems. Embrace a journey through the lush diversity of our local flora and fauna, learning how to turn your garden into a certified Louisiana habitat. From the unsuspected benefits of poison ivy to the historical significance of prescribed burns, this episode is an enlightening expedition into the heart of ecological conservation. Alongside Caitlin's expertise, we'll share tips on how to persuade clients to shift from manicured lawns to more sustainable, wild landscapes, fostering an appreciation for the natural world beneath our feet.

The wonders of native plant landscaping don't stop at mere aesthetics. Step into a world where your gardening choices can bolster pollinator populations, enrich soil microbiomes, and minimize the need for harmful chemicals. Hear how simple practices like cutting plants at the roots can yield flourishing gardens that contribute to the vibrancy of our ecosystems. We'll also spotlight local initiatives like Kelly Josson's Wild Child Kitchen Gardens, exemplifying how embracing eco-friendly practices can yield tangible benefits for the environment and our communities.

Lastly, we delve into the personal and environmental health impacts of reimagining our traditional lawn spaces. We discuss the Louisiana Native Habitat Certification and what it takes to achieve this prestigious recognition. As we wrap up, consider the profound influence that fostering native habitats can have on our well-being. This episode is a call to action for all listeners to reflect on the potential of their own outdoor spaces to support a healthier, more connected existence with nature. Join us for a captivating conversation that might just inspire you to give your yard a wild, life-affirming transformation.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:05

I'm Caitlin Robbins, co-owner of Swampfly Native Landscapes in Louisiana. Keep listening to Porch and Parish the podcast.

Speaker 2: 0:11

What's up, zachary? Great to be back in the booth after a good week of spring break. We are in the booth and in full swing construction mode. With that comes a fun problem what to do with all the landscaping work that needs to be done. If you're like me, you want to know what's best for the local environment and beyond, so you may be wondering whether it's time to ditch your lawn and go wild.

Speaker 2: 0:32

Caitlin Robbins will be here today with us to share what it takes to earn the coveted Louisiana Certified Habitat designation for your garden, and more. If you do, you will literally be on the map, and that is, you'll earn a gold star on a map of all of Louisiana certified garden habitats. Out there, zachary, don't have none currently, so I thought I'd get this program in front of our listeners to help us earn some stars in the Z, to answer all of your most pressing questions about how and why this may be a good idea. We've got Caitlin Robbins of Swampfly Native Landscapes at the press today. Her company has been featured many, many, many times in local magazines, and it's because of a movement that they're a part of, maybe even started here in Louisiana, right? I don't know.

Speaker 1: 1:16

No, I wouldn't say we started it.

Speaker 2: 1:19

It's a movement to craft South Louisiana landscapes to serve as functioning natural habitats, and that sounds really cool. So we're going to talk more about that today. I'm Mike Gennaro, publisher of Porch and Parish. We bring you the best of Zachary and the development North region through candid conversations every Monday from our headquarters right here on Virginia street. This is Porch and Parish the podcast. Stay tuned, we'll be right back with the lightning round.

Speaker 2: 1:43

Greenwood park is the largest park in the Breck system. The master plan vision for Greenwood Community Park and the Baton Rouge Zoo is focusing on creating a one of a kind world class destination for the entire East Baton Rouge, parish and its visitors, stitching together Breck's most visited facility and largest park to transform park goers experiences. See what's coming for Greenwood Community Park in 2024 by going to breckorg backslash park improvements. All right, everybody, welcome back. This is the lightning round. Fun, lighthearted questions just to get to know you a little bit more. And you're here on the solar eclipse day that's when we're recording. And you've got such cool merch. I love that brand. What uh graphic designer did y'all use for?

Speaker 1: 2:28

oh, that was actually my business partner ashley. Um, you know, put together all of our our design images for us cool.

Speaker 2: 2:36

I mean I'm jealous that you get to wear muck boots every day to work. I'm just gonna say that you came and did a garden consultation for us today, if that's what you call it. Yeah, sure, and you're helping me identify all kinds of cool species that are just like popping up in the lawn in the lawn, because I didn't cut the grass in like a week that's great yeah, see it is um. Do you have a particular flower that's just absolutely your favorite in Louisiana?

Speaker 1: 3:05

I definitely don't have a favorite native plant. I think I I really appreciate all of the different benefits that all of our native plants have to offer us and I think I, kind of you know, go through phases where I'm really inspired by one particular plant at a time, but I definitely have never been able to narrow down a favorite.

Speaker 2: 3:23

Yeah you, you surprised me immediately. And you're like, oh, you have poison Ivy. And I was like, oh yeah, sorry. And you're like, no, this is great for bird habitats. I was like I've never had a positive thought about poison Ivy.

