Build it and They Will Come

My husband and I live in a typical bedroom community in a rapidly growing county in Florida. You know the type I'm referring to - the one story homes with beautiful manicured lawns, glorious flowers blooming profusely throughout most of the year and, of course, the requisite palm trees. Can't live in Florida without at least one palm tree in your front yard, and preferably two, situated about 12 feet from each other with a gazing ball and some little shrubs in between.

I know what you're thinking. What about the plastic pink flamingos? Everybody in Florida has a flamingo or two, right? Ha! Not since the plastic flamingo company went out of business recently. There is one store, however, Ace Hardware, on a heavily trafficked main road, that has flamingos galore out front. And if you want to know the true definition of "galore" you should stop by that store. Oh my!

The store managers dress these little guys for every season and holiday and when there isn't anything special to celebrate, that doesn't stop them. They just arrange the flamingos in assorted fashion, all over the front lawn. I'm sure people in a hurry, suffering from road rage, must hate them because everybody slows down to check these little guys out.

I must admit, I find them adorable too, especially around Christmastime when they're all decked out in their best winter finery, with cute little red and green scarves wrapped around their long, slender necks, standing in faux snow. What says Christmas more than an ornament bedecked pink plastic flamingo?

Valentine's Day just passed and I can't begin to tell you how sickeningly cute they were with their little red hearts all over everything and their necks intertwined, staring at one another's beautiful little plastic eyes! With St. Pat's Day rapidly approaching, they're probably already dressed in green, with shamrocks and tam o'shanters and little corncob pipes glued to their little plastic mouths.

A sight to behold, indeed, are Florida's plastic pink flamingos. Don't tell anyone but I do happen to have one in my back yard but wait, before you pass judgment. It was a gift, and I'm not one to throw away a gift that's been so lovingly offered - especially since the giver can visit the givee's back yard and take notice of what is or is not there! And you know darn right well, as they're pretending to admire the bougainvillea, their eyes are surreptitiously darting back and forth looking for said gift!

So my little plastic pink flamingo, called Pinky, (very imaginative, don't you think?) hides behind a big Sago palm, not because I'm ashamed of him or anything, or I'm trying to hide him. No, he just likes it there because it's cool and we wouldn't want the little dear to melt in the hot Florida sun. Ok, I'm not sure my friend is buying this but she's mollified, knowing that I didn't just toss him in the scrap heap.

But this is not about pink plastic flamingos. I digress. This is about turning our back yards into little mini-preserves, little wildlife habitats for real animals, not pink plastic flamingos who have been surviving quite nicely on their own ever since the invention of plastic.

The county commissioners and developers and rich land barons won't be satisfied until every inch of Florida is paved over. As Joni Mitchell sang back in the day, "they've paved Paradise and put up a parking lot." This is what Florida is becoming, I'm sad to say. Paving, concrete, a dearth of trees and lots of big, water sucking, herbicide devouring green lawns.

This is unconscionable. What was once acres of forest is now, as another old song says, "ticky tacky houses" all in a row with absolutely no green zones. Once beautiful forested areas are now devoid of their tall towering trees, knocked down and uprooted by machinery, and then replaced with some woeful little saplings that wouldn't even provide shade for Nicole Richey!

Where do the animals go who have been uprooted from their homes? What do they eat now? Where do they raise their young now? Where do they hide from predators now?

There has to be a sensible approach taken to progress. Humans need habitat too, that's a given. But we don't have to take every square inch of land. We must provide for the animals, for their sake alone. Not just so that we can hear birds chirping in the morning or watch squirrels at play. We must do this because it's the right thing to do.

One way we can do this is to stop the madness with the big green lawns covering every square foot of our lot. Sure, we can have green grass out front along with the shrubbery. That's nice. But our backyards are where we can really shine, where we can do the right thing. We can turn them into wildlife habitats!

A wildlife habitat and a play area for our kids are not mutually exclusive. A portion close to the house can be utilized for the swing sets and even swimming pool. But anything beyond that, extending to the property line can be turned into a beautiful, breathtaking vista, a mini habitat, replete with various shrubs, trees, dense foliage, brush, vines, and even a dead tree for the woodpeckers!

