Habitats
Whether you own 5 acres or 5,000 acres, your property is a part of an even larger landscape that serves as habitat for native plants and animals. As you get to know the types of habitat on your acreage, you will also learn which plants and animals and other living things you are likely to see, and how to manage your land to support them. Major habitat types include woodlands and forests, shrublands and grasslands, wetlands, and riparian areas along streams.
Why is it important to protect native habitats?
The plants and animals in your area have adapted to living together in natural communities or habitats. They depend on the other plants and animals in these habitats to provide their food, shelter, and other needs. The best way to protect plants and animals is to protect the habitats upon which they depend. Ranchette and country home development often breaks up larger habitats, destroying native plants and making it hard for wildlife to find everything they need to survive.
In addition to protecting wildlife, native habitats provide ecological services that you will depend on such as flood control and water quality protection. Woodlands and forests may provide firewood, lumber, and also filter air pollution and create oxygen. Shrublands and grasslands protect soil from erosion.
Getting Started: What You Can Do
- Determine what major habitat types occur on your land and how they compare with similar or other habitat types surrounding your land. Create a plan to protect the habitats on your property and keep them healthy.
- Learn about the habitats and species that lived in your area 50, 100, or 200 years ago. Find out if there are missing species you can plant or encourage to return. Are there missing habitat types that you can recreate?
- If you have a forest, make a forest inventory. Which types of trees dominate the forest? What types of shrubs or other understory plants are present? Are there plants missing that are present in similar local habitats?
- If you have streamside trees or woodlands, find out how the trees and other plants there compare to those found in other healthy streamside habitats in your area. Create a plan to restore vegetation that may have disappeared there, and to protect streamside vegetation from flooding or overgrazing by livestock.
- If you have a wetland, determine what federal, state, or local laws protect the wetlands.
Helpful Links
Helpful Hint
Look beyond your property line, to resources available on adjacent properties, and work with your neighbors on cooperative
conservation planning.
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