Speaker 1: 3:38

I definitely, I definitely get that. I mean we do take it out plenty of spaces if we're in people's landscapes, if it's in an area where it does not make sense. You know, and I've definitely fallen victim to it many times. But I think if it's in an area where it can kind of be left to do its thing, and grow and provide habitat for birds and it's not bothering anyone, then I think, definitely leave it, if you can.

Speaker 2: 4:02

Yeah, does it feed birds. It does how it produces berries.

Speaker 1: 4:05

that birds love anyone, then I think definitely leave it, if you can. Yeah, does it feed birds?

Speaker 2: 4:06

it does how it produces berries that birds love those berries that like just bust and like, like the. Or there's that stuff on the leaves right that create some oil, like it's on you, or uh, well, yes, that does happen and that's what causes the?

Speaker 1: 4:21

you know the rash right, but the plant itself does produce berries and that's what causes the you know, the rash and the itching, but the plant itself does produce berries, and that's what, okay, birds eats okay, all right, awesome, and they're immune to it and we're not yeah, it doesn't bother them are we native to louisiana?

Speaker 2: 4:33

we are, I mean, we are not. Are we invasive to louisiana?

Speaker 1: 4:37

I would say we are probably invasive to most places, yeah us and the poor hogs.

Speaker 2: 4:42

Do you ever? Okay, we'll get into all that good stuff in a sec. Favorite lunch spot in Baton Rouge after y'all have done a little bit of gardening in the morning.

Speaker 1: 4:52

Oh my gosh. I mean, I think most of the time I just eat lunch at my desk. Um, I've lived in Baton Rouge my whole life. There are so many different places that I really love to go, it's it's hard for me to pick one. I mean, I definitely love going to the chimes my whole life, you know, lived kind of down the street from it.

Speaker 2: 5:09

That cup that you brought in. Is that Highland or or Perk?

Speaker 1: 5:13

Well, formerly Perks. Yeah, garden District Coffee, I don't even know what to call it anymore. Yeah, yeah, I still love to call it Perks but it's Garden District Coffee now.

Speaker 2: 5:30

Okay, that's still cool. Yeah, all right, I can tell you that that could be a trivia game for me.

Speaker 1: 5:32

I could just tell you where you got your coffee from. Um, based on the cup. Favorite native animal species. Wow, there are so many fun, cool native animals. I think again, I definitely don't have a favorite, but I do. I get so excited when I see bats places, so I'll go with that for now. Crazy this week bats are my favorite.

Speaker 2: 5:48

Okay, okay, what was your college major?

Speaker 1: 5:52

In undergraduate I majored in anthropology.

Speaker 2: 5:55

Okay.

Speaker 1: 5:56

And then for my master's degree, I studied public health and tropical medicine.

Speaker 2: 6:03

Nice, awesome. All right, learn more about that. Shout out to your coworkers and co-owners.

Speaker 1: 6:10

Yeah, so Ashley Bracken is my co-owner. You know my best friend, we are definitely a tight team and you know, could not accomplish any of this without her every step of the way. Um in, uh, new Orleans Emily, uh, she is our project manager down there. She's awesome. And Magda is, you know, her assistant on that New Orleans crew here in town. Uh, Sivea is, you know, my full-time helper here.

Speaker 1: 6:40

And we have a mix of people who we hire, as you know, contract workers to intermittently work with us to do installs and maintenances, things like that.

Speaker 2: 6:49

Yeah, awesome Project management is very heavy on my mind. It's something that that just seems to be a useful skill in everything you do.

Speaker 1: 6:58

Yeah, definitely yeah.

Speaker 2: 6:59

So y'all treat it like a true project management approach here. All right, let's get into some of the deeper interview questions. Like a true project management approach here? All right, let's get into some of the deeper interview questions. So I had you on.

Speaker 2: 7:07

We had looked at a couple of landscaping options for this property. The press and something just didn't feel right about doing it the normal way. Maybe it's just like that. I'm weird, I don't know, but I saw two sides of the landscaping issue. One's a cost approach keeping costs down of having to just mow and mow and mow and I'm sorry that I'm saying this to my fellow lawn guys out there. You know, god bless you all. There's so much grass in Louisiana to cut. But I got to thinking you know, if we just let this place be beautiful like Louisiana can be, and then cultivate that beauty, we might save a few animals, teach some kids a different way to do things and have fun doing it. So we called you and fortunately you were able to work us into your schedule. Thank you so much for that. So why don't we start by learning a little bit about what inspired you to become the Swamp Fly here? That's your superhero name now.

Speaker 1: 8:05

Okay, that that works for me. What inspired me? I think you know. When I was in school I was picking up uh work here and there with Ashley, my partner at Swampfly. She has been working in the landscaping industry for over 10 years now.

Speaker 1: 8:23

Um, you know some on other crews a lot independently and I would kind of pick up work with her and she always had this profound interest in, you know, utilizing native plants as much as possible, learning more about them, and I think she is what really sparked my, you know, deeper interest in learning more about native plants. I mean, I think that's pretty much the base of it.

