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Home » Gardening Information » Sustainable Techniques

Habitat Gardening—How Schoolyards Are Being Transformed into Wildlife Sanctuaries

Plants & Gardens News Volume 15, Number 4 | Winter 2000

by Niall Dunne

The approach to JFK High School in the Bronx is a little unsettling at first. Walking south on Tibbett Avenue towards the campus, you notice that you're smack in the middle of a small, dried-up river valley. Hills rise abruptly on either side—a reminder that once upon a time the swift waters of the Spuyten Duyvil Creek ran through here. In the early 1900s, the creek was filled in, and a railroad yard and some factories were built on top. These structures have since disappeared and much of the land now is flat, derelict, and choked with weeds. In the distance, the school—a Goliath of concrete and glass—seems to plug up the entire trough of the old valley.

As you draw near the school's main entrance, however, the scene changes dramatically. The scrub by the roadside thickens into a small woodland of red maples, red oaks, and cottonwoods. Around the base of the trees is an intricate network of pathways and benches, embroidered with ferns and other shade-loving plants. Some paths lead towards areas of dappled light and open space full of wildflowers, colorful ornamentals, bees, and butterflies. (I visited in early fall.) Others direct your attention to a lushly planted pond, a fragrant rose garden, and—just before you turn into the school's parking lot—a native wetland overflowing with cattails, and shot through with Joe-pye weed, goldenrods, swamp willow, and elderberry.

You have arrived at The Enchanted Garden, a one-acre paradise of plants and animals created in 1995 by the JFK High School Environmental Club, with help from community gardening groups like GreenThumb and a host of local and national sponsors. "It all began when some students decided to clean up the garbage and construction debris that had collected over the years in the adjoining lot," explains Tony Thoman, the garden's faculty advisor. "Five hundred trash bags later, we realized that we'd excavated a remnant of the original Spuyten Duyvil wetlands in one corner. And once we cleared out all the junk, it sort of sprang back to life of its own volition. Today, our wetland garden is a reminder to everyone of what this land must have looked like a century ago."

With the restored wetland as its focal point, The Enchanted Garden has grown into a maze of miniature theme gardens supporting a sizable diversity of wildlife—and not just the ubiquitous urban rat. The garden is home to birds, insects, frogs, fish, snakes, squirrels, and sometimes even skunks and raccoons. It's a living classroom, where the students of JFK High learn about the environment, their community, and themselves. It's also an exquisite example of schoolyard habitat development—a landscaping phenomenon that's been sweeping the country of late.

In the past five years, the National Wildlife Federation, one of the country's largest conservation groups, has certified over 1,100 schools across North America as part of its Schoolyard Habitat Program. JFK High is one. Another is Montgomery High School in San Diego, where students and staff have established a magnificent native plant garden celebrating the biodiversity of Southern California, from its coastal sage scrub to its desert flora and vernal pools. At Sweeney Elementary School in Santa Fe, kids and teachers, with the help of parents and local businesses, have planted a beautiful wetland garden as part of an innovative project to purify storm-water runoff from the school parking lot.

Turf and Tarmac

The schoolyard habitat movement's main objective is to replace the "turf-and-tarmac" of conventional school exteriors with nurturing, sustainable, and diverse ecosystems. "The traditional schoolyard landscape is a barren one indeed!" exclaims Marci Mowery, Director of Education at the Pennsylvania Audubon Society and the author of Native Plants in the Creation of Backyard, Schoolyard, and Park Habitats. "Typically, it's a sea of grass, requiring constant mowing, watering, and application of pesticides—an extremely unhealthy environment for children, and a dead zone as far as wildlife goes."

Traditional schoolyards are designed for one thing above all—the surveillance of students. Installing a level expanse of grass or tarmac has been seen as the best way to maintain crowd control, as well as the easiest way to encourage kids to participate in group-play or team sports. But in reality, according to many child development experts, the end result is territorialism, lack of discipline, and alienation among children. "Studies have found that these landscapes tend to promote aggressive behavior," says Mowery. "And they offer little in the way of respite or escape for victims of bullying."

