Plants and Their Relevance to Sustainability

Wetlands also contribute to maintaining good water quality, given their ability to capture sediment and filter pollutants. Wetlands contribute to the quality of life of a region serving a variety of recreation activities (urban fishing, boating, hiking, and birding), locations for outdoor education programs on ecology and natural history, and provide a place of beauty for people to appreciate and enjoy, as well as gain a sense of well-being by having access to nature.

For the curious, the process and mechanisms by which vegetation improves water quality, reduces erosion, and serves to ameliorate the other undesirable impacts discussed above are easily researched. The benefits in following your curiosity may be the basis of establishing a professional services specialty such as wetland restoration consultant. Knowledge gained from your research may also serve as one of the sources of design inspiration for projects you are working on. In the process of finding a way to repair a lost or dysfunctional landscape, a designer may be inspired in creating a new one with added benefits not considered at the outset of the design process. The term “added value design” comes to mind, a process that can lead to enhancement and innovation as well as increased economic value. The perceived emotional and/or functional benefits of a landscape architect’s design services can be a major factor that influences user or client satisfaction of a project or development. The work by the hand of a landscape architect can also instill pride of place for inhabitants benefiting from the creation of the designer.

One can approach the subject of plants from many directions. There is the subject of their aesthetic attributes with their great variety of form, color, texture, structure, and their physical changes over the course of a year and their lifetime. With this knowledge, one can then select and arrange plants in a composition of aesthetic value that creates comfortable spaces to accommodate human activities. Then there is the horticultural knowledge of plants and their needs and preferences in terms of soil, moisture, sunlight and shade, climate, and preferred longitude and altitude on Earth. The use or utility of plants is another consideration. Plants are habitat for animals, birds, and insects as well as a source of food. Plants are associated in a web of functions with bacteria, fungi, mushrooms, and the like. Knowledge of a plant’s reproduction cycles and needs must also be considered to further ensure well-informed plant species choices are made. In this chapter the focus on plants was on their utility in terms of one or a combination of components that can be employed to improve and moderate the environment, contribute to water, air, and land quality, and mediate the environment to improve the livability, health, and safety of humans.