What are green landscaping materials?

Green landscaping allows you to plan and maintain an aesthetically pleasing yard or lawn without having to use harmful techniques or toxic chemicals. Success as a green landscaper, however, is very much dependent on taking into consideration the unique factors of your home climate. One way to tend to your lawn in an environmentally conscious manner is by using green landscaping materials.

Basic landscaping materials include mulch, wood, bricks, stone and wood chips. Nowadays, there are tests available to see whether the materials you're using on your lawn or yard are actually harmful to the environment. For example, the type of concrete that's traditionally used to landscape isn't good for the environment since it contains carbon dioxide. However, there are eco-friendly alternatives to standard concrete, including reused or broken concrete pavers and recycled glass pavers [source: Green Your]. As far as bricks go, most of the ones manufactured in the United States are made in natural gas kilns, which are much less harmful to the environment than wood-fired kilns. If you're looking to really make a positive impact on the environment, then you should consider using terra-cotta or adobe bricks, since neither of them require kilns.

If you're planning to use stone materials, be aware that taking stones out of quarries that are next to bodies of water is especially harmful to the environment. As such, you'd want to look for companies that get their stones from inland locations. Better still, just use rocks that are in your soil. In order to avoid using wood that's not eco-friendly, you should not use any lumber products that are treated. When deciding on what type of mulch to use, rubber mulch and artificially dyed mulch aren't eco-friendly and should thus be avoided.