I learned about this movement when I took a webinar on “Good Bugs” from Dr. Mary Gardiner, an entomologist at Ohio State University. Her point is simple: dandelions are one of the few sources of food for pollinators in the early months of spring, so don’t mow them down.
I was persuaded, and I must admit, I have come to like the look of the dandelions. More challenging are the other plants that could be called weeds because they don’t belong in a lawn and don’t provide anything useful to pollinators. I can, of course, remove these plants by hand, but how long can I tolerate the result of the wildly different growth patterns of my various grasses? I have tufts and clumps everywhere, thick spots and thin spots. How quickly and how thoroughly can I change my aesthetic so that I like a ratty-looking lawn? I might have to capitulate and mow in May.
Over the past few months, I have become intrigued by the pollinator/native plant approach to gardening and by the work of Doug Tallamy, a professor at the University of Delaware, whose books – Bringing Nature Home (2007) and The Living Landscape (2014) — have become guides for the effort to restore our native ecosystem.
A more recent book, Nature’s Best Hope (2019), proposes an extraordinary idea:
“What if each American landowner made it a goal to convert half of his or her lawn to productive native plant communities. Even moderate success could collectively restore some semblance of ecosystem function to more than twenty million acres of what is now ecological wasteland. How big is twenty million acres? It’s bigger than the combined areas of the Everglades, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Teton, Canyonlands, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Badlands, Olympic, Sequoia, Grand Canyon, Denali and the Great Smoky Mountains National Parks. . . . I suggest we call it Homegrown National Park.”
Tallamy’s primary concern is to create habitats that support the insect life that in turns supports other creatures, particularly birds. Birds need caterpillars to feed themselves and their young, and moth and butterfly caterpillars turn out to be quite particular about what they chew. Therefore, Tallamy and others have developed lists of plants that are organized according to the number of caterpillars they support. Just google Native Plant Finder, type in your zip code, and you will get a list of Tallamy-approved plants for your zone. Native oaks, willows, cherries, and birches come out on top for trees and shrubs for my zone. Goldenrod, joe-pye weed, Helianthus, and wild strawberry top the list for perennials. Violets are good too.
I breathed a sigh of relief when I discovered that my birch, Betula nigra, was a native. I patted myself on the back for having left the violets alone, allowing them to cover much of the ground in my rear gardens.
I love Tallamy’s concept of Homegrown National Park, and I am promoting it wherever I can. I think it a brilliant marketing tool, something that people can understand and buy into. If you turn part of your lawn (or current garden) into a Tallamy planting, you can get a sign that says you are part of Homegrown National Park. People like signs.
A Tallamy planting, however, is very specific and somewhat limited. There are other approaches that are equally valuable. I suggest that we think of the larger movement to restore our native ecosystem and support pollinators as composed of three overlapping but not identical circles. There is the circle composed of plants native to the northeastern United States. Not all of these plants support pollinators or desired caterpillars, but they may interact in beneficial ways with those that do. There is the circle composed of plants that support pollinators, which can include plants that are not natives. And then there is the circle labelled Homegrown National Park, where the plantings are determined entirely by the number of moth and butterfly caterpillars they support.
All who write on this issue agree that, since we have so seriously disrupted our native ecosystem, restoration is complicated. Because the science is so complex, my own approach is to plant some pollinators, some natives, and some of Tallamy’s first choices. So, yes, I have ordered a red oak seedling, though I do not know where I will put it or how I will keep it from being eaten.
The last few Fridays, Kevin and I have played the red oak game. He will stand in a spot in the garden and pretend to be an oak, stretching up as high as he can and spreading out his arms as wide as he can. Then I will go to the spot and do the same. So far, we have not found any place to put an oak seedling. I have a lot of trees already, and they are situated so as to have sufficient space to accommodate future growth. I know, however, that Kevin and I will persist until we find a space. The problem is: you don’t want to move an oak once you have planted it.
To be clear, I am not about to rip out all my current plantings just because they do not fit in any of the three circles. Many fall into the category of “deeply loved exotics.” Luckily, I have support for my passion.
In 1470 B.C. the Egyptian queen Hatshepsut fell in love with trees (Boswellia sacra and Commiphora myrrha) from Somalia and ordered them dug up and brought to her, their roots protectively balled in baskets. We know of this event because the journey is recorded on the walls of a temple in Thebes. After I encountered Hatshepsut, I felt better about my Japanese Stewartia and my Chinese Heptacodium. She continues to remind me that there is a long history to human beings wanting plants from elsewhere.
Still moderation and balance are essential in this matter as well. Some exotics, introduced for their ornamental value and their appeal to the Hatshepsut in us, have become nasty invasives. They have escaped the confines of our gardens and set up shop in the native landscape, sometimes with devastating ecological consequences. Take, for instance, the Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergii). Until you have seen a forest floor covered with thousands of baby barberries, you cannot realize the full meaning of “nasty invasive.” Once you have seen this sight, you will never ever want to plant a barberry again.
So I adopt the approach of balance and moderation: 1/3 for the birds, 1/3 for the bees, 1/3 for my own personal pleasure. I will keep my lawn unmowed for as long as I can tolerate the ratty look and plant as many natives as I can cram into already full gardens. But my blackberry lily, a perennial native to eastern Russia as well as China and Japan, stays. And so does my ancient Hydrangea paniculata ‘Tardiva,’ a native of China and Japan. It continues to show me how beautiful aging can be.