When Janine moved into her East Islip home 9 years ago, she always looked at this drab far corner of the yard and imagined a little pond there. It would be small and peaceful, with a sweet little waterfall and a few little goldfish. The idea was always too complicated, too expensive, and too difficult to attempt!

She says, “Enter 2020, Covid-19, home-schooling, murder hornets and quarantine. As a healthcare worker during the most unique and stressful time of my career, I decided there was no time like the present to expand my native pollinator garden …”

Read on to see the amazing transformation of Jannine’s yard even as she battled Covid on the front-lines as a health care worker while home-schooling her two daughters!

Charles Maass is a Civil Engineer living in Manhasset on Long Island. He grew up in this lawn and tree loving community, and now lives with his wife and two sons. His interests include reading and triathlon training. Most importantly, he has always hated his turf grass lawn, and finally replaced it with a beautiful carpet of creeping thyme. Here is how he did it …

Joyce Hostyn, an amazing ReWilder from Kingston, Ontario, had hosted a wonderful session on designing landscapes with native plants. We have her recorded session and links to more information in this blog post.

Joyce is a rewilder who dreams of city streets lined with fruit and nut trees, wild parks and wild yards. She sees each yard as a possibility space - one yearning to burst free from tightly controlled grass and foundation plantings to become a beautiful, biodiverse, magical wildscape populated with native species, edibles and companionable exotics. Raised on a farm where her family grew, foraged and preserved enough produce to last the year, Joyce now experiments with edible forest gardening on her lawn-free quarter acre lot (featured last summer in the Kingston-Whig Standard).

ReWilders have highly varying results when planting natives in their garden. A lucky few report 100% success, most of us are in-between, and an unfortunate few report all plants dying on them. This is not a matter of experience alone — there are very experienced gardeners who have known the desolation of plants that don’t come back up the following spring.

While we have not unlocked the keys to complete success, here are some tips that may help newcomers to native plant gardening have greater success.

And if you agree or disagree or want to add your tips or wisdom to this list, please email us with your ideas at info@rewildlongisland.org.

Phyllis Sickerman, a long term gardener and resident of Port Washington, NY, who started gardening 26 years ago primarily for nice curb appeal on her beautiful prominent front yard. Over time, she realized there was much more and moved on to perennial gardening. She says, “Gardening has become an Important part of my life providing me with an opportunity to bond with Mother Nature as well as helping and preserving Mother Earth!”

On the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day on Wednesday, April 22nd, Phyllis shares her rewilding experiences so that those starting out can be assured that earth care and curb appeal can definitely go together!

Can you garden with no ground? Most people would be stopped in their tracks by tree roots choking up the back yard and not letting any plants come up. But not Angie Ng.

Angie took up gardening to relax and clear her mind. Over time she has added a number of delightful plants in containers, artistically arranged to great effect in her backyard. And now, she ReWilds with Containers in her beautiful backyard.

Randal Wolfer, a long time Long Islander and Cornell Extension Master Gardener, recalls the steady loss of habitat and wildlife on Long Island. She writes, “I’ve been a Long Islander my entire life and can attest to the steady decline of our local insect and bird populations due to loss of habitat to lawns and formal gardens made up primarily of ornamental plants. While lovely to view, lawns provide no benefit to our native population of insects and animals, and use large quantities of water to keep them looking green. You won’t see insects butterflies or bees hanging around your lawn or ornamentals as they offer no nutritional value to them.”

Margaret and Charlie DeSiervo are long time gardeners and advocates of sustainable practices. They ReWilded their yards in the past fall and reflect on the experience of designing, researching plants, preparing the yard, planting and then waiting for results. What worked for them and what did not?

Thinking about how you are going to get a head start on that weed patch by the side of the house? Want to take out a piece of the lawn for a pollinator patch?

Well, an ounce of preparation is worth a ton of fixing.

One of the easiest ways to deal with a plot of land is to cardboard and mulch a few weeks before planting, so that you can maintain the new design without “old” plants or weeds popping their heads back up for the first year. By the second year, the cardboard and mulch are all gone, the new plants have reached maturity and are shading out any new competition easily!

Peggy Maslow is a devoted conservationist who volunteers for a wide variety of causes cutting across her beloved birds, native plants, science and eco-conservation. Her front yard is a beautiful testament to native plants, insects and birds. Peggy’s gardening philosophy is centered around allowing plants to find their own micro-niches, carefully observing what does well where and allowing design to develop over time. Her approach seems to indicate that ReWilding is less about instant gratification than patient unfolding.

Joyce Hostyn, an amazing ReWilder from Kingston, Ontario, had hosted a wonderful session on designing landscapes with native plants. We have her recorded session and links to more information in this blog post.

Joyce is a rewilder who dreams of city streets lined with fruit and nut trees, wild parks and wild yards. She sees each yard as a possibility space - one yearning to burst free from tightly controlled grass and foundation plantings to become a beautiful, biodiverse, magical wildscape populated with native species, edibles and companionable exotics. Raised on a farm where her family grew, foraged and preserved enough produce to last the year, Joyce now experiments with edible forest gardening on her lawn-free quarter acre lot (featured last summer in the Kingston-Whig Standard).

Mindy Marcus is a long-time Long Island resident, and a Master Gardener. She and her husband Michael grow ornamental plants, a vegetable garden and have been adding Native plants to their gardens. They have a son Joey who in October of 2010 finished his Eagle Scout Beautification Project, at the Welcome to Hicksville Site on the corner of Levittown Parkway and Old Country Road. The family has upkept the site and adding plants and flowers since. Native plants as Joe Pye, Mountain Mint and Black-eyed Susan’s have been added to bring the pollinators and birds to the area and keep it a site of beauty and honor, to recognize all who serve.

Mindy reflects on her long road to ReWilding and what she learned on the way …