Pandra

@beechhollow.bsky.social

Spring buds drift overhead in hues of pink and peridot; petals unfurl pollen. Winter coats are folded, my hiking boots are laced. Proud member of GA Plant Conservation Alliance #nativeplants Photos my own or attributed AI blocked

@beechhollow.bsky.social

He wanted some of that for the garden. It was Bermuda grass. I implored him not to plant it. 3 years later, he was fighting it in all his crop beds, the pollinator beds. It had taken over everything. He still has an amazing community garden, but they have a lot of work removing the Bermuda grass

@beechhollow.bsky.social

A darling man I know, a Deacon at his church, started a 2 acre community garden to help those in need. One of the church neighbors had this “beautiful” green patch of backyard lawn. I had just delivered a trailer load of plants for his pollinator garden. He thought the lawn was so pretty…

@cheriepriest.comReposted by @beechhollow.bsky.social

so many articles out there like “trees actually do lower crime/make people happier, and no one knows why!”, yet meanwhile:

Screenshot from the NIH: Birdsongs alleviate anxiety and paranoia in healthy participants EStobbe 1, 4,1Sundermann Sundermann?, LAscone?, S Kühn 1,2 • Author information • Article notes • Copyright and License information PMCID: PMC956 pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov E FeedbackAbstract E The present study investigated the effect of urban (traffic noise) vs. natural (birdsongs) soundscapes on mood, state paranoia, and cognitive performance, hypothesizing that birdsongs lead to significant improvements in these outcomes. An additional goal was to explore the differential impact of lower vs. higher diversity of the soundscapes by manipulating the number of different typical traffic sounds or songs of different bird species within the respective soundscapes. In a randomized online experiment, N = 295 participants were exposed to one out of four conditions for 6 min: traffic noise low, traffic noise high, birdsong low, and birdsong high diversity soundscapes. Before and after the exposure, participants performed a digit-span and dual n-back task, and filled out depression, anxiety, and paranoia questionnaires. The traffic noise soundscapes were associated with a significant increase in depression (small effect size in low, medium effect size in high diversity condition). Concerning the birdsong conditions, depression exclusively decreased after exposure to Feedback diversity soundscape (small effect size) and paranoia… .…significantly decreased in both birdsong conditions (medium effect sizes). For cognition, no effects were observed. In sum, the present study suggests that listening to birdsongs regardless of diversity improves anxiety, while traffic noise, also regardless of diversity, is related to higher depressiveness. Moreover, for the first time, beneficial, medium-sized effects of birdsong soundscapes were demonstrated, reducing paranoia. Overall, the results bear interesting implications for further research, such as actively manipulating soundscapes in different environments or settings (e.g., psychiatric wards) and testing their effect on subclinical or even clinical manifestations of anxiety and paranoia. Subject terms: Human behaviour, Environmental impact
@boulderbedrooms.bsky.socialReposted by @beechhollow.bsky.social

"Gardening for a healthier planet: how Wild Ones is opening the door to native plant gardening KGNU News By: Abby O’Brien and Paige Gromfin Colorado is having its warmest year on record."

@earthdotcom.bsky.socialReposted by @beechhollow.bsky.social

Reintroducing bison to Kansas prairies doubled native plant diversity over decades, helping grasslands recover from drought and resist tree growth.