If you monitor the goings-on in the gardening world, you know that a firestorm is raging that began with the announcement by the National Wildlife Federation that they’re partnering with Scotts Miracle-Gro. If you haven’t heard about it, I want to make you aware of the impact of this quite frankly, puzzling, partnership.

Snowberry clearwing moth (Hemaris diffinis) aka Hummingbird Moth on Bee Balm (Monarda sp.)

The National Wildlife Federation has historically been an advocate for wildlife. Their latest move has many of us questioning just how deeply their commitment goes. After all, an organization that claims to care about the environment as it directly relates to living things surely wouldn’t partner with a company that does billions of dollars of business a year selling chemicals known to be harmful to the environment, would it?

They did. And many many of us can’t understand why. They seem to be strange bedfellows, to say the least.

Roundup® is especially toxic to amphibians.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think Scotts is the devil, as some do. And I’m not for throwing out the baby with the bathwater; Scotts is working towards producing more organic products. I don’t want to take away from that. But they do produce many products that are known to harm the very things that the NWF claims to care about. (Roundup®, for one, and it’s a BIG one.)

It remains to be seen how this will all play out. The NWF is surprised by the public outcry over their decision to partner with Scotts. It amazes me that they didn’t think about the reaction that they might receive before they made that decision. There’s been a call for boycotting all things made by Scotts to hit them where it hurts, but as someone has said (sorry, I’ve read so much I don’t recall who it was), many of the people that object the most don’t buy Scotts products anyway.

I had our garden here at Our Little Acre certified as a “Wildlife Habitat” in 2008. (See certificate in right sidebar.) The fact that I desire to reduce any harmful effects on the environment and those who live here with me in it by providing a relatively safe place for all of us to live, means that I keep my chemical use to a minimum, if using any at all. (I honestly can’t remember the last time I used anything that wasn’t organic.) I thought this was the philosophy that the NWF embraced, too. This hook-up leaves many of us not as sure about that as we once were.

Unlike many of those who object to this partnership, I’m not going to tell you how you should feel about it. That’s for you to decide. But I did want to help raise awareness of the controversy if you weren’t already aware of it. And I have meager hopes that something good might come of this. I am a glass-half-full kind of gal, after all.

For further reading:

• Miracle-Gro Deal with Wildlife Federation Outrages Environmental Community
• As Wildlife Federation Defends Its Greed, Scotts Continues to Assault Our Sensibilities
• National Wildlife Federation Teams up With Scotts Miracle-Gro? 
• David Mizejewski Defends National Wildlife Federation Partnership with Scotts Miracle-Gro

UPDATE: NWF posted this on their site today, in an attempt to answer to the concerns of so many:

• An Open Letter from Larry Schweiger to NWF’s Friends and Supporters

I sincerely hope that these goals can be met. I have some doubts, due to incongruous statements in Mr. Schweiger’s letter. Time will tell. But I think NWF now knows that they’ve got their work cut out for them, both in achieving their goals and winning back the trust of those supporters they’ve lost by this action. 

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