The distant view from Kelly Brenner’s Seattle living room was enviable, a testament to the engineering marvels of modern human habitat. But much closer to home were sights even more spectacular than the Space Needle rising hundreds of feet in front of the Olympic Mountains. Against the backdrop of...

Nestled among honking geese, hooting primates, scurrying lizards and lowing cows, the Black Beauty Ranch pollinator garden is “a different kind of place,” says Master Gardener and volunteer Cynthia Holifield. Before Holifield began her work seven years ago, staff despaired of the barren space behind...

As my beloved seedlings languished untouched on the display table, I improved my sales pitch: “Would you like a late-flowering thoroughwort to help migrating butterflies refuel? What about an aster that’s the only pollen source for some bee species?” But unlike the animals who would devour these...

Standing in the street and admiring each other’s gardens one day, Sherrie Pelsma and her neighbor made a discovery: They’d become hosts to a buzzing block party. “We could actually see the air traffic of bees and butterflies crossing the street between our two habitats,” recalls Pelsma. “I said,...

It’s a peculiar rite of modern homeownership: Plant a tulip bulb in autumn, cage or spray it to deter nibblers, admire its fleeting blooms a few months later, let it rot in soil ill-suited to its needs and repeat the whole cycle again the following year.

Fading yellow leaves fall from tulip trees, settling as quietly as a whisper into piles of gold among the ferns. A catbird calls from a walnut branch, warning competitors away from the pokeberries. A flock of pine siskins descends to the pond, chattering softly as they sip. Young green frogs dive...

Black Beauty Ranch—which is the world-renowned sanctuary for rescued animals operated by the Humane Society of the United States—becomes another beacon of light for humane treatment of animals in the growing network of the Trust’s Humane Stewardship Alliance lands. With over 1,400 acres in Murchison...

LONDON―Ahead of Fashion Weeks in New York, London, Milan and Paris, the largest ever global anti-fur consumer campaign has been launched to urge fashion house Max Mara to go fur-free. The campaign is headed by animal charities Humane Society International, the Humane Society of the United States and...

SACRAMENTO, California —On January 1, California’s ban on the sale and manufacturing of new animal fur products takes effect across the state. Assembly Bill 44, which passed in 2019, makes California the first state in the country to take this monumental step to end the fur trade within its borders...

As a new homeowner susceptible to sales pitches from the garden industrial complex, I spent my early planting years salivating over glossy magazine spreads exploding with color and texture and promises of endless summers. “Flower porn” was how my husband described those lushly photographed...

A humane backyard is a safe haven for wildlife—a space where animals can thrive free from pesticides, trapping and other threats.

In 1988, after a decade that saw record sales of animal fur, a representative from the Humane Society of the United States met in Europe with other advocates to plan an end to an industry built on cruelty. Only a year before, the first ladies of the U.S. and what was then the USSR had famously...

LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas—Today, four leading animal protection organizations—the Humane Society of the United States, Born Free USA, FOUR PAWS USA and Last Chance for Animals—launched a national campaign urging Dillard’s, the last major U.S. department store still selling animal fur, to adopt a fur...

As my neighbors and I stood 10 feet apart and swapped tips for scavenging kitchen staples this spring, the wilder residents of our community shared no such concerns. Squirrels twirled maple seed clusters like bouquets to reach every tidbit. Bumblebees made a mockery of social distancing in their...

The delegate seemed ready to pick a fight, already having mocked a proposed plastic bag ban and other pro-environment bills on the day’s agenda. As I finished my testimony in support of wildlife-friendly plantings, I steeled myself for a heated debate. But on that gray afternoon in February 2020...

Of all the surprising twists and turns my venture into the world of wildlife gardening has taken, the one that stands out most is the day I learned about the dark side of my favorite symbol of hope and summer: the sunflower. It was in the early 2000s and the fledgling gardens at my new home were...