The following pages include some simple guidelines for planting and maintaining your "backyard" naturally.  Many common practices have been tested at Universities and found to be wanting.  Some are based on either the premise that chemical fertilizers and insecticides are good to use or that water and oil are unlimited resources.  Both premises have proven to be false.  Another common false premise is that all insects and weeds are bad for a garden and need to be eliminated.

These guides are based on our best knowledge to date.  As we learn more, I am sure these will change too. 

"The bees rove and revel,
rejoicing in the bounty of the sun,
clambering eagerly through bramble and hucklebloom,
ringing the myriad bells of the manzanita,
now humming aloft among polleny willow and firs,
now...plunging deep into snowy banks of cherry and buckthorn."
John Muir, "The Mountains of California"