Opinion

You — yes, you! — can help the planet. Start in your backyard.

This column will give you some tools to help mitigate the damage we’re causing to the planet. But, first, let’s look at why you — yes, you — should pay attention to this.

Here’s how we tend to build in the United States:

(Google Earth/Google Earth)

(Google Earth/Google Earth)

(Google Earth/Google Earth)

We find a patch of unspoiled land.

We wipe it clean.

We move in.

These photos are from a D.C. suburb, but they could be from a million places across America. There’s nothing unusual or illegal about it. This is just what we do.

The cumulative devastation is so massive that just thinking about it is a downer. But here’s a piece of science-backed good news for you: Perhaps the simplest, most tangible and effective action you can take to help the planet is to restore whatever part of the environment you control with native plants. Even a window planter helps.

This is not woo-woo science. “Don’t worry about the whole Earth,” said Douglas W. Tallamy, an entomology professor at the University of Delaware and author of several books on conservation. “Worry about the piece of the Earth that you can influence.”

How do small steps add up?

Why native plants are so good

Native plants are generally easier to grow, and they can require little or no fertilization or watering. They also provide food sources and breeding habitat for North American insects and birds far better than plants from other continents do.

Insects such as bees, moths, ladybugs, ants and butterflies pollinate flowers and a lot of the food that we eat. And they are at the bottom of the food chain, so helping insects helps everyone else.

Native plants are also important because many insects evolved to rely on one particular kind of plant.

Take, for example, the monarch butterfly:

Monarchs lay their eggs on milkweed plants.

The eggs become caterpillars, and milkweed is all they eat. Without milkweed, monarchs will go extinct.

If all you can do is to put a flower box in your window, great. But if you have a yard, transforming a piece of your lawn is usually the lowest hanging fruit, so to speak, for helping the Earth.

Grass has its uses, but we can do with less of it. Lawns are the largest irrigated crop in the United States — greater than corn. Aside from water, they need fertilizer and pesticides, which pollute beyond your fence line.

If you want to keep some grassy spaces, let go of the American ideal of perfection. Flowering weeds such as dandelions and clover help to create a bee-friendly lawn. “Think of your lawn as being like a low flowering meadow that has a variety of plants that attract pollinators, like clover,” said Julie Moir Messervy, author of several books on landscape design.

How to turn your lawn into a garden

What will you fill your yard with if not grass? I reached out to a number of landscape architects and came up with a few basic tips. Here’s how a regular 8,500-square-foot lot, the median lot size of single-family homes in the United States, could become more eco-friendly in baby steps:

Our hypothetical yard is mostly covered by lawn.

Lawn

Deck

House

Driveway

Start small. You don’t have to do all your yard at once.

Maybe add a tree where you’d like privacy or shade.

Or expand an existing plant bed near the foundation.

Adding shrubs, trees and perennials over time will make the property more beautiful and private.

Notice the lawn receding naturally.

By now you’ve learned that you can save a lot of money starting plants from seed.

You go bold on a birdbath and flowers that bring pollinators.

Our hypothetical yard is mostly covered by lawn.

Lawn

Deck

House

Driveway

Start small. You don’t have to do all your yard at once.

Maybe add a tree where you’d like privacy or shade.

Or expand an existing plant bed near the foundation.

Adding shrubs, trees and perennials over time will make the property more beautiful and private.

Notice the lawn receding naturally.

By now you’ve learned that you can save a lot of money starting plants from seed.

You go bold on a birdbath and flowers that bring pollinators.

Our hypothetical yard is mostly covered by lawn.

Start small. You don’t have to do all your yard at once.

Maybe add a tree where you’d like privacy or shade.

Lawn

Deck

House

Or expand an existing plant bed near the foundation.

Driveway

Adding shrubs, trees and perennials over time will make the property more beautiful and private.

By now you’ve learned that you can save a lot of money starting plants from seed.

You go bold on a birdbath and flowers that bring pollinators.

Notice the lawn receding naturally.

“Go to the hardware store and get some landscape flags,” said Brandy M. Hall, who runs an online class on regenerative landscaping. She recommended using the flags to mock up spaces at scale in your yard.

Maybe you want to keep some lawn for kids or pets to play on.

Plants can

give privacy

to a seating

area.

Or maybe a vegetable garden and lounger.

The grill.

The hammock you always wanted.

A place

to sit.

Soon you’ll be strolling around your garden, surveying your tremendous achievement.

Never mind if your better half says you’re obsessing.

Maybe you want to keep some lawn for kids or pets to play on.

Plants can

give privacy

to a seating

area.

Or maybe a vegetable garden and lounger.

The grill.

The hammock you always wanted.

A place

to sit.

Soon you’ll be strolling around your garden, surveying your tremendous achievement.

Never mind if your better half says you’re obsessing.

Maybe you want to keep some lawn for kids or pets to play on.

Or maybe a vegetable garden

and lounge.

The grill.

Plants can

give privacy

to a seating

area.

The hammock you always wanted.

Soon you’ll be strolling around your garden, surveying your tremendous achievement.

Never mind if your better half says you’re obsessing.

A place

to sit.

How to find the right plants

Feeling emboldened? The next step is to find plants that are native to where you live and that can do well in the conditions that you have, such as full sun, part shade (three to six hours of direct sun) or full shade.

The nonprofit National Wildlife Federation has a tool you can use to find plants native to your Zip code and a store that sells them — often cheaper than big box stores. The Audubon Society has a tool to find local plants and nurseries. Several apps can also help you to identify plants — a recent assessment by Michigan State University found that PictureThis and Plantnet were the most accurate.

Finally, fall is coming. Fall and spring are the best times of the year to plant.

It’s not up to any one of us, individually, to solve the devastation that we have all caused, collectively. But restoring your small piece of the Earth is within reach.