BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY

Biological diversity has become a buzz word in our culture. From the spotted owls of the Pacific northwest to the rain forests in Brazil...concerns about biological diverstiy captures public attention. Biological diversity refers to the variety, complex relationships and interdependence of living things in our world. Our waters and riparian lands support some of the richest biological diversity of northern latitudes.

You can help maintain diversity by protecting and managing the natural environments on your property: wet meadows, hardwood forests, and bogs. You can encourage fish, bird, reptile and other species in any of these habitats. View your property as a piece of a regional environmental puzzle. Before you decide to alter it, determine how it functions in realtion to your neighbors' lands, land in the watershed, the town and the county. The landscape scale diversity often requires large areas of important natural habitat types. Creating a variety of artificial habitats on your property may destroy an existing larger natural habitat unit. For example, you might choose to protect an entire stand of old-growth forest rather than fragmenting it to create a local diversity on a 10 or 20 acre parcel.

As human activites and development encroach on the natural landscape, shorelands of lakes, rivers and streams become more important travel corridors for wildlife. Your protection of these wildlife "highways" will provide an opportunity to view the tracks, sign and travels of frogs, salamanders, turtles, otter, mink, osprey and others.

                         FIRST STEPS

Start with an inventory of what you already have. Whether you are building on a lot for the first times or considering a change, talk to the neighbors and take a walk to tally the living things with which you share a home. What creatures do you see and hear at different seasons and times of day? What plants and trees are they using? Now that you have a list, you need a plan:
-Collect information about the species and habitats you discovered.
-Research the habitat requirements of the plants and animals on your list.
-Map your property's habitat types (open meadows, upland hardwoods, wetland, etc).
-Visit your local nursery for ideas about native trees, shrubs, flowers and grasses.
-Select plans and build bird houses, feeders and nest boxes.
-Confirm your plans with a local naturalist or DNR wildlife manager or County Extension educator.
When will you find the time for all of this? Begin your "landscaping for wildlife" projects in the time you once used to mow the lawn, trim the shrubs, prune trees, rake leaves, pull weeds, fertilize the lawn and sweep the patio. But before you turn the first shovel of earth and plant the first sapling, recall Aldo Leopold's admonition:
       "The first rule of intelligent tinkering is to save all the parts."