Sustainable Backyard Tour Returns June 10
A free, self-guided tour of residential yards throughout St. Louis, the tour showcases a range of green living practices, including low-impact lawn care, composting and using recycled materials, organic gardening, chicken and beekeeping, gardening with native plants, water conservation, and renewable energy.
If your backyard is green or you know someone whose yard is, we invite you to consider being a host on this year’s tour and putting your yard on show.
Your yard doesn’t need to be perfect, elaborate or large. If it’s inviting and demonstrates some element of sustainability that the public can learn from, we’d like to hear from you! As an organic, life-celebrating event, the tour asks only that you commit to organic best-practices and refrain from using synthetic pesticides and additives. If you have questions about what that means, we encourage you to contact us for more information.
As a host, you agree to open your yard from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and interact with visitors—as many as 300 might visit your yard! We can’t know how many because while registration is strongly encouraged, it is not required to attend. Guests design their own routes and set their own pace, choosing from the addresses and descriptions in the tour booklet and online.
More than 300 St. Louis families have welcomed tour goers over the past eight years. Practices like naturescaping, rain gardening and edible landscaping are spreading into every neighborhood and town—we want to find the trailblazers so we can shine a light on their efforts and learn from each other.
While many host sites are single family backyards, organizers encourage residents of apartment buildings, condos and other residential communities to apply, too. If you have worked hard to make your yard sustainable, consider being a host.
The deadline to register to host is May 1st.
Visit www.sustainablebackyard.org for details or email Terry Winkelman at Terry@SustainableBackyardTour.com.