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If you’ve ever strolled down the Lake Michigan shoreline, you know how impressive the Great Lakes can be. Cognitively, you understand it’s just a lake – a landlocked body of usually fresh, not salt, water – but the breadth and majesty of it might as well belong to an ocean.

This intuitive awe of the Great Lakes is even better deserved than you might think. These huge bodies of water comprise a whopping percentage of the Earth’s fresh water. Plus, they are a “strategic opportunity” to better Chicago’s economic standing – and the Midwest’s in general.

That’s not to say we should simply capitalize on a neighborhood resource. Rather, we have a responsibility to be good stewards of our environment by doing right by the Great Lakes.

Let’s take a look in today’s spotlight.

If we have to rethink national parks to get more of them, should we? Some say yes.

If you thought the American National Park system was working just fine, thank you very much, think again.

And if you automatically want to curl your lip at the mention of Big Money, well, think again ... again.

Why? Because people with deep pockets are reassessing America’s lost wilderness areas and making some unusual plans to bring them back. In the coming centuries, global stewardship might require we think a little differently about The Wild With A Capital W, and the American Prairie Reserve is throwing that idea in sharp relief.

Understanding green roofs starts with understanding their power to heal our cities – and what happens when we don’t steward them carefully enough.

 (PSST! Download our free green roof stewardship infographic to share with colleagues and friends!)

One of the questions we get most often here at Ecogardens is Why green roofs?

And we get it. Most people aren’t as familiar as we are with the stormwater retention benefits of an extensive green roof, of the pollution-fighting power of plant roots, or the cooling effects of a blanket of green atop a formerly bare cement rooftop.

The good news is, more people are learning about green roofs today – and getting interested in the possibilities they wield for a healthier tomorrow.

In this infographic, we take a look at the explosion in green roof square footage across the US and Canada in the last few years, their incredible ROI-capturing power, their energy savings and property improvement value, and more.

Check it out below!

Green roofs come in many forms, depending on the site, climate and owner intent. So what are those differences, and which is right for you?

Expecting green roofs to solve climate change single-handedly is like expecting any one football player to win the Super Bowl for his team. It’s a severe burden, and probably an unfair one.

However, neither would you dismiss a good player’s role in his team’s chances that year. We need all the tools we can get to find success.

(We’re not calling football players tools, by the way. Just FYI.)

But while we wouldn’t want to send them off on their own to do all the work, green roofs really are one of the best ways to address climate change. They:

• Insulate buildings so they use less energy
• Reflect sunlight, raising the planet’s albedo and keeping it cooler overall
• Help to fight the urban heat island effect, a phenomenon increases the temperatures of cities, which puts more demand on the energy grid and impacts human health
• Capture stormwater runoff and keep it out of streets at peak runoff times
• Give birds, pollinators and other critters a place to live
• Increase the number of native plants in our world

We could go on and on. (And on.) Instead, let’s assume we’ve convinced you of their amazingness and move right along to the question of which one is right for you?

Choosing between extensive and intensive green roofs is an important question in the decision-making process, so let’s take a look at the definitions and benefits of each.

Stormwater detention is an important goal in any city, but we’re not necessarily going about it the right way. Let’s take a look at what it is and how we can do it better.

When you look outside at the rain, what do you see?

If your answer is something along the lines of “a wet walk, muddy dog paws and Seasonal Affective Disorder,” then no one can blame you. But those aren’t the worst downsides of precipitation.

No, that honor goes to stormwater runoff.

While you can find numerous definitions of stormwater and runoff, the best way to think of it is precipitation that hits the ground. In other words, when rain lands on a surface, it becomes stormwater – and it needs to go somewhere.

Urban areas have typically dealt with this by routing it into sewer systems, where it leads to combined sewer overflows. Or it runs along streets and across parking lots until it finds a stream, lake or other waterway. It picks up toxins along the way, spreading them to plants and animals. Obviously that’s not ideal.

If we want to understand what stormwater management is and how best to approach it, we must first grasp stormwater detention.

Looking for green roof plants that will protect your building, attract wildlife, soak up stormwater and look beautiful? Here are some of our favorites to put on your list today!

