September — The Fundamentals of Urban Greenspaces

Cultivating Biodiversity and Building Resilience

Public greenspaces not only help improve human health and connection—they also restore environmental health and biodiversity.

Capital Trees began its work in 2010 with a focus on trees, the shortage of urban canopy, and the consequences of that shortage: more stormwater runoff, fewer habitat corridors, and increased heat stress. Our first project on 14th Street didn’t just replace vacant tree wells; we installed bioretention wells to collect and filter stormwater before it entered the James River. Even then, we recognized that trees and water are deeply linked.

Today, that mission continues. Greenspaces are a critical layer of climate resilience—they reduce urban heat, buffer flooding, and restore ecological connectivity. As we’ve discussed in our post on urban heat islands, neighborhoods without tree canopy can be up to 10°F hotter during the day and 20°F hotter at night, making green infrastructure a health imperative, not just a nice-to-have (Capital Trees, 2024a).

Urban public greenspaces do more than look good. They build the backbone of biodiversity, supporting native plants, insects, and wildlife, while slowing and filtering stormwater. The Xerces Society (2024a) reminds us that biodiversity protection must happen in cities and neighborhoods, not just in wilderness areas. Each greenspace can become a refuge for pollinators and native plants—and a step toward climate resilience (Xerces Society, 2024b).

At Capital Trees, every greenspace we design is a nature-based solution—spaces that heal the soil, cool the air, and welcome life back to the city.

How We Build Biodiversity

• • Native Planting Commitment:  Our projects include a minimum of 70% native plant species—often closer to 90% as stock becomes available—to strengthen habitat connections across urban spaces (Capital Trees, 2023c).
  • Layered Plant Structure:  We plant a mix of trees, shrubs, forbs, and grasses to support a variety of pollinators, insects, and wildlife. As we note in our post “What Happened to All the Bugs?”, insect populations are under pressure, and restoring native plant diversity provides vital refuge and food sources (Capital Trees, 2024b).
  • Avoiding Monocultures & Contextual Planting:  We avoid monocultures and design with each site’s soil, sun, and hydrology in mind to ensure long-term ecological health.
  • Sustainable Management & Soil Health:  We manage our gardens without pesticides or herbicides, supporting thriving insect and wildlife communities. We also prioritize soil health, following principles outlined in “Creating a Mulch-Improved Soil, Parts 1 & 2,” which emphasizes soil structure, organic matter, and water retention as the foundation of healthy ecosystems (Capital Trees, 2023d).
  • Seasonal Stewardship:  We “leave the leaves” and reduce winter pruning to provide overwintering habitat and seed forage, a practice aligned with national recommendations for pollinator-friendly management (Xerces Society, 2024a).
  • Bee City Coalition:  Capital Trees has joined a coalition of public and private partners to establish Richmond, Va as a Bee City and incorporate those principles into our work including planting native plants and creating safe habitats.

As Wired has reported, even small gardens can become biodiversity hotspots when managed with native plants and ecological care (Molteni, 2023). Each Capital Trees project functions as both community gathering space and living habitat.

Green Infrastructure in Action

• Great Shiplock Park — A retrofitted rain garden captures and filters stormwater from the parking lot before it enters the James River.
• Low Line Gardens — Linear gardens buffer the canal, slow runoff from Dock Street, and serve as pollinator corridors.
• Low Line Green — A rain garden captures more than 140,000 gallons of stormwater annually from nearby roads, improving canal water quality.
• Canoe Run Park — Over 50 new trees and a pollinator garden enhance soil permeability, improve habitat, and reduce heat island effects.
• Hotchkiss Green — A permeable asphalt trail and rain garden ensure that stormwater is captured, filtered, and recharged on-site.
  

These projects embody what the City Parks Alliance (2024) and The Trust for Public Land (2024) describe as the future of city infrastructure—parks and public landscapes designed as systems for climate adaptation, stormwater management, and biodiversity.

Greenspaces as Essential Infrastructure

Public greenspaces are not optional extras—they are essential infrastructure that help cities adapt, heal, and flourish. When we invest in nature, nature invests back in us: cleaner water, cooler air, more pollinators, and connected communities.

Our work thrives through public–private partnerships, a model that ensures long-term care and sustainability (Capital Trees, 2022). Collaboration with city agencies, community groups, and volunteers allows our greenspaces to flourish for years to come.

At Capital Trees, we see every planting as a bridge—between people and place, between stress and resilience, between what is and what can be. Together, we are restoring the city’s ecological heartbeat, one greenspace at a time.

Sources and Further Reading

Capital Trees. (2022, November 2). Public–private partnership. https://capitaltrees.org/public-private-partnership/

Capital Trees. (2023c, July 11). Conservation landscaping in public spaces. https://capitaltrees.org/conservation-landscaping-in-public-spaces/

Capital Trees. (2023d, September 14). Creating a mulch-improved soil: Part 2. https://capitaltrees.org/creating-a-mulch-improved-soil-part-2/

Capital Trees. (2024a, April 16). Increasing urban green spaces to reduce urban heat island effect in Richmond. https://capitaltrees.org/increasing-urban-green-spaces-to-reduce-urban-heat-island-effect-in-richmond/

Capital Trees. (2024b, August 8). What happened to all the bugs? https://capitaltrees.org/what-happened-to-all-the-bugs/

City Parks Alliance. (2024). Parks and green stormwater infrastructure. https://cityparksalliance.org/parks-and-green-stormwater-infrastructure/report/

Molteni, M. (2023, April 21). You can turn your backyard into a biodiversity hotspot. Wired. https://www.wired.com/story/you-can-turn-your-backyard-into-a-biodiversity-hotspot/

The Trust for Public Land. (2024, July 31). Green papers: The climate crisis and the role of parks. https://www.tpl.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/073124_Green-Papers_Climate-Crisis_FINAL.pdf

Xerces Society. (2024a, April 18). Ways to defend biodiversity this Earth Week. https://xerces.org/blog/ways-to-defend-biodiversity-this-earth-week

Xerces Society. (2024b, May 1). Nature-based solutions: A win for both biodiversity and climate. https://xerces.org/blog/nature-based-solutions-win-for-both-biodiversity-and-climate

September — Urban Greenspace Maintenance

“Live in each season as it passes: breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit.”

