FINDING OUR WAY toward a more ecologically vibrant garden can sometimes feel a bit challenging, and I’m always looking for resources to guide me along the way, and to share with you.

Last year I shared news about a New York-based sustainable landscaping firm called Plan It Wild that had developed a digital self-test to help us each evaluate the ecological health of our landscape, and an accompanying 12-step program to enhance it—both of them free to use.

Now the same company, with an impressive group of collaborators that includes Doug Tallamy’s Homegrown National Park, the Wild Ones membership group, Audubon, Cornell Lab and more, has taken the next step. They just launched the beta version of an app described as a “personalized rewilding guide for every homeowner in America” to help us decide which actions to take and what plants to use to accomplish them.

Joanna Hall, the CEO of Plan It Wild, a Westchester, NY-based landscaping firm focused on creating biodiversity-raising native habitats, and Bram Gunther, Plant It Wild’s  VP of Science & Development joined me to talk about the Wildr app, the new app they’ve developed to guide us as we enhance our home landscapes with an ecological focus, and the key topics we need to keep in mind along the way.

Read along as you listen to the May 11, 2026 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) or Spotify (and browse my archive of podcasts here).

the wildr app, with joanna hall & bram gunther

Margaret Roach: So I took my test last year, my Wildr score and so forth. So last year, a lot of us used your self-testing technology called the Wildr Score—and it’s W-I-L-D-R for those who want to quickly go Google it or whatever, without the E—to assess how our place was doing ecologically speaking. And then it sort of followed up with, I think it was a 12-week challenge, to sort of be more tuned in and think about and maybe make some adjustments and so forth. And now there’s a new app that’s in beta with the kickoff on May 7 with a keynote talk by Robin Wall Kimmerer, yes?

Joanna Hall: That’s right, yes. Coming up here, actually, by the time we will have recorded, I think it will have just run [recording embedded below]. We are so excited. Everything kicks off May 7, and it is the fourth year of this national campaign now called Less Lawn More Life.

Margaret: Right, which is of course the big goal. So I guess from those first four years, but especially from last year, which was a big push with the Wildr score and so forth, I assume you sort of observed and heard, in fact, probably from some of those who took the test and followed the 12-week program. Did what they had to say and what they did using it, did that inspire you to sort of shape this new thing? I mean, were there sort of inferences that stuck out?

Joanna: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I will say the past few years has just been a listening journey, listening to this growing community and being very tuned into their suggestions and needs to help advance the movement. So we just continue to lean into it. So last year was our biggest yet. The feedback was incredible, overwhelmingly positive. And in fact, I think over 90 percent of the participants in the 12-week program improved their score. They take it at the very beginning of the challenge and then they learn some of the best practices and then they take it at the end again.

Incredible feedback, but still asking for more: Can you make more custom recommendations? Can you answer these questions? And so we just keep leaning into the momentum and the opportunity. And I think the more that we listen to the needs and then develop the technology and tools accordingly, that basically becomes our roadmap, if you will, for the product itself.

Margaret: Right. And I’ve heard you guys call Wildr kind of a translation layer. As you’ve told me, it “makes intimidating science actionable for homeowners.” And that’s what I found as I played with the beta and so forth. And I want to ask you, Bram, you can jump in and I’m interested to hear about some of the recommendations and so forth.

As a garden writer, I get a lot of emails and comments from people who seem to get stuck on like what plant is the plant for their purpose and their location. And they want to know where should they go to find out. And so I think one of the things you’ve done is you’ve made that part of this … some of the answers can be found now in this app, yes? Is that true?

Bram: Yes, that’s exactly true. And fundamentally, people are hungry for this just to reemphasize what you were just talking about. And in their hunger for this, they want action, and it can be complicated. So having a guideline, a set of guidelines like this, helps people walk through it. So translating that science into mainstream action is the way that we are going to reach our ecological and sustainability goals, whether it’s on an individual or community or regional level.

And it’s also spurring scientists, the new generation of scientists, that are finding out how to get classical science collected in the field and analyzed… but how do you translate that for people across the country and across our communities? So it leads to a healthier neighborhood.

So it’s all converging at this moment, I think driven by desire and also backed by science, and that’s what we hope we’re capturing in the Wildr app.