Speaker 1: 8:50

And you know, once we kind of got started using them more in our landscapes and I got started learning more on my own about them, I just kind of fell in love with it. Fell in love with it, you know it's. There's so much to learn about native plants, so much to learn, I guess, about Louisiana's diverse ecology. That it's. I know it's something that you know. For the rest of my life I can, you know, work at to improve that, and it can be both my job and my hobby.

Speaker 2: 9:17

That's awesome. It's very easy to kind of let that curiosity just go go crazy, go wild. Um and you guys don't just plant beautiful things, you also get the uh, the flamethrowers out, take it to the forest, so that's a huge thing for anybody that owns large tracts of land, whether that's timber or they're just trying to get the perfect hunting plot. Talk about that a little bit. What is this?

Speaker 1: 10:14

So burn management is used to. I mean just for that, for management it's. Fire is a it's a natural function of a wild landscape and it's something that throughout our history here we have kind of for a for a long time we kind of put an end to wildfires. You know, we didn't let nature manage land because we were over-managing it and managing it incorrectly you know, when the United States was colonized.

Speaker 1: 10:48

But burn management is really important for ridding native species, for kind of, you know, killing back overgrowth of certain species, for rejuvenating soils and area so that certain plants can germinate and emerge. And yeah, I mean we don't just burn forested areas, we burn prairies as well, because that's a it's a natural function of those forested areas we burn prairies as well, because that's a it's a natural function of those.

Speaker 1: 11:15

You know it helps especially. Let's see, in louisiana we have so much agriculture that has negatively impacted our land. Um, we have a lot of invasive species that have been brought in and have been allowed to take over these. You know, beautiful natural spaces that should be there. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 11:33

You know, in places like prairie remnants, burns, can be used to help rid the invasive non-native species, or you know even, I guess, native species that are more aggressive than others. And you know it allows seeds to germinate again. It allows, you know, know, new emergence of things. It also allows an easy way to you know, cut back the dead debris and keep things looking manageable to you know, people who don't necessarily understand the function of a prairie yeah so kind of playing into um.

Speaker 1: 12:07

so, like you know, if someone were to have a space like this on their own property, one easy way that they can manage it they they could mow it back every year, so maybe a couple of times a year, or they could burn it back.

Speaker 2: 12:18

Got it.

Speaker 1: 12:19

I don't know if that answers your question. I feel like I started to kind of-.

Speaker 2: 12:21

That's a very broad topic.

Speaker 1: 12:23

Ramble a little bit.

Speaker 2: 12:24

No, no, it does. All I could think of is like wait, if I went out there with a flamethrower, I'd be worried that I would burn like the tri-parish area down, or something.

Speaker 1: 12:37

It's very hard to manage these things, isn't it? Well, there are definitely, um, I guess, different environmental factors that you look at before you prescribe a burn to an area so you know you've got to look at, of course, the weather that day. You know your wind patterns, things like that and make sure you know you're going to have enough lift from your smoke and that it's not going to just blow into nearby road areas things like that you know. You set fire lines to kind of guide where the fire is allowed to go.

Speaker 1: 13:03

You take precautions in case the fire does escape, because that can happen. Our, you know, wildlife and fisheries agents. They do burn management all the time in areas and it's also to help kind of prevent wildfires from going out of control, because we do have so many, you know, built human spaces we don't want things to just burn endlessly, and that was. Wildfires were a big problem this summer in Louisiana.

Speaker 2: 13:28

Wow, wow. Well, you know we talk about it almost every episode because I'm trying to raise awareness to this but the town of Zachary burnt in 1903. And it burnt all of the beautiful historic buildings down except three, and this was one building that burnt down. So, and that was just from a man-made reason- you know, somebody was flame ripening bananas of all things. It's kind of funny Anyway. So if our natural landscape was burning more regularly, then we wouldn't be so prone to outbreak of wildfire. Is that what you're saying?

Speaker 1: 14:04

I guess essentially that is what I'm saying. I think it's. You know, when fire was allowed to just occur, naturally there were less built human spaces. So you know, I guess I don't really know how to answer that question. You know, we just don't have a lot of truly, you know, untouched areas left anymore, yeah, yeah, is left anymore.

Speaker 2: 14:37

So yeah, let us quench that topic and move on to more of the rewilding part of uh, how, how do you even approach a client that has just like endless grass everywhere and it's like you know, it's usually well manicured, fertilized. I'm sure your clients are very interested in you know how their property looks and what's that conversation even go like.

Speaker 1: 14:57

Well, I'm assuming you mean like in a residential area in a neighborhood, something like that. I guess it kind of depends on what they want. You know, we don't always do a full lawn removal for everyone, but we definitely love doing that lawn removal for everyone, but we definitely love doing that. I think most people who reach out to us to have us come to their property have already got it in their minds that they are interested in doing something like that.