– Henry David Thoreau

We’re just a few days into fall, and the plants and animals alike have already welcomed the cooler temperatures. Hints of color can be seen on the trees. Summer flowers have faded, leaving behind prickly seed heads to feed the hungry birds and populate the seed bank for the next growing season. The grasses have sprouted showy flower panicles which wave gently in the breeze.

This month in the gardens, volunteers began wrapping up summer chores and turning their attention to settling the garden for the coming winter months. While still alive, the summer perennial weeds have started their descent into dormancy. The cooler temperatures signal them to send sugars into the roots for winter storage.

The volunteers have also started some much needed dividing and transplanting of perennials in the Low Line Gardens. It is always nice when you can “shop” within your own garden. We divided Rudbeckia fulgida and Penstemon digitalis. We also divided some Iris viginiana which will be transplanted in Canoe Run Park (600 W 22nd Street Richmond, Virginia) in the perennial garden we established last fall. We love being able to share plants amongst the various projects and with our partners — perennials can truly be the gift that keeps giving. Now is a great time to shop your own garden for plants to share with friends as well as fill in gaps in your landscape.

Thanks to our partners — Keep Virginia Beautiful, Co-Star, and the City of Richmond Department of Parks, Recreation and Community Facilities — another exciting project is underway at Canoe Run Park. A section of the forested area has been overrun with kudzu, an invasive plant that grows aggressively and smothers healthy ecosystems.

Restoring this space will be a multi-year effort, combining thoughtful mechanical and chemical methods to remove the kudzu and give native species room to thrive. Together with our partners, we are working to revitalize this greenspace so it can once again support biodiversity, strengthen the environment, and offer a welcoming refuge for the community.

The first step in this reclamation  process was to have RVAGoats onsite to eat the kudzu and other invasive species. The goats were onsite the first week of September and served as the backdrop for our  successful community volunteering event on September 6, 2025. Attendees learned about the project, watched the goats hard at work, and assisted with weeding and re-mulching tree rings. While not glamorous, the work on the tree rings is vital for the tree to develop a strong and resilient root system. If left unchecked, grass competes with the tree roots for resources (water and nutrients) and can inhibit the growth of the tree roots. 

We are pleased to announce that a regular maintenance opportunity is now available at Hotchkiss Green. On the second and fourth Tuesday of each month volunteers are welcome to work in the gardens between 4 p.m and 7 p.m. We have a small but mighty group on board already and look forward to watching this community grow. No experience is required. We will have an expert onsite to offer direction and guidance

Keep an eye out for upcoming events at the various garden sites. We already have lots of fall fun planned including tree plantings, plug plantings, and tree ring maintenance.

Fall Planting and Maintenance Tips from Our Gardens to Yours

Planting: If you are planting trees at home this fall try to establish a mulch ring around the tree 3x the width of the root ball. When planting, remember to set the root flare of the tree at ground level and  not push mulch against the trunk of the tree. Water deeply when first planting trees, and then provide about 5-10 gallons of water weekly during the establishment period.  

Pruning: As a general rule you do not want to prune trees and shrubs in the fall except to remove damaged, diseased, or deadwood. The act of pruning is a message to the plant to put out new growth and it also creates a “wound” for lack of a better term. The new growth does not have time to harden off, and the wound does not have time to heal before cold weather sets in. This can result in dieback of the foliage and new branch tips and disease entering the unhealed pruning cuts.  

Look for more information on late winter pruning in the blog we’ll publish in January 2026 .

Watering: The plants are thirsty, we have not had significant rainfall for over four weeks in most places in Central Virginia. While plants and trees don’t need quite as much water now that the temperatures have cooled, they do need some rainfall or supplemental watering. We recommend checking the soil around the rootball to a depth of 6-8” prior to watering.

Not sure where to start when it comes to taking care of your own plants, trees, and shrubs? Our volunteering opportunities are a great way to learn how to care for landscaping. You’ll take home new knowledge that you can put to use in your yard.

September — Featured Trees Seasonal Update

Black gum tree at Canoe Run Park, photographed in September 2025.

Throughout 2025, we’ll be documenting the black gum tree, Nyssa sylvatica, which is planted at many of our urban greenspaces. This native tree is one of our favorites, hence its wide use. It offers interest every season of the year — shiny green leaves in the summer, brilliant reds, yellows, oranges and purples in the fall, and architectural structure in the winter.

Important for our purposes, black gum trees thrive in a variety of growing conditions making it suitable for planting in urban soils. They are tolerant of drought, heat, and both dry and wet soils. Typically, in cultivated conditions, the tree matures at 20-30 feet in height with a 1-2 inch diameter trunk. Because it’s native, it supports a variety of wildlife including mammals, birds, and insects.

You can learn more about black gum trees here.

September — “Spotted At”

This month in the gardens we’ve seen birds, bugs, pollinators, and more. But this particular insect really caught our eye! No, it’s not a sea urchin. It’s actually the caterpillar of the giant leopard moth. The caterpillar balls up when it feels threatened, and can be between 2 and 3 inches long at full size. We got a close look, and a couple of photos, before returning it to the garden where it’s welcome to eat, live, and pupate. We’ll keep an eye out for the adult version of the giant leopard moth in the spring!