Grounds and Landscaping Sustainable Practices
Throughout the fall and winter months, FMS Grounds is tasked with collecting leaves from all over campus. With nearly 3,000 trees, the amount of leaf litter amounts to hundreds of yards of organic waste. FMS has put a mulching program in place on campus that shreds the leaf litter, speeding up the breakdown of leaves and creates a rich mulch product. Once ready, the grounds team brings the mulch back to campus, placing it around trees and in shrub beds. The benefits are weed control, improved soil health, and improved plant health. Additionally, FMS saves money and reduces carbon emissions by not shipping the leaf-litter off campus to be processed by waste-haulers.
During the last 5 years, the landscape at Chico State has been including more and more drought-tolerant and California native plants. The resulting landscapes are more attractive to birds, bees, butterflies and other beneficial insects and pollinators. In the fall of 2018, FMS completed two landscape improvement projects at the Gateway Science Museum, both of which incorporated a sub-surface irrigation system, drip irrigation, drought-tolerant and CA native plants. Future landscape improvement projects will work towards using even more of these plants.
FMS Grounds has improved and implemented bioswales on campus, which help reduce storm water runoff and pollution. Bioswales located at the Student Services Center and Yolo Hall are recent FMS projects to improve and introduce bioswales. Additional swales and sediment filters can be found in front of the EHS & UPD building, and inside the courtyard at the Arts & Humanities building. FMS Grounds is looking to install more swales and sediment filter areas throughout campus as part of their on-going plans to improve the look and function of the campus landscape.
In the summer of 2018, the campus was given a long-term maintenance agreement to clean up the riparian corridor that runs through the center of campus. A great deal of work has been done to clean up the existing sites, remove hazardous trees and non-native/invasive plants, open up sightlines, and trim vegetation away from trails and pathways. As a result, existing native vegetation has been given room to flourish which in turn creates better habitat for birds, owls, hawks, river otters, and fish. FMS Grounds will working to install more native trees and plant material along the riparian corridor to offset the vegetation that has been removed.