Speaker 2: 15:24

I've removed almost every speck of grass off the front lawn just because I was going to go out there and like sprinkle seeds and just go crazy.

Speaker 2: 15:33

But then I started to think, no, that you know I I read about you guys in in register or 225 or something like that, and I started to think, no, I can't just go plant zinnias, even though it'd be so beautiful just to have a monoculture of zinnias and everybody would think that's cool. It's probably not the right way to go about this, because I know what happens, even if you're just out there for for the beauty of it all, when the zinnias die. Now I have all these, all these dead zinnias and I'll look like a crazy person out here, yeah, and then it'll be pretty bare, yeah, you know so I don't want to go through that yeah, well, I'm glad you called us, because we

Speaker 2: 16:06

can definitely help with that is there anything wrong with zinnias if you want to mix in a little bit of that, or is that introducing and I wouldn't say there's anything wrong with zinnias.

Speaker 1: 16:17

I you. I think they're beautiful and pollinators do like them. They're an annual, I mean. They do seed themselves pretty readily. So it's totally possible that you know you could have a lot of them self-seeding, but I think if you're mixing them in an area with native plants they probably wouldn't be as competitive with some of our other native plants.

Speaker 2: 16:38

I don't see it being something that would ever get out of hand in that way yeah, well, that's kind of nice to know, because this stuff has to be somewhat approachable to your, you know, and I will say on behalf of native plants yeah we have some absolutely stunning native grasses and sedges, and definitely wildflowers, that people are just completely unaware of in a lot of cases. I can't go buy them, or I have not been. This is another reason I called you. Access is a huge issue.

Speaker 1: 17:08

Um, my business partner, ashley, is actually in the process of opening up her own native nursery called Gulf Coast Flora. It's located out in Arnoville. Um, it's not going to be open to the public. It's going to be wholesale to the trade, at least not regularly. I think it's possible that, you know, maybe occasionally plant sales could happen. That's up to her. I don't want to speak for her, but she does intend to supply to other local nurseries. You know in the area Beaver's Abundance Native Plant Nursery just opened.

Speaker 1: 17:41

It's a brick and mortar location and you know they're working to provide natives to people. There are native plant societies that do plant sales from time to time there are you know a few in New Orleans that do plant sales.

Speaker 1: 17:53

The Louisiana Native Plant Society is a great resource to find these other societies. But the Acadiana Native Plant Project has a greenhouse. People can go buy plants from them, so they're a great resource. And then, of course, you know, by seed is another great one. Louisiana Native Seed Company is who we use to seed all of our native areas and they specialize in creating native prairie habitats. Got it, got it yeah they work on some pretty large projects.

Speaker 2: 18:25

You keep mentioning prairies, so you know. I've heard tale of Louisiana, what it used to look like and all and were there buffalo that roamed in Louisiana?

Speaker 1: 18:35

There were and we had prairies.

Speaker 2: 18:37

Yeah, we definitely had prairies.

Speaker 1: 18:38

We used to have over two million acres of prairie land in louisiana. Yeah, that has been decimated because of agriculture and development. Um, you know, those are seen as really fertile. Yeah, coveted sites so they. They're also really accessible because they're typically in, you know, flatter areas of Louisiana.

Speaker 2: 18:58

Yeah, dryer, flatter pine trees.

Speaker 1: 19:06

So yeah. I mean they've they've been converted to other agricultural purposes, and now the Cajun Prairie or Coastal Prairie there are different names for it is really limited to just remnant sites throughout its native area of the state. And for the most part. Those sites are unprotected.

Speaker 2: 19:58

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 19:59

There are a couple you know that have been identified and preserved, but they are really endangered areas, yeah.

Speaker 2: 20:07

Keep listening, we'll be right back.

Speaker 3: 20:10

Invest in you. The East Baton Rouge Parish Library connects people to information, resources, technology and experiences to make a positive difference in their lives. Stop by one of our 14 locations today or visit us online at ebrplcom rambling two-part questions.

Speaker 2: 20:38

But first of all, what will the? Um rewilded lawn look like? And if we had a few more of these around, let's say you know, 20 of the population does this? What?

Speaker 1: 20:45

what good would come to the world okay, so the rewilded lawn there are a lot of directions that you could take with that you know you don't have to um, remove your lawn and then just plant grasses and wildflowers.

Speaker 1: 20:58

Only you know that's one direction. You could go with it. You could. You know. It kind of depends on what's already existing there as well. You know, maybe, what area you're in. You might want to do more trees and shrubs and have you know different ground covers as a base. Maybe it's a shadier area. It just kind of depends on where you're located, what your soils are looking like. Whenever we build landscapes for people, one of the things that we look at is the region that they're in and, historically, what that region would have been.

Speaker 1: 21:33

So we like to bring in species that make sense for the area.

Speaker 2: 21:36

This is like historical preservation at it, at its heart.

