Spring Regeneration has ended

Workshop #1: How & Why to Kill Your Lawn

Lawns are an ecological disaster. Learn simple steps to make the change from a lawn to a thriving eco-garden!

Workshop #2: How to Improve Soil Naturally

The key to a healthy garden is healthy soil! But so much of what we think we know about soil just isn’t true. Get tips & tricks for working with nature to improve your soil.

Workshop #3: Gardening for Wildlife

We’re living in a mass extinction event right now. Learn what your garden can do to restore local wildlife and biodiversity, ensuring you see tons of bees, butterflies, birds, and more.

Spring Regeneration disappears in

What people are saying about Native Yardening

Enrollment for Gardening for the Future opens May 28th!

Gardening for the Future is an online course to transform your North American yard into an ecological oasis

Lawns are an ecological nightmare and a waste of space, water, and time.

Learn how to easily create an eco-garden that needs less maintenance with every season

Your yard could

Require way less maintenance
Improve your physical and mental health
Reduce your water bill compared to a traditional lawn or garden
Be prepared for both flood and drought
Reduce your waste and carbon footprint
Restore declining wildlife populations
Grow healthier plants with higher yields
Grow food that you know is nutritious and safe
Help fight climate change
Move you closer to self-sufficiency

Frequently Asked Questions

Eco-gardening can absolutely be done at a slow pace and in small areas at a time. A little improvement is better than no improvement!
We also have students who live in apartments or don’t have an outdoor grow space but grow in containers, community gardens, guerilla gardens, etc.
Nope! Students have lifetime access to the course, you can go at your own pace.
As far as legalities, there are ways around it and we discuss this in the course!
Adding fences, rocks, and other hardscaping can make it look more intentional. Adding signs that explain what you’re doing is also helpful.
And you can get your yard certified with the NWF as a wildlife habitat and they’ll send you a sign and paperwork for about $40 (it’s cheaper if you don’t get the sign.) I did this last spring and I haven’t gotten any complaints from the city since!
Each individual site and gardener is going to have their own timeline and expenses based on size, the current condition of the land, whether they already have a garden or are starting from lawn, etc.
Items that you’ll most likely need:
- Seeds or starter plants
- Shovel
- Containers for composting (can be DIY or purchased)
  Cardboard or tarp
- Mulch
- Plant clippers/a scythe/something to chop with
- Gloves
- Substrate - compost, coco coir, bagged soil, etc. (you don’t need enough to cover the whole site, just a handful or two per plant or seed and enough to fill any raised beds, etc.)
Items you might need depending on your project and your wants:
- Composting worms
- A broad fork
- Landscaping pins
- Chainsaw or handsaw
- Woodchipper
- Rainbarrel
- Microbial inoculants (~$30)
- Air pump
The first year is the most work because you’re working to improve the soil, planting new plants that are still establishing, getting rid of invasive species, etc.
If you can achieve that in the first year, then the following year you wouldn’t need to do much aside from planting your annual vegetables, putting compost on the soil, and possibly irrigating your vegetables depending on what’s growing and how much rain your area gets.
If it takes you longer than a year to achieve those things, you’ll still need to do less work each year until it gets to the point where things are self-sufficient. Regenerative growth is exponential and doing a little can still go a long way!