Why This Book is Worth Your Time

By the end of this book I hope to convince you of three points:

1. The way we currently manage the suburban and urban (henceforth sub/urban) landscape is creating a wasteland and harming the well-being of Earth.
2. The landscape paradigms and practices outlined in this book do the opposite—they help heal Earth.
3. When we work to help heal Earth, we save time and money because we are working with natural systems instead of against them.

When I began this journey, I joined my dad as his business partner in what was then called Leaf & Limb Tree Service. I did not know the first thing about trees—except how to cut them down. My goal was to grow and optimize the business model, increase revenue, and generate as much profit as possible. In short, my goal was to become rich by cutting down trees.

But along the way, I started learning more about the complexity of trees and soil. I came to understand and appreciate how they play an essential role in the well-being of life on this planet. We decided to transform Leaf & Limb into a company that cares for trees instead of one that cuts them down.

Through this change I came to clearly see what should have been obvious: our current landscape paradigms and practices produce millions of acres of sub/urban wasteland that exacerbate some of our most serious environmental issues. We pave over forests, use giant machines to scrape away soil, and turn thriving grasslands into dead lawns. Rain is unable to soak into the ground and instead rushes downhill, causing erosion and flooding. We repeatedly soak the land in toxic chemicals that kill life. There is little food for the migrating birds, butterflies, and pollinators that need it. Even when we attempt to replant trees we miss the mark—they generally have handicapped root systems, are improperly installed, and die prematurely. Worst yet, many species are from other parts of the world and create ecological disasters within their new ecosystems.

There is hope! The methods I outline in the coming pages do the exact opposite. They help heal Earth instead of causing harm. These methods also help save time and money, because we perform fewer tasks by working with natural systems instead of against them. Think about swimming with a water current versus swimming against it. The latter is our existing model. It takes effort to swim upstream—we use a lot of energy in exchange for little movement. What I teach in this book is swimming with the current, which means we use less energy and achieve greater results.

Here’s the new game plan in a nutshell: increase photosynthesis and transform dirt back to soil. Properly plant native trees. Help them attain a long, healthy life. Preserve existing trees. Get rid of lawns in exchange for native meadows planted from seed. Stop using fertilizers and harmful chemicals. Do everything we can to increase the abundance and diversity of life within the sub/urban landscape.

Let me assure you that there is no catch and no sacrifice required. I am not going to ask you to do anything more difficult or unpleasant than what you are already doing (quite the opposite). All I ask is that you keep an open mind, because I’m going to dismantle many facets of our current landscape paradigms and practices. Please hold your ideas about the ways we currently care for trees, lawns, and sub/urban spaces lightly and leave room for new ones. We can think of our ideas like clothes—they do not define us. Much like clothes, when our ideas become old and worn, we should trade them for new ones.

I’m saving the best for last. After we transformed Leaf & Limb from a traditional tree service into what it is now, I found that caring for trees, soil, and the well-being of Earth yields a more beautiful world than what I had experienced previously. My life is full of joy and purpose; joy because I experience so many moments of wonder, and purpose because I feel empowered to help solve big issues using the spaces where I live, work, and play. My hope is that what follows provides you with similar experiences.

Here is an overview of what to expect in the coming sections of this book:

Section 1: Four Fun Essays About Healthy Natural Systems

The essays in this section explain how the systems of photosynthesis and soil formation work and how they affect water, carbon, and all other life on land. Understanding these systems and relationships provides a knowledge base for everything that follows. These essays are meant to be entertaining and easy to understand.

Section 2: Four Not-So-Fun Essays About Broken Natural Systems

This section is a downer. My apologies in advance. In these essays I revisit the same systems from Section 1, but this time I illustrate how we are damaging them. These essays provide a foundation for why we need new paradigms and practices in the sub/urban landscape.

Section 3: Fast & Easy Ways to Help Heal Earth

This section provides tutorials and instructions for the easiest concepts that we can implement quickly on our properties to help heal Earth. This and the remaining sections are built on first-hand experience from me and my colleagues at Leaf & Limb and Project Pando since 2010.

Section 4: More Powerful Ways to Help Heal Earth

Here we learn about planting pocket forests and thickets from saplings, as well as meadows from seeds. By working with communities of plants instead of individual plants, we generate some unexpected benefits (including less maintenance as compared to the status quo) and increase our ability to help heal Earth by orders of magnitude. These actions also provide incredible beauty! A meadow in July is one of the loveliest things I have experienced.

Section 5: Lead & Inspire Communities to Help Heal Earth

For those who want to help shift paradigms even more, we can work with our communities to gather native seeds, raise them into trees, and give them away for free. The model outlined in this section not only makes native plants more widely available while bringing people together through a shared sense of purpose and community, but it also has the power to change hearts and minds—and paradigms by extension.