Backyard conservation: Saving the planet one lawn at a time

I recently read Doug Tallamy’s book, "Nature’s Best Hope: A New Approach to Conservation that Starts in Your Yard," and it made me look at my lawn anew.

Tallamy is making the rounds in our area, speaking in person at Shepherd University and virtually several times in September. A professor of entomology and wildlife ecology at the University of Delaware, Tallamy sees homeowners as potentially the new front line of American conservation.

If Tallamy is correct, we hold the future of wildlife and ecosystem health in our hands — or on our lawns.

Now Tallamy is not the first to suggest this idea. More than a century ago, John Burroughs, the conservationist of the Catskills, recommended creating nature-friendly landscapes outside one’s doors in a series of nature books written for children and adults.

Tallamy carries on that tradition by arguing that our existing public lands (e.g., national parks, forests, wildlife refuges) are not large enough to provide the habitat and corridors to protect wildlife during turbulent climatic times. Instead, Tallamy proposes “homegrown national parks” established in our backyard lawns across America to augment our already protected lands.

His arguments are as compelling as his vision of the future. If each landowner converted half of their lawn to native plant communities, it would add 20 million acres of habitat to our natural areas in the U.S.

That would be the equivalent of 13 large national parks, spread across the continent. More habitat, food, and corridors for long-distance migrants like monarch butterflies would be an immediate and obvious benefit.

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Less visible but equally important would be the stabilization of ecosystems, climate change remediation and the restoration of large-scale natural processes helping keep invasives and wild fluctuations at bay.

The human benefits are also myriad. In 1956, Marylander Rachel Carson suggested it was critical to use nearby natural habitats to instill a “sense of wonder” and a love of nature in our youth.

Fifty years later, Richard Louv’s book, "Last Child in the Wood," warned that a lack of easily accessible natural habitats for young people leads to what he called “nature-deficit disorder.”

Instead, our backyards could become conservation classrooms and overcome this malady while achieving Carson’s vision.

Best of all, Tallamy suggests a pathway to transform our yards from bastions of bluegrass to beacons for wildlife. Some of the simple steps he suggests include shrinking the lawn (by half if possible), removing invasive species, planting native species of trees and flowers, growing pollinator favorites, limiting fertilizers and pesticides, and, finally, conversing with one’s neighbors about transforming grassy monocultures to rich wildlife corridors.

Although it won’t happen overnight, the path is feasible and enticing. Both our landscape and families will be healthier, happier and enriched. We can all transform our role from lawnmowers and chemical engineers to ecosystem architects!

Mark Madison is an environmental historian whose Hagerstown backyard is still in the process of undergoing naturalization.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Backyard conservation is good for families and good for the planet