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Avoid heavy equipment whenever possible; big machinery often fakes efficiency. Rain gardens are commonly dug out by backhoes and fine grading is done by skid loaders. Inappropriate or oversized equipment does more damage than good, and it takes years for a site to recover from the compaction and unnecessary disturbance. In the time spent waiting for machinery to be delivered to a site, a team of five could have prepared a planting area with three rakes, two shovels, and no compaction.
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Thomas Rainer (Planting in a Post-Wild World: Designing Plant Communities for Resilient Landscapes)