Family Friday: Nothin’ Better Than Your Own Backyard (for Wildlife)

For August, Lucas Miller discusses a great program run by the National Wildlife Federation and shows how easy it was for his family to create a certified wildlife habitat in their own backyard. (If the reference in the article’s title is unfamiliar, check out Robert Earl Keen’s song I’m Coming Home.)

Whether you have a .35 acre lot in the suburbs, a sprawling ranch in the boonies or a mere balcony in the city, you can attract wildlife that will intrigue and excite your wee ones with a minimal investment of work and money.  The National Wildlife Federation’s Certified Wildlife Habitat program provides you with all the information you need to get started as well as the actual “certification.”  I don’t imagine your local bluebird’s likely to notice the certification sign that you can proudly display but, just perhaps, your human neighbors may ask you a few questions and convert their own piece of turf to a haven for native flora and fauna. Read more

Book Review for ‘Bringing Nature Home’

This summer was hard on our yard. Several of our plants bit the dust and a few more are looking shaky. As a result, we’ve been thinking about replacements. We tend to plant native plants, but our reason for doing so has simply been that we aren’t willing to pay to water our yard. :) Then I read Bringing Nature Home: How Native Plants Sustain Wildlife in Our Gardens by Dr. Douglas W. Tallamy and became committed to planting native plants on an entirely different level. Read more