BiodiversityWorks, founded by wildlife biologist Luanne Johnson, is an organization whose mission is to promote conservation through wildlife research and monitoring, and to provide opportunities for people to engage with nature. One of the programs BiodiversityWorks offers is Natural Neighbors. How it works: A representative from BiodiversityWorks visits your property to identify current and potential contributions to support the island’s biodiversity. From there, they customize a management plan that will benefit plants, pollinators, and wildlife.
“The idea of conservation lands is great, but that alone, and with continued development, isn’t enough to sustain our wildlife,” Rich Couse, Natural Neighbors program director, said. “One way to help our wildlife is to make our own yards conservation land. We do that by recommending ways to create habitats for insects, birds, and native plants that attract wildlife, and how to create shelter, food, and water sources.”
My husband and I are very lucky. His employer is building employee housing, and we were able to procure one. Given the housing shortage on the Island, we feel immensely grateful for this opportunity, but we also want to be respectful of the land we’ll be living on, and of the wildlife we’ll be sharing that land with. So we set up an appointment with Couse.
Joined by his assistant, Will Hamson, Couse walked us around our house, which is slated to be done in December, and talked through possible plantings for the spring. Couse isn’t a landscape architect. He is a conservation biologist. “We come at landscaping differently,” Couse said. “We’re recommending plants that are native to the Island, and that will help the habitat in varying locations thrive. We take different things into consideration.”
For example, we aren’t sure what habitats were disrupted and displaced by the clearing of the land, and if there are ways we can amend some of that disruption. “You can put up one or two nesting boxes for birds and bats,” Couse said. “You can also create a hibernaculum [a place in which an animal seeks refuge] for snakes by making a rock pile where they can stay during the winter.” He also suggested a birdbath, pond, or a small water feature of some kind to provide a water source for birds and other critters.
Couse went on to suggest that if we want low-maintenance grass, we could use native grass seeds — crabgrass being the most native. “The Vineyard Conservation Society [VCS] website has a link on how to maintain that kind of lawn,” Couse noted (bit.ly/VCS_MVLawns).
I checked the VCS link, and was struck by the following: “The ubiquitous suburban lawn — that emerald-green, weed-free monoculture — has never been the ideal here. In fact, for many of us, it’s not even desirable. Instead of seeing a safe and inviting extension of our homes, we’re thinking of downstream consequences of chemical perfection. The fertilizers used for monoculture turf contribute significantly to the nitrogen pollution that has our coastal ponds frequently closed to swimming and shellfishing. The pesticides and herbicides used to kill bugs and weeds also kill native biodiversity and threaten our drinking water. Even the watering needed to keep a lawn artificially green in summer is a sad waste of groundwater during the most droughty season.”
Currently our backyard is dirt, and pretty tiny. Behind it are woods, which makes us extraordinarily happy. As we were looking at the plants surrounding the woods’ edge, Couse pointed out a small pile of dead tree limbs not too far in. “Leaving that pile is a way to provide shelter for wildlife,” he said. On the side of our house is a massive pile of topsoil that was dug up when the land was cleared. Eventually that topsoil will be reused. Couse pointed out the grasses and plants that were growing out of it. “Invasive plants can get a good foothold in a pile of topsoil like this. In some ways, it’s like a compromised immune system,” Couse said. “Plants can act like disease and take advantage.”
Some invasive plants Couse said to watch out for include multiflora rose, oriental bittersweet, and honeysuckle. In terms of what to plant, Couse had a number of suggestions. “Ground covers we typically recommend are the Eastern teaberry/wintergreen, which is a plant you already have growing here,” he said. Other suggestions included Virginia creeper, wild strawberry, and wild geranium.
Walking around to the front of the house, we asked about tall decorative grasses. “Miscanthus [species] like silvergrass are what we often see here — big grasses with fuzzy tops. They look great, but they can ruin other grass. When they seed, those seeds fly everywhere,” Couse said. “An alternative is switchgrass, which is a little less showy, but serves the same purpose.”
I was curious about flowers. I’m aware that many flowers we see here aren’t native to the Island, but flowers add such color and levity to a space, so I definitely want to include some. The flowers Couse suggested included those from the goldenrod family. “These bloom later in the season,” Couse said. “Milkweeds are also good choices.”
My husband and I were at a farm recently that had glorious bushes and flowers with butterflies dancing everywhere. We looked at each other and were like, “That’s what we want!” So I was pleased to find out, through xerces.org, that milkweeds are the required host plants for caterpillars of the monarch butterfly, and play a critical role in the monarch’s life cycle.
“Mountain mint, which are white flowers that grow tall, are also good,” Hamson added.
“Yes, those are pollinator powerhouses,” Couse said. “For sunny areas, meadow-type flowers are good. For shade, red columbine, and for wet areas, cardinal flowers are great.”
So where do you find these flowers and plants? One of the nice things about the Island is the symbiotic relationships that develop between people, and between organizations. Polly Hill Arboretum partners with Natural Neighbors with its MV Wild Type propagation program. “Plugs can be purchased online, Sept. 6 through Oct. 9,” Emily Ellingson, curator and assistant director of Polly Hill, said. “Rich does the site visits, and we share what we have available. He gets back to us on what people ask for.” These landscape plugs are an economical way to add native plant diversity to your yard.
As we were wrapping up our visit, Couse looked at our front porch and asked what outdoor lighting we were using, suggesting we choose insect-friendly bulbs. “Anything below 3,000 lumens is best,” Couse said. This was news to me, which just goes to show that even someone who is interested in nature, plants, and wildlife can still be in the dark about certain aspects of conservation. So I asked Couse what most folks misunderstand when it comes to planting.
“We often have what we call ‘plant blindness,’” he said. “I had it too. When I lived off-Island, I went to Home Depot to pick out plants, just like everyone else. Most people think, ‘A plant is a plant.’ We don’t think about native plants versus nonnative plants. A plant from Asia doesn’t have a purpose here. Every native plant serves a purpose, and that’s what people miss. But no one teaches about this — they teach about the food web, but not about how important native plants are.”
This may be changing, however. The Natural Neighbors program is thriving. “It’s going very well. I am consistently scheduling people at least two months out,” Couse said. “My greatest joy is when I visit a property, and they don’t have to do anything. I can tell them to just keep doing what they’re doing. Which is nothing. The native plants have grown in, and they left them. There is a lot of potential on the Island for maintained conservation land. We have a chance to keep the Island pristine, or at least not lose more of what has been here for a very long time.”
If you’re interested in having Natural Neighbors come to your house or place of business, reach out to biodiversityworksmv.org to set up a free appointment. As its website says, there is no better way to get connected to nature than in your own backyard.
