The Land Trust of West Haven, Inc. is pleased to co-host the screening of Hometown Habitat at the West Haven Public Library on April 26 from 6-8:30 p.m.This 90-minute environmental, educational documentary focuses on showing how and why native plants are critical to the survival and vitality of local eco-systems. It raises awareness about sustainable, native, healthy, easy and affordable land care practices that support wildlife and human life. Native plants, once established, don’t require the use of chemicals such as herbicides and pesticides to maintain their beauty. Nor do they require extra watering from our already overtaxed water supply, the film maintains. Using native plants attracts native pollinators such as butterflies, birds and bees.
Catherine Zimmerman (The Meadow Project) has teamed up with Doug Tallamy, Ph.D and the Chesapeake Conservation Landscaping Council (CCLC) to produce the film. The Meadow Project and CCLC promote the principles of conservation landscaping and expand the practice of conservation landscaping throughout the Chesapeake Bay region.
An entomologist, Tallamy has produced research, books, and lectures on the misuse of non-native plants in landscaping, and sounds the alarm about habitat and species loss.
The message: “We can change the notion that humans are here and nature is someplace else. It doesn’t have to, and shouldn’t be that way.”
Award winning director, Catherine Zimmerman, and film crew journey across the country to visit Hometown Habitat Heroes, people – young and old and with varied backgrounds – who are reversing detrimental impacts on the land and in the water of major U.S. watersheds, one garden at a time. Zimmerman and the film crew wind their way through the watersheds of Florida, the prairies of the Mississippi River Basin, the streams and rivers of the Rocky Mountains, the Chesapeake Bay, the Great Lakes and Columbia River to share success stories and works-in-progress that celebrate conservation landscaping that re-awakens and redefines man’s relationship with nature.
Along with the everyday Hometown Heroes, we meet ecologists, entomologists and other experts who will share the science behind how today’s “native-plants-know-best” enthusiasts, landscape architects, and conservation groups are helping city planners, businesses and developers appreciate the myriad benefits of low-maintenance, seasonally-dynamic, and eco-healthy landscape installations, that respect nature’s original best practices.