Speaker 1: 21:40

We're trying. You know we're learning a lot as we go.

Speaker 2: 21:43

We're all focused on what color the fricking building is, but yeah, we don't. We don't think about what the yard used to look like, or the land that's cool.

Speaker 1: 21:51

Yeah, so it makes it fun, it makes it challenging it. You know there's a lot of care put into every proposal that we give someone, because we want it to be functional for them, we want it to be beautiful, we want it to make sense where it is. Yeah, um, could you remind me of the second part of your question?

Speaker 2: 22:07

part of the question. Yeah, like, what is, what's the the benefit? What does our world look like if everybody started to do this?

Speaker 1: 22:15

There are so many benefits to native plants. Each plant has its own unique benefit, but in general, you are going to provide immense support to pollinator species. You're going to provide a lot more support to birds and other mammals that exist in our areas. You are going to improve your soils, because the native plants that are here, you know, have a relationship with our soils and they thrive. You don't have to use chemical fertilizers on them. You don't really have to use any fertilizers on them.

Speaker 2: 22:50

No fertilizer at all.

Speaker 1: 22:53

Yeah, we don't use fertilizer often yeah um, we have used it more in the past and I guess occasionally we do use organic fertilizers um at the start of things, but for the most part, no, we don't build in a lot of soil amendment at all, so the soil is taking care of itself, and well, the yeah, the soil and the plants are kind of working in a scientific way. Yeah, no no, I guess they're working with each other.

Speaker 1: 23:22

You know, they have a relationship and the plants will establish themselves over time and they will provide nutrients into the soil for the you know, the, the microbiome of the soil to thrive.

Speaker 2: 23:35

I love that word. That's my new favorite word this month because I'm learning more about it. I tried to write an article on composting you know, for Earth Day and it was going to be that. The normal stupid one. You know where it's, just like. Make sure you get to the green brown matter, correct, but I learned so much more about the soil. Like there is, it is alive, and you can kill it really really easily.

Speaker 2: 23:58

Yeah, it's really easy to kill it um super easy to chemical pesticides and fertilizers are a really great way to, you know, diminish your soil quality yeah, if you dig up some of your soil and there's like nothing wriggling around in it, think again, right, it's, there's something going on. Um, you know, and it's almost like this epidemic of just having the perfect green lawn and it's just a dead zone yeah.

Speaker 2: 24:26

Dead, that's a good word for it. Um, yeah, I don't want to sound like too much of a hippie, but I think I am. You know, I love this stuff and it really lights me up. So I do think that we could be just a little bit better. If you just start thinking about this at any level, really just how interconnected the food you eat is to your lawn, your garden.

Speaker 1: 24:48

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 24:49

Kelly Josson locally. I wanted to toss this name out. I wanted to see if you knew her.

Speaker 1: 24:52

She's got this thing called wild child kitchen gardens I don't think so I don't, I don't think I know her we had her on the podcast.

Speaker 2: 25:00

Um, she's just known kind of in this region and she, um she told me, mike, when you go to redo your, your vegetable garden stop digging everything up and just try one thing for me just cut at the roots, don't get the tiller out, tiller bad, and just let stuff rot out and then plant over it and watch what happens to that soil in about a year. And I did, and like now my garden just doesn't. It doesn't just have tomato plants in the row, it's got like all this other crazy great stuff in it, like these other plants that I can't identify, that you could probably have a field day. But my garden is so healthy and my um reliance on fertilizer is way down yeah, so I mean for vegetable gardens.

Speaker 1: 25:46

That is an area that you know. I would maybe add compost to areas like that. They definitely love those extra nutrients. Um, you know, cutting plants back is a great way to add extra nutrients to your soil. Uh, the roots that were there from that plant will die back and give food to all of the you know, all of the creatures living in the soil, the you know bacteria and fungus. Um, it also creates less disturbance in your soil.

Speaker 1: 26:16

So, typically, when you think about where like the active live part of the soil system is, it's in the first few inches.

Speaker 2: 26:24

Um, really I didn't know that.

Speaker 1: 26:26

Yeah. So when you're, when you till it, you kind of break up that area and you're, you know you're essentially killing it when you disturb it so much. You're just kind of rotating it back through and you're, you know you're essentially killing it when you disturb it so much. You're just kind of rotating it back through and you're also creating compaction in your soil beneath. So that's why it's not really the most sustainable way to do it.

Speaker 2: 26:45

Compaction's bad because I was just about to go rent a compactor at AAA and just like compact all of the the soil that I just put down. So please tell me.

Speaker 1: 26:55

Yeah, wouldn't compact your soil.

Speaker 2: 26:57

Okay, this is like one of the most common things people do before they put the uh, the, the sod on top of the soil, right, isn't it?

Speaker 1: 27:07

Well, I don't install sod, so I don't really know. Uh, we're not here to tell people that they're bad.

