Withlacoochee Permaculture Guild

I am not a purist and could never see how spraying herbicides could be justified to help the environment--that part definitely a racket. Yet there are some species that due to our actions of habitat destruction are vulnerable to extinction. For example the Florida scrub jay whose dry, upland scrub community is usually the most desirable land to develop here. I believe it is worthwhile to restore habitat we degraded in the first place using native plant species, which the threatened animal species evolved with and depend on.

I am skeptical of his claim that exotics can provide as much if not more habitat than natives. Just because Purple loosestrife might do so doesn't mean other introduced species do as well. This is important ecologically I think and it should be taken very seriously on a case by case basis using evidence-based research not dogma. Since we introduced the species and if deleterious effects are discovered, for example with red imported fire ants, we have a responsibility to remedy our mistakes in a responsible manner (in the case of RIFA pesticides make them worse since they kill native ants).

Hemenway's goal seems to be to provoke debate and he's good at this but I think he goes too far the other way sometimes. It catches people attention though and sure sells some books.

I think native or non-native shouldn't be a consideration at all (cause otherwise why not give hiring preference to people whose ancestors came here on the Mayflower?). Just find the best man for the job and the nature will do the rest. Whether or not a plant provides shelter or food to local fauna is definitively one of the most important qualifications and it's objective, unlike "native" which is very arbitrary and (for reasons I don't quite understand) very emotionally charged. Should species (or even whole ecosystems) that may extinct be preserved? Sure, that's what national parks, etc. is for. But let's not kid ourselves - those ecosystems on life support are as natural as Disney World. And yes, in a perfect world development wouldn't threaten any species at all.