Spring Lawns for Butterflies & Bees
Memphis River Parks Partnership is making big moves to support flora and fauna native to the riverfront’s microclimate. New trees have been planted to create the Fourth Bluff Arboretum. A volunteer-planted garden at the foot of Beale Street supports vital pollinators. Most expansively, Tom Lee Park is being transformed from an arid and featureless meadow into a vibrant natural habitat.
Alongside large capital projects sits standard everyday maintenance practices. Wherever possible, the Partnership seeks to prioritize the health of plants and wildlife, while creating a safe and welcoming riverfront for visitors and Memphians alike. Every day the Partnership manages 250 acres of diverse landscapes, including open lawns, meadows, perennial gardens, floodplains and forested bluffs. Each landscape requires a unique maintenance program and presents myriad opportunities to expand habitat potential along the riverfront.
This spring, the Partnership is adopting new lawn mowing procedures in limited park areas to positively benefit our Mississippi River fauna. Open, mown lawns are great for sports, picnics, pets and play. Lawns create a comfortably legible landscape with clean lines and openness. At the same time, highly mown and maintained turf lawns provide little wildlife value, due to their short height and limited plant diversity.
Springtime is an especially sensitive time for hungry, newly emerging native bees & pollinators. Early blooming flowers can be hard to find, especially in dense urban neighborhoods. This is significant because research has shown significant declines in native pollinator populations across the globe. According to Bee City USA (a Xerces Society initiative), “up to 40% of pollinator species on earth may be at risk of extinction in the coming years as a result of habitat loss, pesticide use, and climate change.”
Fortunately, many small, flowering plants bloom in lawns early in the season. By reducing our mowing intervals in the spring and allowing lawns to grow slightly longer, the River Parks can provide nectar and pollen to help our neighboring pollinators and wildlife thrive.
This new maintenance practice will be limited to a few strategic locations this spring, including within the floodplain lawn of Greenbelt Park, the lawn just south of the Mud Island Dog Park (that is typically used as a soccer field after the soggy soil naturally dries each summer) and the river-edge slopes of River Garden, Beale Street Landing and Mud Island River Park. The maintenance practice involves the following steps:
- Contractors will perform an initial spring clean up in March (when weather and soil moisture allow).
- Subsequent mows will be delayed through the month of April.
- Any lawn within 6 feet of paved pathways and parking lots will be mowed at the standard interval for a clean buffer.
- The standard mowing intervals will resume in May.
- Mowers will be set at 2” minimally throughout the season to allow for healthier plant growth within the turf lawns. This will be raised to 4” in low-use, sloped lawn areas.
- The Partnership and its contractors will observe the maintenance areas and adapt the plan as is necessary to provide a clean and safe park system within our habitat objectives.
Come to the river this spring and keep an eye out for a show of blooming lawn flowers, like deadnettles, tiny bluets, buttercups and clovers. Even better, test out a Low Mow Spring to support pollinators in your own home garden!
