Boost Your Impact By Landscaping With Native Plants

The National Wildlife Foundation Native Plant Finder says more butterflies and moths use goldenrod as a host plant for their caterpillars than any other flower or grass plant in the Fort Wayne area. (By Kevin Kilbane)

You can grow native plants in your yard to help some pollinators and wildlife. Or you can maximize your ecological impact by choosing native plants that produce big benefits for Nature’s local food web.

In his book “How Can I Help? Saving Nature with Your Yard,” researcher Douglas W. Tallamy urges people to use native plants in home landscaping that host the greatest number of butterfly and moth species’ caterpillars. (By Kevin Kilbane)

That’s researcher, professor and best-selling author Douglas W. Tallamy’s main point in his 2025 book, “How Can I Help?: Saving Nature with Your Yard.” In it, he answers hundreds of questions about native plants and using them in your landscaping.

I recently received the book as a gift, and it has me thinking differently about how to transition more of our home landscaping to native plants.

Residential landowners can have a major impact on ecological communities because property owners control about 135 million acres across the United States, says Tallamy, who some people also may know as a co-founder of the Homegrown National Park (https://homegrownnationalpark.org/) movement to regenerate biodiversity.

Instead of choosing native plants that appeal to some pollinators, Tallamy promotes planting a mix of native plants that support the great

est number and variety of caterpillars, inchworms and similar insects.

Caterpillars are the foundation of any ecological community’s food web, he says. The more caterpillars a home landscape produces, the more successful birds and wildlife will be in surviving and raising their young.

ENERGY SOURCE

The food web takes energy that plants create from the sun and transfers it to other creatures, Tallamy explains in his book. That can take place as animals eat plants, as animals eat animals that ate plants, or as animals eat something that took energy from plants.

Caterpillars produced by butterflies and moths are the foundation of any ecosystem food web, says researcher Douglas W. Tallamy, author of the recent book, “How Can I Help? Saving Nature with Your Yard.” (By Kevin Kilbane)

“No food web, no animals,” he says. “No animals, few to no flowering plants. No flowering plants, vastly simplified food webs and the loss of most species on Earth.”

Without the high-functioning ecosystems we have now, humans would survive only a few months, he writes.

Insect populations also can vary greatly from year to year, so Tallamy encourages people living in residential areas to use a diverse mix of native plants that support the greatest array of caterpillar species. That way, if one or two insect varieties have a down year, birds and wildlife still will find a wide selection of other caterpillar dining options.

To illustrate the importance of this point, he uses the example of a pair of Carolina chickadees. Depending on the number of chicks in their nest, he says the parents will have to supply 350 to 570 caterpillars every day to feed their youngsters. This bird species also continues feeding their young for 21 days after they fledge and leave the nest, Tallamy says. That means it takes more than 10,000 caterpillars to produce one nest of chickadees.

MAKING CHOICES

You don’t have to totally avoid non-native plants, Tallamy writes. When 70% of the plant biomass in a residential yard consists of native plants, that will be enough to support successful breeding by birds.

Also, 14% of native plants support 90% percent of all caterpillars, Tallamy says. He calls these workhorse native plants the “keystone species” because they should be included in every residential landscape.

Violets are among the best native plants to grow in local yards because they serve as hosts for the caterpillars of 27 butterfly and moth species. (By Kevin Kilbane)

In addition, he supports including native plants used by insect “specialists,” such as monarch butterflies, whose caterpillars depend on one or a few types of plants for food.

How do you decide what native plants to use in your yard? Tallamy worked with staff at the National Wildlife Federation (NWF) to create a Native Plant Finder on the NWF website, https://www.nwf.org/. Type in your ZIP Code, and the website shows you the best trees, shrubs, flowers and grasses to plant in your area, ranked by the number of butterflies and moths that use each plant as a host for their caterpillars.

LOCAL TOP 10s

As an example, here are the top native plants suggested for the 46802 ZIP Code area, ranked by the number of butterfly and moth caterpillar species they support. The 46802 ZIP Code includes downtown Fort Wayne and the area just west of it:

Native flowers and grasses by genus

1. Goldenrod (early, giant, wrinkleleaf and zigzag), 110 caterpillar species

2. Sunflower (giant, thinleaf and woodland), 69 caterpillar species

3. Strawberry, 63 caterpillar species

4. Common boneset, 32 caterpillar species

5. Violet (alpine, common blue, longspur, striped cream and sweet white), 27 caterpillar species

6. Spotted geranium, 24 caterpillar species

7. Hemlock water parsnip, 24 caterpillar species

8. Rosemallow, 22 caterpillar species

9. Philadelphia panicgrass and switchgrass, 21 caterpillar species

10. Ironweed (giant and Missouri), 21 caterpillar species

Hickory trees are among the best native trees to plant in residential landscapes because they serve as a host plant for the caterpillars of 224 species of moths and butterflies. The nuts also provide food for squirrels and other wildlife. (By Kevin Kilbane)

Native trees and shrubs by genus

1. Oak, 434 caterpillar species

2. Cherry, chokecherry, wild plum and other Prunus trees, 344 caterpillar species

3. Willow (Bebb, black, meadow, prairie, shining), 289 caterpillar species

4. Birch (bog or yellow), 276 caterpillar species

5. Maple (black or red) and boxelder, 252 caterpillar species

6. Aspen (bigtooth or quaking), and swamp cottonwood, 250 caterpillar species

7. Crabapple (sweet), 243 caterpillar species

8. Hickory (bitternut, red, shagbark and shellbark), 224 caterpillar species

9. Blueberry (highbush), 202 caterpillar species

10. Elm (American and rock), 174 caterpillar species

MAKING A DIFFERENCE

Many people want to join in restoring the world’s biodiversity, but they feel powerless to help, Tallamy writes in his book. He believes each person can make a difference.

By reducing the amount of lawn in our landscapes, planting keystone native plant species, removing invasive plants and using other practices he suggests, people can revitalize ecosystem function in their yards and also enhance the surrounding ecosystem, he says.

“In short,” he adds, “you will become empowered; you will join millions of other like-minded people to become the future of conservation.”