The World Wildlife Fund reported in October 2024 that between 1970 and 2020, Earth had lost two-thirds of its wildlife.
This jaw-dropping news joins a litany of other recent reports about our steady march into the sixth great extinction event on our home, Planet Earth: from the global decline of insects, to the loss of 3 billion North American birds in the last 50 years, to the 22% decline in North American butterflies since 2000, to the failure of the 150-nation global biodiversity initiative to meet even one of its 10-year goals, and finally to the United Nation’s prediction that 1 million species will go extinct in the next 20 years.
You could hardly be blamed for concluding that the demise of our fellow earthlings, and thus our life support systems, is inevitable. But to that I exclaim, “Not in our yard!”
This guest article was written by Doug Tallamy, TA Baker Professor of Agriculture and Natural Resources at University of Delaware and founder of the Homegrown National Parks movement.
Insects are wildlife.
Mention “wildlife,” and most people conjure up images of megafauna like lions and tigers and bears (oh my!); camels, rhinos, and eagles; wolverines, jaguars, and Burmese pythons. Yet wildlife is far more than the few large mammal species that adorned our childhood picture books.
The vast majority of Earth’s animal species are insects and other invertebrates, as well as the insectivores, like birds, salamanders, foxes, possums, raccoons, rodents, spiders, and lizards, that eat them. We, humans, will not survive long on this planet without these tiny creatures.
As naturalist E.O. Wilson famously explained long ago: Insects are the little things that run the world. Without insect pollinators, 80% of all plants, and 90% of all flowering plants, would disappear, as would the food webs that support mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds, and freshwater fishes. What’s more, the earth would rot, as bacteria and fungi replace insect decomposers that rapidly recycle nutrients.
Wilson’s message was clear: there will be no lions, tigers, or bears; birds, bats, bunnies — or even humans — in a world without insects.
Despite Wilson’s warnings, we have waged war on many insects and ignored the basic needs of the rest for so long that now most insects are in trouble. By one measure, the little things that support our world have already declined globally by 45%. Insects are not the only important forms of wildlife, but nearly all of the more charismatic vertebrates depend on them.
The simple truth is, we cannot reverse wildlife losses without reversing insect declines.
We can make a difference at home.
For the past nine years, I have been photographing the moth species that live on our property; I haven’t gotten to the butterflies yet. One recent night, I reached 1,377 species. That’s right: at least 1,377, and counting, moth species now make their living on our 10-acre patch of southeastern Pennsylvania. That is 44% of all of the moth species that have been recorded in the 29.4 million acres that comprise Pennsylvania; 44% on just 1/2,940,000th of the land area!
And because many of those moths, and the caterpillars they developed from, are essential bird food, 62 species of birds have been able to breed on our property: a full 38 % of all the terrestrial birds that breed in Pennsylvania. And who knows how many additional bird species have used our land as a refueling site during fall and spring migration?
Our property is not a long-protected preserve. Just the opposite. Not long ago, it was part of a small farm whose successive owners had worked the land hard for nearly 300 years. Before we moved in, the vegetation was a tangle of invasive plants that the owners had mowed and called "hay." Very few trees and native shrubs grew here, and most of the resident birds were introduced starlings and house sparrows that could thrive on exhausted farmland. The caterpillars that sustain 96% of North American terrestrial bird species were largely absent.
But today, rather than having lost two-thirds of its wildlife as WWF suggests, our 10 acres have increased the number of its resident wildlife species by at least that much, probably much more. And it did not take decades for those increases to occur.
The depleted agricultural wasteland of two decades ago has become a hotspot for local wildlife. How did this happen?
Landscape for nature with native plants.
The seemingly astounding rebound in species on our property was not accidental, and, when we act in time, not all that astounding. It was a predictable response by the natural world to our purposeful restoration of nature’s foundation: native plants.
The moths I am counting have returned because the native plants they require are now here as well. And those plants are thriving on our property because, along with the wind and the local blue jays, we have planted them. We have also cleared the tangle of invasive species so that our native plants have enough space, light, and water to grow, and we do our best to protect them from the burgeoning population of deer in our neighborhood.