Speaker 2: 27:13

I get that. Yeah, yeah, but that's interesting, that's a paradigm shift for me, so I just learned something.

Speaker 1: 27:20

Yeah, yeah. So I mean one of the great benefits of our native plants, kind of going back to you know, if more people did this, what are the benefits? Aside from pollinators and, you know, food for wildlife. A lot of our native plants, especially our prairie plants, going back to those a lot um our grasses and those wildflowers have such immensely deep root systems that they can go, you know, six plus way farther down into the soil, whereas you know our turf grasses maybe only go like several inches down into the soil.

Speaker 2: 27:51

I've seen those diagrams of like the coastal plants, like how they go down.

Speaker 1: 27:56

It's like six feet of roots.

Speaker 2: 27:58

That's crazy, yeah, so.

Speaker 1: 28:00

I mean when you, when you allow the soil to be broken up in that way by the root systems, you're allowing you know more oxygen to get through the soil. You're allowing water to be able to permeate into the soil, which is what you want. When you compact your soils, you're going to get a lot of runoff of water. That's part of the problem. We don't want water to run off, we want to slow it down and we want to bring it down deeper into our soil.

Speaker 2: 28:22

Interesting. Okay, like there's not enough water down at the water table, or Well it's not even so much about that. It's that you don't. You don't want to create runoff into other areas, got it? Yeah, I just installed 200 feet of French drains and it wasn't fun and it didn't seem necessary. Like, why is this happening? Why do I have big pools of water? Here and it's not moving, you know, but that might be a different problem altogether.

Speaker 1: 28:48

I mean, there are many reasons, but we've we've built our spaces so much and we've changed the landscape, that you know. We have compacted our soil and we have taken away our native plants and you know we have created opportunity for water to be mismanaged and run off into places it shouldn't be and cause problems in other areas. So it's. It's a really complex topic. I don't have all the answers to and we don't have all day.

Speaker 2: 29:17

This is just like introducing you to this beautiful idea, right, and so we're going to, um, hopefully, uh, get a star on the map here at the press. That's, that's my dream. So, um, we're going to be working on working with you guys, and, and everybody out there will get to watch as we experiment with this. And you know, I talked to you outside and I was like this isn't always going to be a pretty thing, is it? Like in the beginning it's going to going to be a fledgling operation, right, it's not going to be this instant like meadow that you would get if you just went to a garden center and just started planning everything right?

Speaker 1: 29:57

yeah, I mean, like I said, we will do kind of a mixed situation where we plant more established plants in areas throughout and then seed other areas so that you do have some initial impact and it will be definitely interesting looking.

Speaker 1: 30:13

It might not, you know, it won't look like what the finished product should be, but I think it's definitely something people can see and be like oh wow, this is going to be so cool. Um, you know when, when we do that, we, we we bring in fun species that are already, you know, growing in larger sizes, so that you do get that kind of initial excitement that you would get from it. But no, it's not going to immediately be some incredible area. You know, it might be over the course of a couple of years until it really starts to kind of wow you what it can be.

Speaker 2: 30:48

Beautification award 2027. Here I come. Yeah, yeah, I mean, you can, you, can, you can, you know, still get certified before then talk about the certification a little bit because we touched on it, but there are some guidelines to getting a louisiana native habitat certification.

Speaker 1: 31:04

So so that certification is awarded by the louisiana native plant society, um, and they have some guidelines for generally what they look for to offer a certification. You know they want you to have minimized the invasive non-native plants that exist on your property, um, they want you to have. There are a couple different ways you can go about it. You either can have a certain amount of species present on your property or a certain percentage of your property can be considered a native area.

Speaker 1: 31:36

So even if you don't have that, that true number of species. Um, but you have, maybe you've got an incredibly small front lawn and you just, there's no way you could pack all the species they want in there, I mean you could do it but, um, maybe, you know, for design purposes you didn't want to do that. If you have fully landscaped your area and just only use native plants, then you might get awarded a gold certification for that.

Speaker 2: 32:01

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 32:02

But they have different levels bronze, silver and gold. You can always amend your property. If you're awarded a bronze or a silver, you can keep adding to it, you know, ridding invasives on it. And you know, free of charge, they will up your certification to the next level if you need that.

Speaker 2: 32:18

And this isn't like some high dollar certification, it's just hard, it's it. It will take a lot of work, though.

Speaker 1: 32:24

Yeah, it's very accessible to get the certification. They want people to get the certification you know, so they'll really offer you guidance and work with you and um, but basically yeah. So I think that I want to say the bronze level it's maybe 25 species or like 25% of your area, and then I think silver is 50 species or 50%, and then I think gold is like 75% or 75 species or more.

Speaker 1: 32:49

Got it Something like that Um but yeah, yeah, I mean, 75 species can sound daunting, but even if you, you know, especially if you can't find one at Home Depot or wherever. Yeah, well, I wouldn't go to Home Depot. I would definitely look at your local nurseries for things like that.

