Using Plants for Stormwater Management: A Green Infrastructure Guide for the Gulf South
By Dana Nunez Brown
2013
Review by Chris Belser:
This book, published by LSU Press, is an excellent resource for anyone looking for information about how to harness plants to help with stormwater management
and nuisance flooding.
The introduction provides a brief overview of basic information about stormwater management within our region and introduces the different plant communities that will be discussed later in the book. Each plant community is associated with the primary habitat (e.g., flatwoods ponds, small stream forests, scrub swamps, batture lands) in which these groups of plants thrive.
The majority of the book focuses on different plants that can be utilized for stormwater management, broken in to six categories: 1. Deciduous trees; 2. Evergreen trees; 3. Deciduous shrubs; 4. Evergreen shrubs; 5. Grasses and ferns; 6. Perennials. Each plant mentioned in the book gets its own page, complete with multiple pictures of each, growing conditions, and quick facts.
Whether your issue is a low area in your yard that holds water or more large scale stormwater flooding, this book has something for you.