Wildlife-Friendly Cultivation Archives - Page 2 of 2

You can have all the native plants you want, but you won’t have nearly as many wild visitors unless you also leave the leaves

I opened the October issue of Consumer Reports with a feeling of mild dread. Every autumn, the magazine publishes an article extolling the virtues of leaf blowers, mowers, and other tools of destruction. This year was no different. A piece debating the pros and cons of vacuum functionality warned that leaf blowers might damage plants. But not to worry, the writer noted in the online version of the article: You can always switch to the vacuum mode instead! “If you have a small yard and are diligent about keeping up with leaves as they fall, or if you want to surgically suck up leaves from around bushes and flower beds, the vacuum mode on your leaf blower can save you time and effort.”

Time, effort, money—these are the shortsighted reasons often cited for deploying weapons against nature. I could list dozens of reasons why leaf blowers and vacuums are counterproductive to all three of those goals. But that would be beside the point. In an era of compounding losses, we need to focus not on saving ourselves from inconvenience but on saving lives instead.

As I watch plants go to sleep for the winter, I think of all the animals who are doing so too, especially the ones who’ve been able to make a life here because we have enough leaves to help them through every season. From the luna moth to the wood frog, many of our wild residents need the ground layers that so many of our human neighbors are intent on blowing away. Some of the species featured here were new to our habitat this year—a testament to what can happen when we adopt an ethos of minimal disturbance to the land.

The Luna Moth

“What’s this?” my husband, Will, texted me from outside one late July night. He’d been taking out the recycling when he happened upon this luna moth perched on a hickory tree near the driveway. We’d seen these beauties before, but not yet in our own little habitat. Over the years we’ve planted and nurtured many of the luna moth’s host plants: hickories, walnuts, sumacs, sweetgums and persimmons. But just as importantly, we’ve left the leaves to fall where they may underneath those trees. Like most other moths, luna moths overwinter in a cocoon in that leafy ground layer. (Moths are also in trouble because of light pollution, so our efforts to keep outdoor lights off at night—and to close the curtains inside—are likely making a difference too.)

The Wood Frogs and American Toads

Sometimes it’s hard to stay on task here for all the frogs and toads living in every nook and cranny. I call it being Thwarted by the Warted. This summer as I was pulling remaining bits of Japanese stiltgrass in a spot that’s now mostly covered in native plants, a young American toad (right) popped out of the decaying leaves nearby. A couple minutes later, the smallest wood frog (top) I’ve ever seen surfaced too. Both made their escapes into the leaves of a fallen tulip tree branch.

American toads and wood frogs both find refuge in leaves and dense vegetation during the hot days of summer. In winter they have different strategies; toads burrow underground, while wood frogs take shelter in fallen leaves and produce an antifreeze substance to survive the cold.

The American Bumblebees

Once among the most abundant bumblebee species in North America, the American bumblebee (Bombus pensylvanicus) is now highly threatened by the usual suspects: habitat destruction, pesticides, modern agricultural methods, and climate change. I spotted one of these little guys for the first time on ironweed flowers in late August; for the next couple of weeks I also saw them on wild bergamot blooms.

These bees make their nests on the ground or below ground in grasslands. They also nest in old rodent burrows (one of many reasons not to use rodenticides), abandoned birdhouses, and even cinderblocks or buckets. As with other bumblebee species, overwintering habitat is critical for the queens, who are the only ones left to start new colonies once spring arrives. Burrowing just below the soil surface, they wait out the cold season under the protection of fallen leaves and other decaying plant matter.

The Ringneck Snake

The floor under my bookcase isn’t the preferred habitat of ringneck snakes, but that’s where the poodle I was petsitting sniffed one out this summer. The snake was so wiggly and small that I worried about hurting her if I tried to scoop her up too quickly. An envelope and a glass did the trick.

Once outside, I found a rich spot of fallen leaves by the patio for her entry back into the wild. She had a little lint on her, but nothing a slide through the damp organic matter wouldn’t quickly wipe clean. Home at last from her basement adventure, she could now start the business of being a snake, eating earthworms, slugs and salamanders while trying to avoid being eaten by raccoons, owls, and even frogs, who can be both predators and prey of ringnecks.

These snakes are woodland dwellers, so their presence would not have been likely when this land was all turfgrass 20 years ago. During the winter, they hunker down in fallen leaves, rotting logs, stone walls or old mammal burrows—all of which are plentiful here.

The Meadow Fritillary and Silvery Checkerspot Butterflies

These two little butterflies, the meadow fritillary (above) and the silvery checkerspot (right), are uncommon in my community and across the state of Maryland. Though I may have spotted them from a distance over the last couple of years, this summer they indulged me by showing up for some closeups in a planting right next to the driveway. They live here in part because we have plenty of host plants for their young: Meadow fritillary caterpillars eat violets exclusively, and silvery checkerspots lay eggs on wingstem (Verbesina alternifolia), native sunflowers (Helianthus spp.), and reportedly purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea) and some black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia spp.).

But equally important to sustaining these butterflies’ life cycles are leaves and other decaying matter. Both species overwinter as caterpillars, with the meadow fritillaries waiting out the cold in violet habitat and the silvery checkerspots hibernating at the base of their host plants.

Unlike monarch butterflies, these creatures aren’t snowbirds flying south for the winter. Overwintering animals rely on us to protect leafy blankets and cozy stems and insulating stumps that make the lands outside our houses their permanent homes. It’s so easy to do, and so life-giving. And if we all did it, could it even be species-saving?

Photos: Luna moth by Will Heinz; all others by Nancy Lawson.