Speaker 2: 33:06

Shop local first.

Speaker 1: 33:07

Yeah, Going local. You know even some of our bigger, more established nurseries. They might not have a lot in the way of you know, true, native plants, but some of them do really well to um to stock native trees and shrubs native trees, or something you know that fortunately we see a lot of around town. I mean I see. I see a lot of non-native ones but, there are. There is still a lot of native canopy um. You know relative yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:35

Can, um, okay, so like, take, take, let's take a tree like an lsu certified peach tree or some of the la festival peach tree. It's not. It's probably not a native species, but it's something that is well known and blessed by lsu, like well, lsu doesn't mean that it's. Let's just be real it doesn't mean anything right, right, but it makes you feel like you're you're doing something that will at least survive in louisiana, you know maybe maybe.

Speaker 1: 34:08

Um, I you know I'm not gonna bad mouth a peach tree if you want to grow a fruit tree right, you know so power to you, but there are a lot of native fruit trees you could also grow yeah, it for real, for real, like a native fruit tree yeah, we have native fruit trees.

Speaker 2: 34:24

We have, you know, several species of native plum okay, and it's not going to taste like a caveman should be eating no, no, they're delicious.

Speaker 1: 34:31

You know, we have native persimmon, we have really the pawpaw trees which are native throughout, you know, a large area of the United States and largely forgotten. Yeah, you know, we've got not like nut trees, that we've got. We've got native blueberries we have, you know we have native blueberries in Louisiana.

Speaker 2: 34:49

We do have native blueberries.

Speaker 1: 34:51

We have our native grapes you know muscadine Are satsumas native.

Speaker 2: 34:55

They're not.

Speaker 1: 34:56

No, okay, they have a really native sounding name. I know, and you know you think about all the, the plants that so many people think of as iconic to louisiana that's what I'm saying, things like the satsuma and you know the non-native azaleas and what about a magnolia tree native? Magnolia trees are native.

Speaker 2: 35:15

Okay, thank goodness because we have that in the front yard yeah, pecan.

Speaker 1: 35:19

Pecan is native okay, heck yeah so that's two.

Speaker 2: 35:23

Yeah, yeah, you're well on your way so right now, since I dug up the lawn, I have two native species and a bunch of boxwood and monkey grass which I was like. Surely she will not say anything about these two oh no, they're always gonna get roasted they got roasted. She's like get rid? No, they're always going to get roasted.

Speaker 1: 35:40

They got roasted. She's like get rid of them.

Speaker 2: 35:41

No, I mean, I get it, I get it, now I get it. They don't do much for anything.

Speaker 1: 35:47

Yeah, no, they really don't, and I mean there are endless bad things we could say about them.

Speaker 2: 35:52

Oh no.

Speaker 1: 35:53

We'll stick to the positives.

Speaker 2: 35:59

Totally I think positives, totally. I think you catch more flies with honey and that's. It's just one of those things.

Speaker 1: 36:02

We're gonna have, a really cool looking native uh, habitat out there and it will be dynamic, you know it will change from year to year I can't wait, I'm ready, I'm ready.

Speaker 2: 36:09

I think this is a good place to kind of land the plane here okay, um yeah, so sorry if I rambled. No, oh my goodness I'm the rambler, um, the endless rambler and the two part question guy, so you did perfect, um. Is there anything else that you just feel like we, we left out today?

Speaker 1: 36:27

off the top of my head. You know I, I don't, I don't think so. There's, I mean, plenty more that we could talk about. I can't remember what all was on your question list more that we could talk about?

Speaker 2: 36:37

I can't remember what all was on your question list. Yeah, I think we hit all the high points. And is there a native habitat that um?

Speaker 1: 36:50

if you just wanted to see something in its prime that you could just go visit. There are lots of spaces.

Speaker 2: 36:54

Well, I wouldn't say lots of spaces. There are some spaces.

Speaker 1: 36:59

Don't just send people to the woods, but like a cultivated natural habitat, a cultivated a cultivated. Yeah. Well, I do want to give a shout out to some of the woods, like you could go to kisatchi national forest and you know certain areas of that are extremely beautiful.

Speaker 1: 37:09

Uh, the abita flatwoods preserve is a really gorgeous landscape, uh, one of our favorites, um, you know, we we do have, like I mentioned earlier, um, some preservation areas for the coastal or Cajun Prairie. There are some sites that you know are pretty accessible to get to. People could go visit them, um, if they want to learn more about it. And there is a Cajun Prairie Habitat Preservation Society, um, and they do you know habitat preservation society, um, and they do you know they host days where they will kind of walk people through the Prairie area and give talks about the importance of it and the history of it and how it's managed today and you know what species are present and things like that.

