create and maintain a certified backyard wildlife habitat

I’m rather disappointed that I didn’t get to complete this goal this year, but my pregnancy and constant battle with morning sickness really prevented me from spending much time in the garden. We did make some strides, but not enough to have it certified. I do hope that we can complete it next year, because it is an important goal for me to achieve.

When we bought our house the property was bare except for three trees and a few bushes in the front. We have a lot of lawn and weeds, but not much else!

My goal is to ultimately have our yard certified by both the National Wildlife Foundation and the Virginia Habitat at Home program. I am going to use native plant species to create a hedgerow on one side of our yard. On the other I am going to make a butterfly garden. I want to reduce the size of our lawn (I’d love to not have any lawn at all in the front, we need lawn in the back for our puppies to run about!) and put in a culinary garden in the back with veggies, fruits and herbs. Most of our “backyard” wildlife habitat will actually be in the front yard since right now the pups have the run of the back. But eventually we will add more to the back as well.