The birds and other vertebrates that live on our land can do so, not just because of the moths our plants produce, but also because of the fruits and nuts our oaks, black walnuts, hickories, filberts, blackberries, serviceberries, dogwoods, persimmons, black cherries, pawpaws, chokeberries, viburnums, and black gums make each year.
Winter birds like juncos and white-throated sparrows migrate to our yard because of the copious amounts of seeds produced by our native grasses, sweetgums, sycamores, evening primroses, asters, wild lettuce, black-eyed Susans, and goldenrods. Red-shouldered hawks, Cooper’s hawks, and sharp-shinned hawks regularly hunt here because their prey is so abundant. And it is hard to walk anywhere in the spring and summer without encountering the cutest little gray tree frogs imaginable.
We have planted native plants because 90% of the caterpillar species, the meat and potatoes of terrestrial food webs that transfer more of the sun’s energy from plants to other animals than any other plant-eaters, are unable to develop on non-native plants — those ornamentals we habitually decorate our yards with. Most insects can only use plants after they have evolved adaptations that counter the chemical and physical defenses of those plants. Such adaptations take eons to appear, eliminating the chance that decorative plants from other continents can serve as viable host plants for most of our insects.
When we allow non-native plants to replace native plant communities, either as well-behaved ornamentals or invasive species that ecologically castrate local ecosystems, caterpillar populations decline by up to 96%. Those plants simply have not been here nearly long enough for North American insects to adapt to them, even though many have been here for hundreds of years.
Working together
Will our 10-acre restoration alone be able to reverse global declines in wildlife? Of course not, but if ecologically appropriate plant choices were consistently made by homeowners, land managers, and municipalities everywhere, the habitat value of all non-agricultural land would be measurably enhanced, just as it has been on our property in Pennsylvania.
Most agricultural lands can be improved as well, by liberal use of pollinator strips and hedgerows rich in native plant species, and by removing the mowed turf from roadside verges and returning the native plants —the milkweeds, asters, goldenrods, sunflowers, evening primroses, ironweeds, and more that used to thrive in these strips throughout agricultural settings.
Aided by groups like the National Wildlife Federation, Homegrown National Park, National Audubon, Wild Ones, Grow Native, the Wild Seed Project, the Missouri Prairie Foundation, and the California, Texas, New Jersey, North Carolina, and Florida Native Plant Societies, such transformations are well underway across the country, and, just as on our property, the results are beginning to defy global wildlife trends.
In 1949, Aldo Leopold lamented that “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.” But that was then, and this is now. You are no longer alone in your desire to heal the ecological wounds around you, and you can heal them quickly and effectively starting today on the tiny piece of the earth you can influence the easiest: your yard.
Returning native plants to our landscapes provides essential energy for species-rich food webs on any scale, be it 10-acre parcels like ours, half-acre suburban lots like Margy and Dan Terpstra’s near St. Louis, 1/10th-acre city lots like Pam Karlson’s in Chicago, or even the 3-foot-wide strip of nature along Manhattan’s High Line.
The ecological approach to landscaping that I have described here is nothing more than basic earth stewardship, but it is stewardship that empowers us all to become forces in conservation.
Replace part of your lawn with ecologically powerful native plants; remove those ornamentals that have proven to be invasive; and plant a pollinator garden.
Even if you don’t own land, you can make a difference by volunteering to help your local land conservancy manage its properties, or simply by helping someone who does own property. Either as property owners or volunteers, each of us has the power — and we have the responsibility — to enhance the ecological value of local landscapes.
My yard’s message is loud and clear: Most wildlife losses are reversible!
Humans can coexist with the natural world in the same place at the same time. Whether we decide to do so will determine nature’s fate and, ultimately, our own. In that sense, we are all nature’s best hope!
About Everyday Environment
Everyday Environment is a series of blogs, podcasts, webinars, and videos exploring the intricate web of connections that tie us to the natural world.
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