Margaret: Yeah. So it kind of encourages us—as I was clicking around and so forth—it kind of encourages us and guides us through creating these “planting zones,” I think you call them. And I think, I mean, I didn’t go all the way through. I was playing around and it was the beta version and so forth, but it’s almost like I was able to say, well, here’s what the conditions of light and moisture and my purpose were. And I was offered a potential plant list, like a palette of possibilities, not just one or two or three, but a range of things that I could maybe choose from and play with. Is that an accurate portrayal?

Joanna: Yeah, that’s exactly right. So back to this idea of the translation layer, what we really think is required to activate and support so many of these homeowners and individuals is truly meeting them exactly where they are. So making it hyper-personalized.

So folks can join, they can set up these planting areas or zones. You could just start with one or you could have multiple. Maybe you have a small meadow patch, a soft landing under a tree, a shade garden. And then you put in your … We know your eco-region from the app, so we’re making recommendations that are native to you. You put in your site conditions, you put in your goals, and then the app is going to recommend a list of native plants for you ranked in ecological order. And then there’ll also be advanced filtering.

So it’s really about making this as easy as possible, but also sort of translating that science directly to the end user.

Either add it to your wishlist: Here’s a list of native plants that I hope to plant over time, and I’ll chip away at. Or you can also add them if they’re already planted in your garden and you can start keeping track of what’s living and sort of the diversity and abundance of species that you have on your property.

Margaret: Right. So it can be a project you have in mind, and you can get guidance, or you can say what you’ve already got going on and that adds up.

Bram: It’s worth noting that in the personalization, in the mainstreaming, which is what we are trying to accomplish, we are collecting and synthesizing data sets in a way that hasn’t been done before. There’s a lot of different landscapes across the country, as we all know. And even within those counties, you can have even more nuanced landscape.

So to put this data set together based upon federal data, community-based data, new emerging literature, having experts review this data, it really helps a person who’s there doing it on their own, feel confident and reliable that we are suggesting the right composition of plants to restore their land.

Joanna: And if I could add one thing to that, because I think one of the things that we as a team are most excited about is, again, back to the whole ethos, if you will, of this platform is this idea of it being built by and for the community. We’re also getting community members involved in ground-truthing those recommendations.

So it’s not just, yes, we’re doing a tremendous amount of work integrating all of these data sets from regional to national, but we’re also inviting folks in to confirm the accuracy of our recommendations. Well, what about bloom time in your particular area? What about availability? Some of this first-party data that ensures that our recommendations are ground truth with real people, and that it’s constantly getting better and smarter to serve the whole.

Margaret: And I noticed that there was … I mean, there’s different tabs at the top, like navigational tabs at the top of the app page, if you’re looking at it on an iPad or whatever. And there was one that offered you the possibility of looking at what other people are doing. There were sort of examples of adventures other people had been on, and the plants they had chosen for different applications and so forth. So there was also the chance to learn both from other examples like that, or almost just kind of research.

Again, like if it’s a potential area you want to develop and say, I want to do a thicket or whatever, I want to do a privacy screen, and I’m in this area and I have these conditions and so forth, and to get this potential palette to choose from—again, there’s another way to learn. So there’s a lot of that as well. There’s a lot of reference materials, so to speak, of different kinds, inspirational and more, I don’t know, academic, more research: here’s the plant and that would work in that situation.

Joanna: We’re very excited about the “explore” feature, which is that inspiration piece. So this is where you, for example, can, as you’re setting up your own place and you’re setting up your garden zones and your plant palettes and maybe adding what wildlife features you have, you have the ability to make that public if you choose.

And if you make it public, you’re actually inviting—your address, of course, is obscured—but you’re inviting folks to take this virtual tour of your own journey, seeing photos of your garden, seeing what plant palettes you’re using, maybe even what nature and wildlife has visited your place. And we’re already hearing from folks that that’s a big source of motivation to know that they’re not alone, and be able to be inspired by other people’s journeys, whether it’s something that they’ve been doing for 20 years or they just started.

And so again, this is the kind of thing we’re putting out there, and then we’re going to hear from the community how important this particular feature is in supporting them. So we already have a few folks that requested, “Ooh, I’d be happy to share my own field notes, what’s working, what’s not, my own best practices,” kind of like a blog for those others to learn from. And so you could imagine people in your ecoregion, if you’re able to follow and learn from them, this starts to become really powerful peer-to-peer support.

