|
|
Back to About CUES
What is CUES ?Back to About CUESCUES strives to educate urban residents and landscape managers on ways to embrace environmental stewardship by practicing sustainable management. CUES reaches consumers and landscape industry through the resource center, educational materials, and public programs. A Minnesota Extension Service, MES, Collegiate grant in 1995 funded the creation of CUES. CUES is housed in the Andersen Library at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum (MLA).
CUES main goal is to convince people that environmental stewardship is not confined to the Serrengeti in Africa. Environmental stewardship starts in your backyard. CUES tries to reach the manager of urban green spaces to convince them to practice the principles of plant health care (PHC) and Integrated pest Management (IPM).
What is sustainable landscape design ?
Landscape managers and gardeners generally want a landscape that is easy to maintain as well as one that looks good. Sustainable landscaping is a common sense approach to obtaining both goals. These landscapes use native and introduced plants adapted to the conditions of the sites so the plants can prosper without chemical inputs into the environment. Properly designing or even redesigning a landscape is the first step towards lowering maintenance. A sustainable landscape is one that preserves and protects nature's balance, while providing aesthetic pleasure.
Once a good design is in place, other practices come into play such as following the principles of plant health care (PHC), encouraging biodiversity, composting yard waste, and implementing Integrated Pest Management (IPM).
What is sustainable landscape management ?
A sustainable landscape requires low inputs of labor, fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, and fungicides to thrive. These chemicals have the potential to pollute surface and ground water and disturb natural ecosystem processes. Fertilizers from urban landscapes runoff into storm drains and enter waterways and cause algae blooms which affect light penetration, oxygen, and fish populations. The urban ecosystem objectives differ from the agricultural model driven by yield and profits which justifies the high usage of fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, and fungicides.
Sustainable management promotes tactics that recycle nutrients to promote an ecological balance. Composting and using mulching lawn mowers all return nutrients back to the urban ecosystem. Other strategies lower the use of broad spectrum pesticides to permit the natural control of damaging insect populations by insect predators and parasitoids. Finally, sustainable management encourages diverse and alternative landscapes which require lower long-term maintenance.
What is plant health care, PHC ?
An important component of Plant Health Care (PHC) practices is selecting plants appropriate for the purpose and appropriate for the site. A plant correctly matched to its site will experience fewer pest problems because a healthy plant is less prone to insect and disease attack. Know and meet the cultural requirements of any plants. Once you have decided on a particular plant, investigate the characteristics of various cultivators. Much research has been done on plant resistance to pests. Plants can be bred with inherent chemical or growth attributes that make them unattractive to insect feeding or resistant to diseases. For example, honeysuckle witches' broom aphid feeding, a common problem with older honeysuckle cultivars, results in branch tips with a mass of shoots which is at first, merely unattractive, but eventually weakening the entire shrub. Newer cultivars have been bred that are resistant to aphid feeding.
Many common plant diseases will cause defoliation which will stress the plant over time, reducing its vigor and winter hardiness. For example, select rose cultivars that are resistant to black spot (Diplocarpon rosae), an important rose disease, and select crab apple cultivars that are resistant to apple scab (Venturia inaequalis), a common problem in Minnesota.
What is Integrated Pest Management, IPM ?
CUES stresses the use of Integrated Pest Management, or IPM, which is the practice of using a variety of cultural, biological, and chemical techniques to reduce pest problems. IPM is the part of PHC that is concerned with managing insects and diseases. One goal of IPM is to reduce any harmful impact chemicals may have on the environment including wildlife, soil, and water quality. IPM methods include proper plant selection, biorational and biological pest controls, using traps for monitoring insect populations, regularly examining or scouting plant materials for signs of trouble, and the judicious use of chemical pesticides applied at the most vulnerable time in an insect's life history .
When pesticides are necessary, use environmentally sound controls, such as horticultural oils and soaps, which break down quickly in the environment. The commonly available commercial formulations of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt), fungi, and nematodes are called biorational pesticides and these products can be used to reduce insect populations.
Controls such as insect parasitoids, beneficial wasps which lay their eggs on harmful insects, thereby parasitizing them, and predators such as lady beetles and lacewings are generally referred to as a biological control. These biological controls are naturally found in the environment, but the widespread use of insecticides kills them as well as the pest insect. By limiting the use of insecticides and incorporating a variety of plants in the landscape to attract a wide range of insects, these beneficial insects can thrive and help to regulate harmful pests.
All these strategies are part of responsible urban landscape stewardship. Environmental stewardship of the urban landscape is within our grasp. A landscape managed by sustainable methods provides for a healthier environment that can be shared with butterflies, birds, and fish. The kind of place we all long for on weekends. An urban environment where we can lay back, kick off our shoes, and enjoy nature.
Sustainability promotes the concept that whether you are planting a garden, managing turf, developing a parkland, or landscaping , your management practices affect everyone. The decisions you make affect water quality, waste disposal, and the survival of all forms of wildlife.
When looking at alternative landscape practices, think in terms of management, rather than control. Work with nature to restore the ecosystem balance by improving soil and site conditions. Since problems can't be eradicated, begin by accepting some imperfections, understanding the problems, and using creative management strategies to restore environmental health. The result is a more harmonious environment, with more leisure time to enjoy it.
 |
(C) Regents of the University of
Minnesota. All rights reserved. |
|
 |
 |
