Naturescapes on Main Street: Blight or Benefit?

Two voices speak loudly these days about landscaping, and they are in opposition. One proclaims the need for neatness along main streets. The other defends the need for midtown bird and insect habitats, which may not have the clean lines of a conventional lawn and landscape. 

What happens when wildness meets Main Street? Sometimes, a homeowner receives a blight notice from a zoning enforcement officer, as happened recently in New London to a homeowner who let her front yard develop an unmowed appearance. Though she had removed a massive number of invasive species and was letting native plants take over, at least one neighbor called on a local ordinance to press for a more conventional appearance. 

To learn more about what happens when wilderness meets Main Street, see my latest articles in Zip06/The Day. If you have trouble with the link, please download the articles at the bottom of the page. 

Below, a homeowner grows native short-tooth mountainmint (Pycnanthemum tenuifolium) in a meadow that surrounds his home.