Rain Gardens - Enhancing Your Commercial Landscape and Protecting Water Quality

Rain, Rain, go away! Come again..... wait What? Living in the desert we typically need all the water we can get. But did you know that the urbanization of the desert and all natural habitats is not only helping facilitate the drought we are already in, but it is also causing a great deal more water pollution. No we can't really tear down our civilization to fix the issue ( I quite like having a roof overhead, thank you.) but we can build Rain Gardens that can ease some of the damage that is being done.

What is a Rain Garden?
Rain gardens are becoming increasingly popular in landscapes. A rain garden is a natural or dug shallow depression designed to capture and soak up stormwater runoff from your roof or other impervious areas around your business like driveways, walkways, and even compacted lawn areas. They can be used as a buffer to shoreline areas that capture runoff from the landscape before it enters a lake, pond, or river. The rain garden is planted with suitable trees, shrubs, flowers, and other plants allowing runoff to soak into the ground and protect water quality.

In addition to adding beauty to your landscape, rain gardens can also help protect water quality, by reducing stormwater runoff from your lot. Stormwater runoff is considered one of the main sources of water pollution nation-wide. As watersheds become developed, urbanization and an increase in paved surfaces such as parking lots, driveways, and rooftops increase stormwater runoff causing rainwater to run off quickly into storm drains and surface waters.

Stormwater Runoff Can Result In:
Overall reduction in groundwater recharge.
Long-term lowering of groundwater tables and loss of stream flow during dry weather.
Increased erosion.
Increased water quality impacts caused by pollutants in stormwater runoff.
Flooding – especially more frequent “flash” flooding.

A rain garden will allow the runoff generated on your property to infiltrate into the ground and help to reduce potential water quality problems. While your individual rain garden may seem like a small contribution, collectively, rain gardens can produce water quality benefits.

Benefits of Rain Gardens
In addition to reducing and filtering stormwater runoff and increasing groundwater recharge, rain gardens provide many other benefits including:

Provide habitat for wildlife and, with the proper plants, increase the number and diversity of birds and butterflies for those who enjoy watching them.

Provide an attractive and creative alternative to traditional lawn landscapes.

Require less maintenance than lawns because they do not need to be mowed, fertilized, or watered once established.

Increase property values with creative landscaping designs.

Reduce storm drain overload and flooding if adopted on a community or neighborhood scale. 

It doesn’t matter to us whether you want lush lawns, desert landscaping or some type of landscaping in between, we can help.  We serve businesses like yours all over the Phoenix Metro Area. To find out how give us a call at 623-848-8277.

Presented by:
Greens Keeper Landscape Maintenance, LLC
623-848-8277
http://www.commerciallandscapecare.com
greenskeeperllc@cox.net