We were talking about old trees, and how some groups in the US and UK are trying to save the ancient ones, when someone mentioned “homegrown national parks”.

I was fascinated, and set out to learn more. And it turns out to be one of those wonderful ideas where individual action that you can take for yourself can wind up having a much larger effect if others do it, too. Or as agriculture professor Doug Tallamy puts it: small efforts by many people.

“Our National Parks, no matter how grand in scale are too small and separated from one another to preserve species to the levels needed,” he says. “Thus, the concept for Homegrown National Park, a bottom-up call-to-action to restore habitat where we live and work, and to a lesser extent where we farm and graze, extending national parks to our yards and communities.”