Our entire backyard has been designated a Wildlife Habitat and it is one of the proudest accomplishments of my husband's and my life. My husband built a decent size irregular, oval, koi pond that has a long, 3' wide branch that runs from the main pond under a little wooden bridge (called The Bridge Over the River Koi, once again our imaginations are astounding! ) and then turns into a small grotto with a waterfall which is up against the back of the house.

We have turned our back yard into "rooms" and we did this long before it became fashionable to do so. (let me pause here for a few pats on the back!). Look in any landscaping magazine today and you're likely to see pictures of outdoor rooms. This is easily done and makes one feel as though you were in a huge yard when in fact it's just your typical Florida middle class lot.

For privacy from your neighbors you can't beat vines. They grow rapidly and many of them produce beautiful flowers. We grow lantana here in Florida because it's so easy to do so and the birds love it. Actually our dog loves to eat the lantana leaves too and after several years of munching on them she's still with us so I hereby proclaim them pet-friendly plants, at least for dogs. There have been occasional instances of poisoning to cattle and sheep but so far they are not among the animals that inhabit our yard.. .at least I haven't seen any yet!

We have 4 more small ponds interspersed throughout the trees, shrubs and flowers and wooden walkways winding around gently curving corners with lovely surprises of beautiful flora awaiting the visitor (not to mention that pesky little pink plastic flamingo).

Our "rooms" are divided with wooden vine-covered arbors or just masses of tall bird of paradise plants. Anything that grows tall and lush becomes a room divider. We have a family of cat birds that call our yard home every spring where they raise their young. Catbirds like dense shrubbery and our huge Shefflera provides them with just what they need. They have their own room right next to one of the birdbaths.

We feed the birds and squirrels every day, and whatever is left over, the raccoons and opossums devour at night. We don't purposely feed the raccoons now. We used to until we realized this was not good for them. Once they become dependent on human handouts (and boy do they love dog biscuits) they will turn their attention from food gathering to baby making! With such limited habitat we try not to encourage their breeding practices. I keep admonishing the little buggers, "Hey if you can't feed 'em, don't breed 'em!" We haven't seen many little ones lately (boy do I miss those adorable little bandit faces) so perhaps they're listening to me!

At the back of the yard against the fence is an area devoted to brush and scraps of wood (looks much better than it sounds) for the snakes and other little creatures who find that a desirable habitat. Yes, we allow any creature who wants to live in our yard to take up residence here because it was their yard first! We are the intruders, the invaders, the conquerors but we must be benevolent dictators.

Our ponds are filled with frogs and our trees with tree frogs that delight us every night during the warm months (which is pretty much year 'round here in the Sunshine State) with their symphony of sounds, croaking to one another and our days are filled with the musical flute sounds of the bluejays and the chirping of the cardinals, and all of the other birds who call our backyard their home. This includes woodpeckers, sometimes even pileated woodpeckers (those large Woody Woodpecker types), thrushes, mockingbirds, grackles, wrens and...well the list is too long.

We have even had painted buntings and many other migratory birds who stop in for a few days on their flight to other places unknown. How they find our birdbaths and feeding stations I will never know because our yard is pretty much covered with all things large and green. But somehow they manage and we never know what beautiful winged creature will be visiting us and delighting us with their beauty.

Our yard is teeming with life, from the smallest critters, glorious butterflies, turtles, lizards, mice, wood rats up to the larger ones, the rabbits, gopher turtles, 'coons, 'possums, and who knows what else that we may not even know about.

When taking our dog for a walk down our street, I would be able to tell when we approached our home with my eyes shut. Because I would go from the sterile quiet of the neighbors' homes to a sudden magnificent euphony of animal sounds. It is indeed music to my ears. Our neighbors enjoy this too and are always admiring our yard, and complimenting us, although they still prefer to keep their sterile lawns. I don't know why. They are missing the opportunity to provide for the critters who sacrificed their homes so that they could sit on their back deck and look out over an expanse of green grass...and nothing else.

I'm not suggesting that everyone can do as much as we did, but if we all did SOMETHING it would be such a boon to the displaced wildlife. It's a great lesson to teach the kids, that we need to set aside land for the animals and by doing so we don't have to sacrifice our pleasure.

So the next time you're sitting in your back yard, take a good look around you and see what you can do to give back to the wildlife. And don't forget to make room for the little pink plastic flamingos!