Flora & Fauna: Sentinel gardens; bats do good work; beavers saving ecosystems; firefly delights; seashore reporting

Sentinel gardens help save North American trees.
(Photo by Sophia Simoes, Unsplash)

Planting "sentinel gardens" in different places around the globe helps scientists protect native North American trees. "Scientists have planted American trees in China, Korea and elsewhere to attract hungry insects, reports Sachi Kitajima Mulkey of The New York Times. "These gardens are plots of foreign trees that researchers closely monitor to figure out what local bugs and diseases can damage them. The goal is to learn as much as possible about these potential threats before they cross the ocean and become a problem at home."

For the many Americans who consider bats an animal oddity that flies like a bird but kind of looks like a mouse, they are selling the furry echolocation-using creatures short. Bats do tremendous work, helping U.S. farmers and the economy. "Bats pollinate plants, including many important food crops, when they stop by flowers to drink nectar," write Dale Manning, Anya Nakhmurina and Eli Fenichel for The Conversation. "Their guano is mined from caves for fertilizer. And they eat a lot of bugs – the kinds that bother people (think mosquitoes) and others that destroy crops that humans depend on for food." Read about the impacts of bat population decline on economic markets and how humans are trying to address bat health here.

Beavers to the rescue.
(Drawing by Adam Dixon, Offrange)

In Utah, beavers that trappers would have killed for their fur are being spared and relocated from areas where they are a nuisance to locations where they help local ecosystems recover. "To maximize on their potential to restore ecosystems, the Beaver Ecology & Relocation Collaborative (BERC) at Utah State University started offering trappers a $100 surrender fee to catch beavers alive to transport them to private lands in need of hydrological TLC," reports Karen Fischer for Offrange. "The success of the project could be replicated elsewhere, with sweeping ramifications throughout the American West."

They light up forest floors and the air with their bioluminescence beauty, casting sparkle and wonder all around. Fireflies are among nature's most delightful creatures, and some campers are fascinated. Great Smoky Mountains National Park is not only America’s most-visited national park, but it is also "home to 19 firefly species," reports Jacob Passy of The Wall Street Journal. "Photinus carolinus, also known as the Smokies synchronous firefly, produces dazzlingly coordinated displays that rival even the most extravagant Christmas light installation. . . .Their annual emergence in the Great Smoky Mountains has become so popular that campsites sell out months in advance."

A polluted farm in the United Kingdom "let nature back in," providing a stunning example of how nature can heal itself, reports Jasmin Sykes of CNN. The Knepp Estate is a place where turtle doves "seem to be bouncing back. A recently published, two-decade review of wildlife on the estate found that the number of singing males rose from just two in 2008, to 22 in 2024. Isabella Tree, who owns the 3,500-acre estate in West Sussex, told CNN, “We never thought that in 20 years we could have gone from being this depleted, polluted, dysfunctional post-industrial farmland, to being one of the most significant biodiversity hotspots in Britain."

The famous Assateague wild ponies offer great photos and stories that feature the 
wonders found on our national seashores. (Photo by Sara Cottle, Unsplash)

For reporters who live anywhere near the seashore, there's an ocean of stories to uncover and discuss. "If national parks are 'America’s best idea,' then our national seashores may be America’s best-kept secret," writes Joseph A. Davis for the Society of Environmental Journalists. "For summer getaways, they are a treasure. . . . For example, Assateague Island National Seashore, established in 1965, is a beautiful barrier island running between Ocean City, Maryland, and Chincoteague, Virginia. You can swim or surf or splash in clean waves. You can study how land is built by dune ecosystems. You can see the famous wild ponies. You can go into town and eat oysters." Davis provides a list of national seashores to visit along with story ideas here.