Speaker 1: 37:50

That's a really great way for people to kind of learn more about that. Um, yeah, I mean the wildlife and fisheries headquarters in baton rouge is that's a garden that we manage? Oh really um, and it's not. It's not a huge garden. I mean it's, you know it's a good size, but it's not a huge space. It's in the middle of a parking lot right a big island and what they have, uh, you know, tried to create.

Speaker 1: 38:15

There is a space that kind of represents the different ecological zones of Louisiana, so the different natural communities that exist in the different eco regions of our state and they, you know, we are working with them to kind of it.

Speaker 1: 38:30

It was, uh, it got out of control for a little while because there just wasn't the capacity to manage it, but we have gone in and we are, you know, kind of working to highlight some of the really key species that could excite residents about native plants and give them a better understanding of what exists where in the state Um. People can go seed collect from there if they want to bring some things back to their own gardens. It's a fun space and they have some info boards that help people kind of get started learning more. And if you go to the Wildlife and Fisheries website. They have a lot of resources.

Speaker 2: 39:04

Got it. So I'm going to end on one very, very tough question. What is it going to look like when I have to weed this garden?

Speaker 1: 39:16

When you have to weed this garden.

Speaker 2: 39:18

Is weeding still a word? Will I be weeding grass out or they're?

Speaker 1: 39:22

saying always the possibility. You know, site prep is a really important um factor to make sure you get right when you're creating sure uh, like a prairie, like this? Um, we you know, there's a seed bank that exists within our soils, we have you know a long history of having sod in all these places and you know, non-native weeds kind of grow and take over and even when we remove them there are still seeds in the soil seed bank that maybe you know.

Speaker 1: 39:52

once we've disturbed the soil it prompts more to germinate or you know, maybe in a couple of years this dormant seeds are ready to germinate. Yeah. Um it, you know it's possible that there will be some, you know, management like that happening. It just kind of depends on what was present before. You don't have any thing left really in your soils out front, so I can't really tell what might?

Speaker 1: 40:12

what might sprout up, but you know, based on the surrounding areas, what exists there. I think it's possible that you'll have some weed growth, some native, some non-native, but you know, when we're we're planting in the area and we're seeding it with native seed. You know, over time, the, the native seeds, the plants that you know germinate, are going to out-compete a lot of the other things in the area.

Speaker 1: 40:37

So even if you do have weeds sprout up, they probably won't be very noticeable in the garden. And if they do get to be, or if they start to get out of hand, then I would definitely worry about getting them out of there. But I think it's going to be such a densely planted area that it's not really going to be a big concern for you. Yeah, um, and then you know, as far as management of that area, cutting it back once or once or twice a year, once every other year, you know, just kind of depends on how things are going um, would be your management practice.

Speaker 2: 41:11

Got it All right. I can't wait. That's it for this week's episode of porch and Paris, the podcast with Caitlin Robbins of Swampfly, louisiana Native Gardens. Right, we got it. It's been a pleasure to have you here today and you can reach Caitlin at rewild at swampflycom If you want to get on her radar or on her calendar her very, very busy calendar you can go to their website and check out their calendar. I promise you it does work.

Speaker 2: 41:43

Huge shout out to our community partners, like the city of zachary, who stand with us in our mission to make zachary a place where every resident feels heard and engaged. Thanks to the generosity and support of our community partners, the magazine, podcast and everything you see online is possible and free because of them and the three t's that make up quality of life. I've got pick up trash when you see it. Foster technology at any expense and embrace an attitude of tolerance for diverse voices to begin to engage everyone's talents in our community. Those diverse voices are the creative engines that will drive the future success of our economy. Do you have anything on quality of life that you just think drives quality of life?

Speaker 1: 42:18

About native landscapes. Sure tie it in I definitely think that when you step out and you see wildlife enjoying what you have planted and finding habitat and being present in abundance on your landscape, you can really feel like, wow, I've contributed something so vitally important Not just for me, because I think it's beautiful, which is part of quality of life.

Speaker 2: 42:43

Sure.

Speaker 1: 42:43

Landscapes are incredibly beautiful, and that makes them important in that regard. But you know when they benefit other creatures outside of ourselves and they, you know they improve the health of our soils. That directly has an impact on our own quality of life. Yeah, improve the health of our. You know they improve the health of our soils. That directly has an impact on our own quality of life yeah. Improve the health of our you know our air quality. They can reduce the temperatures in our environment to make things cooler for us.

Speaker 2: 43:08

I've definitely experienced that.

Speaker 1: 43:10

All of these are. They're really, you know, vital ways that they contribute directly into the health of our, you know, yeah, ourselves. Yeah, ditch the lawn of our, you know, ourselves.

Speaker 2: 43:19

Yeah, ditch the lawn, ditch the tiller. Even maybe I don't know. This stuff is so controversial. Look into it and get wild, and we'll see you next time. On Porch and Parish, the podcast.