Margaret: Right. And then there’s a whole other sort of thing to browse through. There’s a whole list of “wildlife features,” I think you call them. So do we have a brush pile? It kind of reminds us, not only asks us, do we have them the way the test did, the Wildr score test did, but it also reminds us that, “Huh, that thing is empowering. That thing might be good to have. Can I figure that into my place?”

So a brush pile, bird and bat houses, a “leaf litter zone,” as you call it, various forms of water access, and covering the windows properly or marking the windows properly to protect birds from deadly collisions. There were lots of and lots of those. And I think those are super-important things, because it’s not just about the planting, is it?

Bram: No, no, it’s not. It’s about the entire dynamics of the place. It’s about the … I was going to use the word ecosystem, and I think some people think of that as a larger space. But you can have an ecosystem, as we both know, which is a teeny little space, but holds all these animals.

And keeping things on site, it’s one of those quirks of the modern age, if I can put it that way. I mean, dropped leaves never walked themselves to the landfill—that was our idea to take those leaves to the landfill. Though the leaves are home and food for all cycles of the season for animals adding nutrition to the soil, and that’s all part of creating a thriving habitat.

And if it doesn’t thrive, then people are going to be less inspired to do it over time. But if it does thrive, and you’re using all the materials that are already there, it’s more likely that the experience is going to be really positive, and you’ll get good results from it. And we’re going to waste less as we keep the logs that have fallen and are adding nutrients to the soil. So it’s all part of keeping things where they are and reusing them as part of the ecosystem dynamics.

Margaret: I mean, when I think about just that element you just said, the logs, for instance, when I think about our traditional methods over however long of tree “care,” definitely in quotes, where we basically removed—right down to the stump-grinding—any tree that wasn’t in perfect condition. For so long we’ve been doing that as a practice, and how costly that is and how much life that did not support, how much life that took away and how much life support potentially to each site that those trees are removed from, that that took away.

I mean, it’s just clicking through, I’m just trying to give an example that clicking through that area, your wildlife features, it reminds me, even as an experienced gardener, of things that are so important and I was taking mental stock of, “How am I doing on that? How am I doing on that?”

And I think that’s the point, right? How am I doing? And can I do a little better?

Joanna: That is spot-on. And you didn’t see it in the version that you saw, but the one that will be in the  app store by the time we launch here for the campaign will have already taken that a little further. So there’s a bit of a dashboard, and this is all coming from the score. The score is this sort of baseline of the ecological health of your land and the levers that you as an individual can control to improve that health.

And so in this version, we give folks targets, a target number of wildlife features that you should have on your property. You can choose which ones, and we’ll make recommendations based on your region and so forth—a target number of native species, native relative to introduced, for example. So we’re going to layer in targets to sort of help people understand what they’re striving for, what good looks like, and to show it all together holistically.

Now, the dream, like Margaret, as you were saying—and this will take a little longer to get to—but the dream is really to be able to show homeowners that based on their management practices and these decisions and actions, what does that mean from a cost savings perspective? What does that mean in terms of the total life, wildlife that I’m supporting, that perhaps the water that I’m cleaning, the carbon that we’re sequestering or saving by not mowing and things like that.

So that’s really where we intend to go because you sort of move what you measure. How do we keep this gamified and fun and encourage people to understand the sort of holistic health of their property?

Bram: And to insert Doug Tallamy’s least-famous quote amongst us is that he envisions landscaping as synonymous with ecological restoration. They’re no longer in conflict. They’re the same thing, and you still get a beautiful yard in which you can spend time in, and yet it is rich with biodiversity. Versus the opposite now, which of course is sullied with chemicals and lifeless lawns.

And we’re not by any means advocating that you give up all your lawn, just to be precise here. The lawn has its functions. People gather there, people talk to each other there, they eat there. We just don’t need as much as we have, and it can be translated into biodiverse habitat.

Margaret: I wanted to take a few minutes to talk about two of the things on the wildlife features list that I was glad to see. And there are ones that have really been coming up lately, more recently, and I don’t know as much about them. But they weren’t in the list of horticultural practices not so long ago, but now I think they’re emerging and they’re so important, especially for birds: the dense shrub thicket and the pocket forest.

I feel like the shrubs—I’ve been saying this lately a lot—we’ve really decimated the shrub layer in our world, the way that we garden and so forth. But yeah, so I was glad to see those. Are those things that are sort of near and dear to you guys?

