During the value engineering process, a lot of the plantings were removed for budgetary reasons. I need to re-introduce them but judiciously to get back to the spirit of the credit. When is a lawn considered non-monoculture?
A maple tree? overseeding with another grass species? A group of native bushes in the corner? I want to achieve bio-diversity and get closer to a habitat than the lawn can afford, but I can't rip it out and replace it.
How do I get there?
Tristan Roberts
RepresentativeVermont House of Representatives
LEEDuser Expert
11477 thumbs up
September 8, 2013 - 1:37 pm
Allen, I don't think there is any clear dividing line between monoculture and polyculture. However, among the suggestions in your post I think that overseeding multiple other species would come closest to what you need. Just added a tree or some bushes is a good step but you see trees plopped in the middle of turf grass everywhere and it doesn't exactly scream "biodiversity."
V B
3 thumbs up
November 14, 2013 - 3:19 pm
Is there a minimum number of species that need to be planted in order to be out of the "monoculture" category? I believe for roofs it's 6 different sedum, but what is the number for non-roof areas?
Trista Brown
Project DirectorWSP USA
456 thumbs up
November 21, 2013 - 1:42 pm
You're right about the number of sedum varieties per Interpretation ID#10231. I'm not sure that a similar ruling has been made for non-roof areas. I think it helps to return to the credit intent for this, which is to provide habitat and promote biodiversity with native/adapted plantings. Clearly demonstrating that the mix of species meets the intent is the most important thing to do to show compliance.