Ecological Horticulture: Native Plant Trust’s Tim Johnson Explains Why You Should Embrace Your Inner Ethical Radical

This is part of a series with Perfect Earth Project, a nonprofit dedicated to toxic-free, nature-based gardening, on how you can be more sustainable in your landscapes at home.

We all know our choices matter. What we buy, where we shop, whom we vote for—and how we garden. But how do we know what to choose? “We typically think of gardening as a neutral activity,” says Tim Johnson, the CEO of Native Plant Trust. “But over the years, I’ve come to realize that gardening can be a radical activity. It anchors our attention and connects us to a place, making us keenly aware of where we are.” As more gardeners are interested in following sustainable practices, it’s helpful to understand why these practices are important and how they impact our greater community. Perfect Earth Project talked with Johnson recently about what ethical horticulture means, what you can do to “put the landscape back together,” and how to embrace your inner garden radical. 

Photography courtesy of Native Plant Trust.

The interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. 

Q: How can you be an ethical gardener?

A: We can approach gardening at two ends of a spectrum. We can treat it like an engineering activity, where we’re sort of installing a thing and then trying to hold the thing static. Or we can see it as an extension of our community and self. If we think about what’s important to us, there are opportunities within the garden to live our personal ethics.

I am hopeful that gardeners as a collective are working towards what’s intrinsically better for the environment—moving away from synthetic fertilizers towards soil management or skipping high maintenance cultivars for lower maintenance native plants, for example. The choices I make in the garden are an extension of the choices I make as a consumer, as an omnivore, as a citizen.

Q: How should you go about choosing plants? 

A: I first ask myself, what am I looking for a plant to do in the landscape? And generally, this means how attractive is it, what is its shape, and what is its form? But I’m also thinking about the ecological function that a specific plant brings. For example, I have minimal shade, really sandy soil at my home, and really terrible grass. Part of the reason I have really terrible grass is because I refuse to do the traditional thing of keeping it a monoculture by fertilizing and applying herbicides to it and watering it constantly. And so that means that crabgrass moves in and things get challenging. Instead of moving backwards towards chemical-based turf science in the landscape, I am asking, what does my landscape need to thrive? 

I’m thinking about three things. For one, adding strategic shade throughout my landscape because more shade means less watering. Two, what are the plants that are going to survive in my sandy soil? Instead of trying to fertilize, I can find plants that work well in a low-resource environment, like prairie dropseed. And lastly I’m thinking about lawn removal. I’ve been planting micro clover, which is a nitrogen fixer, and is also more drought-tolerant than turf grass. Plus, it looks fantastic. 

The ethics behind this is I want to reduce resources, mainly the amount of water that’s going into my landscape. I also don’t want to use chemical fertilizers. I want to stick with primarily compost-based ones. In the long run, I’m thinking about the places where I need fertility, how to use plants to develop that fertility over time, and plan for a succession in the garden.