Backyard Conservancy

Best Practices for Caring for Your Property

Much of land area of our township is homes and private yards. The quality of outdoor life is the sum of every tree, stream in our ecosystem. The better we care for and protect trees and streams and animals, the healthier and happier we all will be.

Traditionally, MTLC has focused only on converting stewardship of large tracts of private land to public/private entities that pledge to care for them properly. But as the housing density of our township increases, it makes sense to encourage homeowners to care for their small pieces of the bigger environmental picture.

This section is a collection of best practices and advice for homeowners who want to do the right thing for their property. Some are things you can do easily, now. Some are things you should STOP doing. Many homeowners unintentionally endanger their trees, pets, wild animals, and the even health of their families because nobody explained the consequences of what they thought was the right thing to do. Many subscribe to these worst practices because “everybody else does it.”

This section offers, first, a list of the easy things you can start doing—or stop doing. For example, tree care, lawn care. Then we offer links to articles about best practices that require more attention and patience. For example, replacing invasive plants with native plants.

Whereever we can, we support our advice with scientific studies, research, and anecdotes from other communities that have had success with these ideas.