Landscaping in Harmony with our Environment

At EarthWise Landscaping and Service our mission is innovative, sustainable environments to mimic the natural environment by using native trees, shrubs, and flowers, and utilizing rainwater harvesting and natural snowmelt from our properties.

“We live in the mountains and should, therefore, enjoy landscaping that is synonymous with our natural surroundings. This can be achieved without a huge burden of care and maintenance.”

We should think about having self-sustaining environments like those that existed before we got here. We can enhance and flourish environments through well-thought-out principles, experience, and attention to detail. Since we have decided to live in or build a foreign object (a home) in the natural environment, we want to enhance, protect, and sustain what the earth has given us outside our homes. The pine beetle has given us a wakeup call to the fact that our forest was unhealthy. Now we have a chance to use that lesson to enhance and sustain our future forest and land.

Our goal should be to design not only homes and structures but also landscaping and environments that are in harmony with each other. Building or having a house in our high alpine environment has an effect on our surroundings. Landscaping and “enviroscaping” can create a harmonious and sustainable impact (or lack of impact) on how we live and work here in Grand County.

Now that Grand County is over the hump of the mountain pine beetle, we can regenerate and sustain the new environments that are starting to grow. And we can enhance the landscaping environment by capturing natural sunlight, rainwater, and snow runoff and planting only native trees, shrubs, and flowers. We now have a great opportunity to have healthier, happier landscaping, sustained by natural water and sun. People have a great opportunity to enhance their property through this type of landscaping and not be burdened with constant maintenance and service.

EarthWise Landscaping and Service offers a wide range of services including planting of trees, shrubs, bushes and flowers to make your home beautiful.  We also specialize in stone paver patios, flagstone patios, built-in barbeques, fire pits and outdoor fireplaces that integrate into the environment and architecture of your home.  For homeowners and subdivision development we also offer services to protect against fire danger by installing fire water cisterns that will allow the fire department to connect to a buried water tank.  These water tanks can hold enough water to fight a fire at your own property or your entire neighborhood if your neighborhood is located in a remote area without fire hydrants.  Please call us to discuss options.
Dave Clingman, EarthWise

When designing, installing and nourishing landscapes in Grand County, look to the native, drought tolerant trees, shrubs and flowers that can be found by simply walking through the woods.
Here is a simple list of hearty, native plants that do really well here in Grand County:
Trees (from sapling to 20ft+)

• Aspen (both transplanted or field grown as well as nursery grown)
• Spruce (green and blue, both transplanted or field grown as well as nursery grown)

 

Shrubs (suggest planting 5 gallon size)

• Native Wild Rose
• Alpine Currant
• Mountain Snowberry
• Shrub Cinquefoil
• Buffalo Berry
• Service Berry
• Twinberry Honeysuckle
• Chokecherry
• Colorado Red Twig Dogwood (this is also a great indicator plant, this will show distress before other plants and indicate stress or need for water before losing all other plants)

 

Wildflowers

• Columbine
• Indian Paintbrush
• Lupine

 

Contact Dave Clingman at EarthWise Landscaping and Service, LLC, www.earthwisecolorado.com, (970) 531-5867, or Mike Klebba, (970) 531-3628 for landscaping ideas for your new or existing home. Contact Margaret’s Garden, www.margaretsgardenonline.com, (970) 726-1273, for information on native plants and seeds. 

Catching Rainwater
According to Colorado water rights, be it rain or snow, almost every drop that falls within the boundary of the state is owned by someone. Catching rainwater to water your flowers was illegal. Not anymore. Now two new laws in Colorado allow many people to collect rainwater legally. These new laws allow residents with private wells to harvest rainwater and set up a pilot program for larger scale rain catching.

A study in 2007 convinced Colorado lawmakers that rain catching would not rob water owners of their rights. It found that in an average year, 97 percent of the precipitation that fell in Douglas County, the study area, didn’t make it to a stream. The water evaporated or was used by plants.
The new law allows limited collection and use of precipitation for landowners, but there is a long list of criteria, such as:
1) The property on which the collection takes place is residential property.
2) The landowner uses a well, or is legally entitled to a well, for water supply.
3) The rainwater is collected only from the roof.

The Division of Water Resources will provide forms and additional guidance for those who plan to collect precipitation from their rooftops. If you have questions, e-mail
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