Bram: Yes. And you are right that in our area in particular, the shrub layer has been decimated by deer. And for an ecologist, as I’m trained, it’s a weird thing to look at a forest and see the big trees and nothing else during. Restoring that part of what’s a natural vertical landscape is really important.

And then pocket forests, I’m glad you brought it up because it is one of the things that we are most pushing and recommending in this area. Obviously, if somebody is using Wildr in the Sedona Desert, it’s going to be a different set of plants.

But in our region and our experience through Plan It Wild, which is our on-the-ground part of the business, forest is the natural succession of this area. You want to establish that forest because it’s self-sustaining, and it can fight off the invasive plants by and large on its own. And we are trying to shift this landscaping perspective away from just a horizontal look to this vertical look to provide the most biodiversity and environmental benefits possible in a particular place. So yes, we are very much pushing pocket forests.

Margaret: Yeah, it’s such an interesting subject.

So do I still take the test [above]? If I’m a newcomer to the whole Less Lawn More Life and to the world of Wildr [laughter], of your Wildr products, do I start by taking the test and also use the new app? Or what’s the entry point? And by the way, all of this is at lesslawnmorelife.com.

Joanna: Yes. The answer to the score is that once … So for anyone that’s taken it, we have a lot of folks that joined the challenge last year and took the quiz and are going to be coming back this year. The app will actually—as long as they’re using the same email—will recognize them and pull in their prior score. So we’ll already have that data. We’ll already have that information; it will be pulled into the app and then sort of tracked over time.

They can also retake it. So they’re encouraged to take it again, particularly at the end of this challenge. And then our goal is to help them use that as a baseline over time.

Margaret: And then there’ll be 12 weeks of prompts again, like a weekly email with suggestions and reminders and so forth?

Joanna: Exactly. Anyone that signs up, it’s 12 weeks of fun little micro-challenges and best practices. We have incredible new hosts and experts that are teaming up with us this year. And then we’ve also decided to layer in … We had a few webinars last year, but for those who want to go deeper, we have six webinars scheduled throughout the course of the campaign that folks can join. And if they can’t join live, they’ll also receive those full recordings.

Margaret: O.K., lots of information. Yeah. And Robin Wall Kimmerer is doing the kickoff, she has also created an entity that’s part of your large group of collaborators, I think, yes? Plant Baby Plant, is that right? Instead of Drill Baby Drill, it’s Plant Baby Plant, I believe is her nonprofit.

Joanna: That’s right. I love it. They’re incredible partners. We are so, so honest just grateful and excited to have her kick this off with us this year. And then we have new national partners. We’ve got National Audubon and Lab of Ornithology and the Garden for Birds folks and One Earth. So there’s a lot of new collaborators that are co-promoting, that are sharing resources and information to just spread the word and get more and more people engaged.

Margaret: Right. And of course, a lot of these have a depth of science knowledge that I assume is really valuable to sort of vet things and toss around ideas and figure out how to shape this as the product sort of emerges, evolves.

Joanna: Hugely valuable. I mean, we think of ourselves as just co-creating this with partners. I mean, we’re constantly talking to the folks at Homegrown National Park, Doug Tallamy’s organization; with Wild Ones, both the national folks as well as the regional chapter leads; with Cornell Lab of Ornithology team—Becca Rodomsky-Bish is on our science advisory board. So again, we sort of think of ourselves as not by any means the experts, but how can we listen and learn and collaborate more effectively to then just build this conduit to the end user, to the homeowner?

Margaret: Well, I’m glad you did. And thank you, Bram, and thank you, Joanna, for being with us today, and I’m looking forward to digging in deeper and doing the test again and seeing how I do by comparison and being more conscious. So thank you. And I’ll talk to you again soon, I hope.

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MY WEEKLY public-radio show, rated a “top-5 garden podcast” by “The Guardian” newspaper in the UK, began its 17th year in March 2026. It’s produced at Robin Hood Radio, the smallest NPR station in the nation. Listen locally in the Hudson Valley (NY)-Berkshires (MA)-Litchfield Hills (CT) Mondays at 8:30 AM Eastern, rerun at 8:30 Saturdays. Or play the May 11, 2026 show using the player near the top of this transcript. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes/Apple Podcasts or Spotify (and browse my archive of podcasts here).