Few people find visiting a landfill enticing, but some of our avian friends do. Grassland and other birds are using a closed portion of the I-95 landfill, according to a recently released Fairfax County report.  

Is it possible to reconnect isolated fragments in our urban, suburban, and rural settings to benefit pollinators and the creatures that depend upon them?

The Dyke Marsh Wildlife Preserve, in northern Mount Vernon along the Potomac River shoreline, is the "nearest thing to primeval wilderness" in the Washington area, wrote Louis J. Halle in 1947 when he biked from the city at dawn to watch the wetland awaken. 

First, the bad news: The U.S North American Bird Conservation Initiative just released its State of the Birds 2025 report, and the birds with the most dire losses continue to be grassland birds, a 43% decline since 1970.

Dead native plant material is integral to a healthy ecosystem. An essential support for the populations of pollinators and other animals upon which we all depend, nothing comes close to replacing its role in the health of a diverse ecosystem.

Elements of the landscape may pose serious hazards to the very wildlife that we’ve attracted. Are we drawing them closer, only to have them harmed by an avoidable threat to their health and wellbeing?

As multi-ton garbage trucks roll in and out 24 hours a day to unload the never-ending detritus of modern life and mammoth forklifts rumble over the I-95 landfill at Lorton, just over the hill, a very different kind of life abounds.

It’s fairly common in residential neighborhoods to see trees surrounded by grass or by small mulch beds, often heaped high like a volcano. But did you know that your trees would be healthier and grow faster if you replaced that turf and those mulch volcanos with a 2-4” deep ring of mulch that extends out to the tree’s drip line or even beyond?

On the Sunday before Thanksgiving more than 30 volunteers came together for a service project at Monticello Park in Alexandria.

Starting in 2020, I worked with volunteers to move some of the native plant bounty from my yard into Upton Hill Regional Park, in Arlington. What started as an isolated project has evolved into one element of a larger ASNV program, Stretch Our Parks.

Warm weather has many of us headed to the garden center, where lovely blooms await. Did you know that those shopping trips can double as one of the most effective ways to contribute to a healthier environment?

In November 2020, ASNV became part of an Upton Hill Regional Park support team that has worked together to improve both habitat restoration and activities welcoming to underserved groups.