Last Updated: Jul 10, 2021
Spring is finally here, for most of us anyway. After months of being locked up inside, homeowners across the country are ready to get outside and get to work on some of those landscaping projects that have been in the back of our minds. With summer and fall droughts likely through much of the western and southeastern parts of the country, however, homeowners would do well to think beyond those manicured, green lawns that have become a staple of most suburban landscaping.
RISE has written extensively about how to incorporate water-smart landscapes around your home, and we have also detailed different smart irrigation products that can help to dramatically reduce your household water usage. Incorporating natural stone into the landscape surrounding your home is another sustainable way to add beauty and functionality to your yard. Whether you have a 25 square foot apartment patio, or several acre backyards, natural stone can add numerous beneficial elements to the landscape surrounding your home.
For most homeowners, the area around their homes is usually a mixture of impermeable hardscapes (such as asphalt driveways and concrete walkways) and green grass. The unnatural hardscapes are usually seen as a practical way to get from your home to your car or the mailbox. Both asphalt and concrete, however, come with an enormous ecological footprint and contrast with natural landscaping strategies.
Stone, rock, and gravel, on the other hand, are completely natural materials that can offer the same tangible benefits as concrete and asphalt while offering numerous advantages for a healthier and more sustainable landscape around your home.
As mentioned above, there are dozens of ways to incorporate natural stone into your landscape. While the best design strategy will largely depend on where you live and the specific conditions of your yard, below we offer three unique stone landscaping ideas to help you get your creativity flowing.
Flagstone is a large, flat, usually sedimentary rock that is widely used for paving and landscaping. All sedimentary rock is formed over time by strong pressure and heat, thus making flagstone extremely strong and durable. Because of its thickness, most flagstone used for paving or walkways does not need to be cemented into the landscape.
To create a permeable pathway through your yard or garden, set thick flagstones at random patterns. Instead of trying to fit the pieces perfectly together like a puzzle piece, leave space (about one to three inches) between each rock. Low growing ground cover such as Irish moss, Breckland thyme, or speedwells can be planted in these gaps to allow for a beautiful, colorful walkway that will allow you to enjoy a natural landscape without getting your feet dirty.
For homeowners who enjoy having a garden to play in during the summer months, raised beds to allow you to avoid encroaching weeds while also building soil. The raised beds make it easy to incorporate compost from a household worm composting bin and can be easily tilled for spring plantings. Incorporating colored gravel around a small backyard garden of raised beds planted with flowers and vegetables makes a beautiful, practical garden.
In areas where droughts are common and rain is always scarce, spreading brown-colored gravel will certainly look much nicer than a lawn full of burnt, dry grass. Planting ornamental grasses such as deer grass with drought-tolerant herbs such as rosemary and basil will offer a stunning landscape that will require virtually no irrigation, while also giving you plenty of Mediterranean herbs for your kitchen.
If you have or can borrow, an old pickup truck, you might be able to find beautiful natural stone in areas relatively close to your home. Along highways where roads have been cut into the landscape, it is often possible to find large pieces of slate rock that can be loaded and hauled away to be used as stepping stones across your lawn or garden. A trip to a river will also allow you to find plenty of smooth river rocks that can be utilized as a garden mulch to protect the soil around your flowers and plants while reducing competition from weeds. Large granite boulders can withstand very high temperatures, making it a great option for building a backyard fire pit.
The Freecycle Network is another great resource to find free rocks and stone for your landscape design. This grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement is composed of people who are giving (and getting) stuff for free in their own towns and neighborhoods. It's all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Some people renovating their landscapes might very well have a few rocks that they’d be willing to donate.
While natural stone offers numerous benefits, the one major drawback is that it is extremely dense and heavy, making it difficult to transport. So, when purchasing natural stone commercially, make sure to choose stone, rock, or gravel that is sourced from local quarries, to cut back on the embodied energy footprint.
Tobias runs an agroecology farm and a natural building collective in the mountains of El Salvador. He specializes in earthen construction methods and uses permaculture design methods to integrate structures into the sustainability of the landscape.