Doctors by Nature: An exclusive excerpt from a book about how animals heal themselves
Here's the good news: even by replacing just 10 percent of our lawns with diverse plant gardens, we can boost biodiversity, maintain insects, and provide medicinal plants for our pets. We may even use these gardens to grow medicinal plants for human use, which would help curb the overharvesting of some medicinal plants in the wild, and recreate the natural pharmacies that traditional healers rely on.
Because of all these benefits, local and national governments are increasingly developing initiatives for individual households to create native habitats. In Germany, the Thousands of Gardens—Thousands of Species project aims to create oases of biodiversity, including gardens, balconies, and open spaces with a goal to curb insect declines.
The project is funded in part by Germany's federal government and partners with seed companies, nurseries, and garden centers to provide seed packages to participants. In Minnesota, the Lawns to Legumes program provides grants to homeowners to develop natural gardens. In my home country of the Netherlands, an organization called The Pollinators provides free bags of seed mixes to create insect gardens.
In (the American state of) Georgia, my new adopted home, I am on the board of directors of the Rosalynn Carter Butterfly Trail, a nonprofit organization that aims to expand pollinator habitats. Initiated by former first lady Rosalynn Carter, the trail was established in 2013 and grew to almost two thousand gardens in the first ten years of its existence.
As an organization, we provide guidance on what plants to use and how to maintain the gardens. We encourage people to plant native milkweeds to support monarch butterflies. My own lab provides milkweeds and other plants for participants in the metro-Atlanta area. It may seem like a small thing to create a garden, but if enough people do it, we can recreate a lot of much-needed nature.
One common theme in this book has been that animals need choices. They do not just need shelter and food. They need medicine. And to get that, they need access to a diversity of plants and other natural products. Preserving nature is the best way to maintain their choices, and so is providing diverse gardens to pets, zoo animals, and our neighborhood insects.
So, as you are building your garden, I invite you to take a moment to witness the spectacles of the natural world that will unfold there. Live in the moment and witness that ant, bee, or butterfly that visits your garden. Watch your cat or dog frolic in the flowers. And as you are watching, ask yourself: What is the animal doing? Is it eating? Is it drinking? Is it finding shelter?
Or, maybe: Is it collecting medicine?
(Excerpted with permission from Doctors by Nature: How Ants, Apes, and Other Animals Heal Themselves by Jaap de Roode, published by Princeton University Press; 2025)
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