Nature’s Best Hope shows how homeowners everywhere can turn their yards into conservation corridors that provide wildlife habitats. Because this approach relies on the initiatives of private individuals, it is immune from the whims of government policy. Even more important, it’s practical, effective, and easy—you will walk away with specific suggestions you can incorporate into your own yard.

Number 1

Cut your lawn area in half. We have converted an area the size of New England into this ecologically destructive status symbol. Lawn fails to support diverse food webs and vital pollinator communities, it degrades our watersheds, and it is the worst plant choice for sequestering carbon. Restrict your lawn to the areas where you regularly walk.

Number 2

Remove invasive plants from your property, and resist the temptation to buy new ones at your local nursery. By definition, these plants are tumors that spread to natural areas, where they displace the valuable native plant communities that support insects.

Number 3

Plant more of the native plants that support the most insect species. In general, native plants support the life cycles of 10-100 times more insect species than non-native plants, and a few native plants serve as host plants for 10-100 times more insects than most other native plants. You can find out which plants are best at fueling food webs in your county by visiting the Native Plant Finder at the National Wildlife Federation website.

Number 4

Minimize the use of harmful chemicals. Homeowners use more chemicals than agriculture does, and nearly all of this use is unnecessary.

Number 5

Oppose mosquito fogging in your community. Contrary to what many fogging companies tell you, the pyrethroids used to knock down adult mosquitoes kill nearly all of the insects they contact. Mosquitoes are best controlled in the larval stage with targeted products like mosquito dunks (Bacillus thurengiensis) that kill nothing else.

Number 6

We have 4000 species of native bees that pollinated the vast majority of the plants in North America before we introduced the honey bee from Europe. Most of these native bees are suffering from our tendency to replace blooming native plants with lawn and concrete. Plants like goldenrod, asters, sunflowers, violets, evening primrose, and native willows are best at supporting native bee specialists, and they attract generalist pollinators like honeybees and bumblebees as well.

Number 7

Put motion sensors on your security lights. Lights draw insects in all night long, exhausting them and making them easy prey for bats and birds. If each of the millions of lights we turn on in this country, mostly out of habit, kills just a few insects each night…well, you can do the math.