Over the years, Living Landscapes has encouraged people to pursue “wildlife gardening” to support migratory songbirds, bees, butterflies, beneficial insects and displaced animals. We have seen the impact on our nation’s wildlife as Americans have cleared wildlife habitat to build homes for their own families. Locally, we’ve seen an increase in sightings of normally nocturnal animals as they search for food and cover when their homes are cleared for new development. We’ve never felt a concern for wildlife, however, like we did a few days ago when we had our own sighting of a displaced animal at Living Landscapes.

A few of us saw an odd looking animal approaching from across the yard. It was too big to be a cat, too small to be a dog, extremely pale and mangy. What’s more, it moved clumsily as if it were ill. When we realized that it was a possum (or opossum if you prefer), normally seen at night, we assumed that a daytime appearance by this haggard animal must indicate rabies. Just before we reached our own rabid frenzy, however, we realized that the possum’s mangy appearance was actually caused by tiny balls of fur (that’s right, possum babies!) clinging to Momma Possum for dear life and a safe ride. It seems that we had inadvertently cleared Momma’s nesting area while pruning and “cleaning up” a corner of the property in preparation for future display gardens. Now Momma needed a new place to settle down.

Wildlife Garden Becomes the Solution

At this point, it took no time at all to agree that the first display garden would be a wildlife garden (it was the least we could do for the possum family). We chose a spot that’s bordered by cedars whose evergreen boughs will offer protective cover for wildlife. We brought back some of the cleared brush to offer even more protective cover. We planted (nursery-grown) plants that are native to the South Jersey coast such as bayberry, serviceberry, river birch, blueberry, inkberry, winterberry, rugosa rose, and viburnum, because they are more well adapted to the local growing conditions and, once established, will require less fertilizer, water, and pest management than less well-adapted plants. Native plants also tend to provide the perfect food for the local wildlife species that have evolved along with them.

Although not necessarily native, we chose other nourishing shrubs and flowers such as autumn olive, red twig dogwood, butterfly bush, bee balm, coneflower, columbine and lobelia. We’ll be careful not to use any chemical fertilizers, insecticides, or fungicides because chemicals become part of the flowers, berries and seeds of plants, and subsequently, are absorbed by the wildlife that eats them. We fertilized with Espoma’s Plant-tone, a 100% organic, granular fertilizer and mulched to help retain moisture and prevent weeds.

Even though we’ve provided many plant food sources, we’ve also placed several bird feeders in the garden, and, even more important, a birdbath. We often think to feed birds, but tend to underestimate their need for a clean source of fresh water!

Last, we will install a footpath to facilitate the care of plants and feeders. Seems that all we need to do now is let the plants get going (wild and wooly works better than well groomed in a wildlife garden) and stay out of the way to give Momma Possum and her babies an opportunity to move back in!

Editor’s Note (4/25/18): We received a lovely email about one of our blog articles from Emily’s mother. Emily wanted to share a link with us about another helpful article on butterfly gardening – https://www.homeadvisor.com/r/how-to-build-backyard-butterfly-garden/.  Thanks, Emily! We wish Emily and her mom Hannah, many happy years of gardening!