Buffer Zones

"Thank God men cannot fly, and lay waste the sky as well as the earth." ~Henry David Thoreau

Vegetative buffer zones are undeveloped areas that are directly adjacent to a body of water and can be made of existing plants.  Interestingly enough, buffer zones can also be created by new plantings.  These plantings can highly improve the quality of life in which it surrounds, as well as water quality. These buffers reduce shoreline destruction from erosion and reduce harmful pollutants entering the water due to runoff.  By creating buffers, wildlife and fish in these areas will flourish by being provided with food, shelter and shade.  

"A study done in northern Wisconsin looked at the impact to wildlife when natural shorelines were replaced with developed shorelines. Researchers found that the number of frog species, as well as the total number of frogs, was significantly reduced in lakes where native vegetation and woody debris were removed from the shoreline. Many bird species were also lost, particularly those depending on insects for food and those that nest on the ground."

MInnesota Department of Natural Resources
http://www.sustland.umn.edu/related/water2.html

This topic relates to my work because I am building landscapes where nature is taking back the land, buffer zones do the same for the environment by creating and sustaining natural life. It opens up a different perspective to what I'm creating, now considering how the land that I have created could have came to be. Did this overgrowth of vegetation start by a human force or form natural causes? It adds more of a background story to my ideas.