Bringing Nature Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants, Updated and Expanded
Where to buy Bringing Scenery Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants, Updated and Expanded books online?
- ISBN13: 9780881929928
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
With the accelerating pace of development and subsequent habitat destruction, the pressures on wildlife populations are greater than ever. But there is a surprisingly vital and relatively simple step toward reversing this alarming trend: Everyone with access to a patch of planet can make a significant contribution to sustaining biodiversity.
There is an unbreakable link between native plant species and native wildlife. Most native insects cannot, or will not, eat alien plants. When native plant species disappear, the insects disappear, thus impoverishing the food source for birds and additional animals. In many parts of the world, habitat destruction has been so wide that local wildlife populations are in crisis and may be headed toward extinction. By planting natives, everyone can provide a welcoming environment for wildlife. This doesn’t need to entail a drastic fix of your yard or garden. The process can be gradual and can reflect both personal preferences and local sensitivities.
Bringing Scenery Home has sparked a national conversation about the link between healthy local ecosystems and human well-being, and the new paperback edition — with an expanded resource section and updated photos — will help broaden the movement. By acting on Douglas Tallamy’s practical recommendations, everyone can make a difference.
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- Native Son
The leader has a firm grasp on the importance of insects. He also realizes that native plants are necessary for maintaining biodiversity. What is a bit comical is that he gives the impression that his thoughts on topics discussed in this book are unique. And they are….if you’re not a naturalist. I suppose he and many like him can be excused for thinking this since collegiate settings (the leader is a professor) can be a limitation to real-world experiences. And, indeed, the leader strays from what he knows best and teaches (entomology) into the uncharted waters of scenery (a meadow he has small experience with).
For example, Dr. Tallamy says that Japanese Beetles have no natural predators in this country. I reflect most wildlife professionals would agree that moles, skunks, Blue Jays, and some predatory insects, all of which feed upon Jap. Beetles in grub or adult form, are native animals.
He also delves into the world of non-native plants where the bashing of them continues in earnest. This feel-excellent, issue du jour is more about guilt-transference than legitimate science.
His aver that alien plants out-compete native plants because the aliens do not suffer constant attacks from local wildlife sounds feasible, but he needs to broaden his thinking. What happens underground is what has the greatest impact on the success of any plant, no matter the trials that plants go through at the surface. Native plants generally like fantastic soil because they evolved with it. They don’t do crummy soil. Human activity destroys fantastic soils and, thus, any plant (certain invasives) that can do well in terrible soil has a huge advantage.
Tallamy’s contention that alien plants deplete soils is counterintuitive. If you have a plant that will grow in subsoil or compacted soil, it’s helping to enrich it by opening up the soil and depositing organic matter into it. Thank God there are plants that will bud and flourish in these dreadful soils because if nothing grew there, the soil would NEVER be rehabilitated and, thus, made more acceptable to the seed of a native plant.
And since alien plants do have wildlife value, is the Dr. prepared to deny wildlife this source of food from soils in which a native plant would not be caught dead sinking a root?
Let’s face it. Invasives are helping to fix one of the many human messes on this planet: soil profile destruction.
Douglass Tallamy has my permission to use these concepts as his original thought in his next book.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5
The basic premise of this book is that native plants have had tens of thousands of years to renovate point(pun proposed) relationships with the bacteria, insects, fungi, birds and additional species in the local biome. When non-native plants are introduced by people into our environment, they do not have relationships with the local primary and secondary herbivores and do not support the local food chain. I establish this to be a potentially powerful observation and concept that should markedly impact how we select plants for our gardens and landscapes.
The one problem I have with this is the revelation that introduced foreign insects run amok and consume hundreds of our native plants because they have no natural predators. If there is such a forceful relationship between our native plants and native insects, I would expect that this would also be right for foreign insects, but rumor has it that it is not. This makes me suspect that the central thesis and foundation of this text may be to some extent simplistic and limited in scope. I do feel that this book should be read, but also feel that it might be the start of more personal inquiry into this area.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
Excellent initial book for persons lacking any knowledge of native plants. Chapters: Building It Take place and What Should I Plant had very practical information for persons ready to plot and plant a garden including regional natives. Appendix 1 & 2 were also very useful.
The leader identifies an insect pest but does not state what the natural predator is. As a replacement for starts in on the evils of insecticides. I felt I had to skim over the preachy parts which comprised about 60% of the book.
Borrow it from the library or a friend, it’s not worth taking up space on your bookshelf.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
As a plant ecologist, horticulturist, and native plant lover, I was keen to read “Bringing Scenery Home”, which has been widely touted as the most compelling case yet for the use of native plants in U.S. gardens. Douglas Tallamy’s basic argument is that widespread suburbanization has resulted in the replacement of native vegetation with exotic vegetation, which allegedly does not support the diversity of insects and insectivores (most notably birds) that native plants support. The first segment of this argument is simply not right for much of the United States. In New England, for example, the landscape is much more “natural” than it was 100 years ago, when it was 70 or 80 percent deforested, with exotic crops and grasses dominating much of the region. In additional words, the trend has been the replacement of exotic vegetation with native vegetation, the opposite of what Tallamy claims. Nor does Tallamy present evidence that native plants automatically support more diversity than do exotic plants. He cites some research that does indeed demonstrate that some native species host more insects than do closely related exotics. But as Tallamy himself repeatedly admits, this pattern does not hold for some groups of plants such as crabapples. He further admits that research on the adaptation of native insects to exotic plants is still scanty and in its infancy. In light of this, his assertion that “unless we restore native plants to our suburban ecosystems, the future of biodiversity in the United States is grim” is more than just a bit over the top. This book has much to say on behalf of the merits and benefits of native plants. It’s a bring shame on that its many excellent points are drowned out by its sometimes alarmist and absolutist tone.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
This was a well written no nonsense book on the necessary steps we need to take to keep our eco
logy healthy. It adapts well to nearly any size lot in urban or rural settings. If you like birds,butterflies,ect., this seems to be an brilliant way to sustain them.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5