So you want a green roof, and you love the idea of natives. Yet after hours of fruitless searching for sedum that evolved in the Midwest, you have come up with exactly ... one option.

Sorry, friend. That’s because there is only one sedum native to our area. (But it’s a pretty great one! See below.)

Many people throw up their hands right here, assuming that they have to therefore accept non-native alternatives on their rooftops. But that’s not the case at all. In fact, there are plenty of choices for native green roof plants. Here are 40 of our favorite to peruse today.

(Want a free download to take with you and share with friends? Get it here!)

Modern landscaping relies heavily on turf and the inputs and activities needed to maintain it. Despite an automatic urge to denigrate those methods, the question that the environmentally conscious and sustainably-minded should be asking is this: Does traditional landscaping have a role in maintaining a healthy Earth? The answer is more complicated than you think.

Not much is simple these days, and nowhere is that truer than in landscaping.

On the one hand, environmentalists decry the use of fertilizers in lawn and grounds maintenance, citing eutrophication (the uncontrolled growth of plants and the death of wildlife) and pollinator die-off. They also point to poor stormwater management and urban monoculture, among other negatives. Each of these represents a clear and present danger to the environment.

On the other hand, more traditional landscapers and industry leaders point out that all plants, agnostic of type or origin, are better for the environment than the alternative of barren manmade surfaces like concrete and asphalt.

Unfortunately, disagreements and partisanship mean that various factions often have little to say to one another. Those who believe in traditional modern landscaping – well-shorn and bright green grass is the usual example – are irritated by those who insist that native gardening is the only way to ameliorate the many ills plaguing the planet. The opposite, of course, is just as true.

Andrew Bray, Vice President of Government Relations at the National Association of Landscape Professionals, doesn’t like that state of affairs. In this charged era, he calls for a bit more open-mindedness when it comes to landscaping and the environment.

We recently caught up with him to get his take on human health, stormwater management, the urban heat island effect, green infrastructure – and perhaps most importantly, the role of turf in all of the above.

The climate debate is turning heads, but is it changing minds? New climate “lukewarmers” argue that there’s a better way to think about the so-called climate apocalypse.

Turn on the television or head to your newsfeed, and you will eventually, inevitably, stumble across the climate debate.

Apocalyptic rhetoric blankets the news. Various groups claim various disasters, up to and including that billions will die within the next few decades. Greta Thunberg and President Trump shout at whoever will listen, engaging in a private (read: not private) Twitter war the rest of the time.

If you’re thinking Hmm, this doesn’t sound like a healthy way to make change, then you are correct. It’s not.

We need a new approach to the science of climate change. And if we want to take the right approach to environmentalism and green infrastructure, we need it now.

(Want a free PDF download to share with your friends, family, colleagues and pets? We promise, they care too. Click that link!)

If someone told you insects were on the path to extinction, would you believe them? Well, turns out you better.

Granted, most of us would throw a ticker tape parade if someone informed us today that “All the mosquitoes are dead!”

Because, come on. Do bugs have any redeeming value?

Actually, yes. Well, maybe mosquitoes are a bad example, seeing as eminent scientists aren’t sure their disappearance would make a major difference to world ecology. (We freaking knew it.)

But insects in general are a critical faction of the animal kingdom. They feed birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish and mammals. They pollinate the crops on which we rely and the native species that steward our ecosphere. And they keep the ecology our cities healthier.

Which is why, when we hear phrases such as “insect apocalypse,” we tend to get a little jumpy.

Too bad the experts aren’t kidding. But it’s far from a simple story, so let’s read it.

The American bison was one of North America’s proudest species, providing food and ecological services to the peoples that lived here. Today ... not so much, but that’s changing.

The American prairie once teemed with bison, but in the last several centuries, their numbers have plummeted to functionally extinct levels.

“About 150 years ago, nearly 30 million bison roamed the Great Plains until a mass slaughter began in the early 1800s,” explains Defenders of Wildlife (DOW). “By the late 1880s, fewer than 1,000 bison remained.”

We know, we know. It’s awful. Get a handkerchief and a donut, because you’re going to need some help getting through this.

But the story’s not all bad. Today, let’s put our spotlight on the American bison (Bison bison) and the role it’s playing in the movement toward a greener, more ecologically sound world.