Schoolyard habitats, on the other hand, are designed to bring children into a happier union with their surroundings, and in doing so, elevate their sense of community, pride, and place. Elementary students all across Georgia, for instance, are turning dreary patches of school lawn into luxuriant native bog gardens. In collaboration with the Georgia Endangered Plant Stewardship Network, these kids are establishing seed nurseries to help save rare pitcher plants from extinction. While caring for their gardens, they learn about plant and insect ecology in their region, about the value of teamwork, and the importance of habitat preservation. They also have a lot of fun.

Habitat gardens aren't so much revolutionary as they are evolutionary. Horticulture has a time-honored place in the schoolyard. School gardens sprouted up throughout Europe in the 19th century as an antidote to industrialization and mass migration to cities. Many educators felt that urban children weren't getting enough exposure to natural environments and that their bodies, minds, and spirits would suffer as a result. Countries such as Austria and Hungary actually mandated the construction of gardens on urban school grounds. "By 1905, Europe had more than 10,000 school gardens," writes Gail Shair in a recent essay on the subject in the journal Public Garden.

School gardens arrived a little later here in North America, which didn't become fully industrialized until the 20th century. Two major wars in the first half of the century ensured that the primary focus of the gardens of this era was on utility—hard work, food production, and personal discipline. "The latter half of the century," says Shair, "saw the emphasis shift to learning, using the garden to teach science, nutrition, and environmental education through hands-on activities."

Ecological Literacy

Schoolyard habitats build upon this tradition of providing kids with stimulating and healthy arenas for learning and play. They work in concert with the flower and vegetable gardens of old. But they add an extra dimension: the opportunity for children to discover—in vivid detail—that biodiversity isn't just a distant phenomenon confined to national parks, tropical rainforests, and the Discovery Channel, but rather something that surrounds them, includes them, and is in need of their help.

"Today, as we begin a new century, our kids may have a sophisticated understanding of global environmental issues, but many of them are disconnected from the land itself," says Marci Mowery. "Urban sprawl is depriving them of the last of the wild places where they can wander, explore, and experience nature in a tangible and meaningful way."

Mowery sees this disconnect between children and nature in the school groups she works with, in her Girl Scout troop, and in the kids around her neighborhood. "I was at a conference recently," she says, "and a gentleman from the Aldo Leopold Foundation presented the results of a survey that found that on average young people could only identify four native plants in their neighborhood, whereas they could recognize 1000 brand labels."

While caring for The Enchanted Garden over the last four years, JFK high school senior and Environmental Club President, Evagelia Bakoulis, has learned a lot more than just four plant names. "I know the names of many flowers, herbs, vegetables, and weeds," says Bakoulis. "I also know planting and watering techniques, as well and how to use various tools, make compost, stake tomatoes, and transplant trees and bushes." But she sees a bigger picture too: "The Enchanted Garden has had a huge impact on our school. Every year that I have been part of the Environmental Club, more and more students have come up to me and joined. When they see us dedicating our time to improving the environment and the community, they realize that this is something really important."

Growing a Schoolyard Habitat Garden

Here are some tips on how to go about creating a plant and wildlife preserve at your local school:

Involve the students at every stage. Student participation and enthusiasm is the key to success.

Collaborate—it's a team effort between students, teachers, parents, and the entire school staff.

Solicit assistance from local nurseries, businesses, botanic gardens, and gardening and preservation groups, as well as from local wildlife and Cooperative Extension professionals.

Seek guidance and grants from natural resource agencies like the EPA, and from programs like Project WILD. (See source list below.)

Map your site. Draw up a base map and inventory of the existing features of the property, including plants, soil quality, water flow, and exposure to light.

Research habitat choices. Determine what kinds of native habitats would best flourish on your site.

Identify wildlife needs. For animals and birds to flourish, there are four essential requirements: water, food, shelter, and space.

Use native plants as much as possible. Natives are low-maintenance, cost-effective, and very attractive to wildlife.

Design an integrative curriculum. Gardening can be a window to many areas of study: science, mathematics, social studies, literature, music, and art.

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