Urban Makeover Advice by Yari Greaney

Extinctions in Near Time: Biodiversity Loss Since the Pleistocene

It seems so innocent. Pretty houses with manicured lawns, several little parks with small grassy fields bordered by metal fences, a few house sparrows hopping around the picnic tables. We’d call it a beautiful town. Unfortunately, this perception of beauty is deadly (Rosenzweig). Hi. My name is Yari and I’m here to provide some urban makeover tips that will help many different plants and animals. Usually when we think about saving wildlife, we think about rain forests and the wilderness, but lets not forget city wildlife. Of course, some animals – like rats, cockroaches, and pigeons – do great living with us (Marzluff). These animals that are thriving in cities are called generalists, meaning they can survive in lots of different situations (Francis). It’s the creatures who need very specific habitats that are struggling, because we’ve replaced their homes with our towns (Rosenzweig). That means that a few generalists like house sparrows (Shoshat) and house mice (Francis) can live all over the place, but the animals that needed those specific habitats die (Rosenzweig). Instead of meadowlarks singing in meadows (State of the Birds), marsh marigolds decorating the marshes (Mabey), and woodland jumping mice jumping in woodlands (Mahan), we’ve got pigeons and rats stealing food in cities all over the place (Francis). With a progressive sense of urban beauty, we can change that. Urban makeover tip #1: Get rid of your lawn! The short, often-nonnative grass isn’t a very good home for animals. Let native plants grow freely! Then, animals will find the food and shelter they need. Bonus tip: Live in a city without much lawn space? Look up! Roofs are a great place for shallow-growing plants. Urban makeover tip #2: Instead of lots of little parks, have a few big ones. Some animals need more space. With a bigger park, you’d see new types of animals on play-dates, instead of the same old house sparrows stealing your french fries. Urban makeover tip #3: instead of fences with metal posts, use wooden posts. Wood gets holes in it, making it a great home for bluebirds and other hole-nesters. But wait, can’t the generalists, the ones who can live in a bunch of different places, just take over all of our urban makeover work? The trick is to cater to the specific needs of the other animals. For example, common toads are doing great - they’re generalists, but Natterjack toads were really suffering, because their specific needs were not being met. Turns out, they like burrowing in sand. So, we put in sand dunes. They use them and the common toads don’t need to. So, for urban makeover tip #4: give struggling animals exactly what they need (Rosenzweig). Now, I know you’re excited to get started on your urban makeover, but if you live in the desert, don’t come up with the same plan as your friend who lives by the forest. That’s my final urban makeover tip: Towns need their own style. Let them take on the character of their natural surroundings (Rosenzweig). And slowly, desert towns will begin to look like deserts, forest towns like forests, prairie towns, like prairies. People creating homes for a variety of native life, right within their own towns - that is beautiful. References Francis, Robert and Michael Chadwick. “What makes a Species Synurbic?” Applied Geography. 2011. Mabey, Richard. Flora Britannica. London: Chatto and Windus, 1997. Mahan, Carolyn and Timothy O’Connell. “Small Mammal use of suburban and urban parks in Central Pennsylvania.” Humboldt Field Research Institute, 2005. Marzluff, John. “Island Biogeography for an Urbanizing World: Extinction and Colonization may determine Biological Diversity in Human-Dominated Landscapes.” Urban Ecology. Springer, 2005. Rosenzweig, Michael. Win-win Ecology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Shochat, Eyal, et al. “Invasion, Competition, and Biodiversity Loss in Urban Ecosystems.” Bioscience. American Institute of Biological Sciences, 2010. “State of the Birds: Residential and Commercial Development.” Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Illustration: a href="http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=756&picture=flower-garden">Flower Garden by vk wade