Like you, perhaps, I’m regularly beset by questions about how best to help (or at least not damage) the natural world. Is it better to rake up fallen leaves in autumn or let them overwinter on the ground? If I throw that tangerine peel into the kitchen trash can rather than the composter by the garage, how wasteful is that?
The Maryland Master Naturalist’s Handbook (Johns Hopkins University Press; June 3, 2025) offers answers. It will serve as the primary textbook for those seeking Master Naturalist status in our state, but even an amateur naturalist like me appreciated its clear, thorough discussions.
Baltimore’s McKay Jenkins edited this multiauthor volume alongside coeditor Joy Shindler Rafey. Jenkins is a writer, professor, restoration ecologist, and urban farmer. He serves as the Cornelius Tilghman Professor of English, journalism, and environmental humanities at the University of Delaware. He is also the coeditor of The Delaware Naturalist Handbook and the author of Food Fight, ContamiNation, and eight other books about nature and history.
Jenkins contributed two of the chapters that a general-interest reader might find most interesting: “Maryland Land Use History” and “Environmental Justice.” In these chapters, he’s careful to explain the nuances associated with human-initiated changes to the natural world. For instance, he notes that although Maryland’s Conowingo Dam has provided decades’ worth of hydroelectric energy—carbon-free electricity, an environmental gain—it has greatly disrupted the Susquehanna River’s ecological integrity.
He also establishes the strong connection between repairing the land and repairing our human communities. For instance, planting trees in Baltimore’s poorer neighborhoods would not only revive and beautify some denuded landscapes, it would help humans be more comfortable when hot weather hits. As Jenkins recounts, one sweltering day in August 2018, the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism found that the hottest city neighborhoods were eight degrees Fahrenheit warmer than the coolest ones.
I appreciated the chance to ask Jenkins some questions about his life and this book.
BFB: Have you always felt a sense of connection to plants, animals, and the natural world in general? Were there turning-point moments in your earlier (or later) years, moments when you became aware of ecology and the connectedness of all things?
Growing up in New York and New England in the 1970s, I loved fishing, canoeing, and backpacking. I did my first unsupervised week of backpacking in the Adirondacks when I was 15, and my first week-long canoe trips on the St. Croix and St. Johns rivers in Maine soon thereafter. As I got older, and took staff journalism jobs in Annapolis, Seattle, and Atlanta, I got deeper and deeper into paddling, mostly on flatwater here in the Chesapeake region and on whitewater rivers in the Southeast. I started building canoes and kayaks, and still use them today.
All of this set the foundation of my love for being outside, and led me to want to somehow find a way to make a living being engaged with environmental work. As a writer, I started out writing about what I used to call “big wilderness”; my first few books were set in places like Montana, Colorado, and the Canadian Arctic. But as I got older, and especially after I moved to Baltimore, my interests—as a writer, teacher, and activist—shifted hard into environmental justice work. My most recent books have been about our collective struggle to assess the environmental and human health consequences of things like suburban development, industrial pollution, synthetic chemicals, and industrial food—and the efforts (like we see in urban reforestation and small-scale urban farming) to address and undo some of this damage.
BFB: Over the decades that you’ve been involved with environmental and social matters, how have discussions and efforts evolved?
In a way, my own experiences have mirrored the evolution of the “environmental movement” writ large, from a desire to protect wild places “where people went on vacation”; to a deeper understanding of broad-scale issues of water and air pollution and public health; to a much more energetic engagement with the social, historical, and racial dimensions of environmental degradation. Baltimore happens to be a national leader in addressing issues of environmental justice, whether it’s through the Farm Alliance of Baltimore; the great work being done in the city by local, state and federal reforestation and stormwater efforts; or the powerful activism in places like South Baltimore over challenges arising from the coal pier or the massive garbage and medical waste incinerators. In each of these cases, scientists and community activists work side-by-side in ways that are revitalizing our whole approach to restoration work.
BFB: How can Baltimoreans change our gardens and homes to better support the flora and fauna of Baltimore, as well as the human communities who live here?
For my money, learning about native and invasive plants is a great first step. A good bit of this new book addresses the benefits people can provide simply by attending to the trees and plants on their own property, and in their home neighborhoods. Like everywhere in the mid-Atlantic, the Baltimore region is under siege from invasive plants like Asian bittersweet, porcelain berry, Japanese honeysuckle, and English ivy, all of which can be cut away from trees. Invasive trees like ailanthus and Norway maples, and stands of bamboo, can be removed and replaced with natives. Especially in suburban areas, where people still seem to be obsessed with turfgrass lawns, homeowners can replace swaths of grass with native plants, which dramatically increase the biodiversity of an otherwise fully degraded ecological landscape. Native plants are especially vital to restoring populations of native birds, which have been under incredible pressure because of decades of suburban landscaping practices.
BFB: Can you recommend local nonprofits where people can get involved as volunteers?
So many to choose from! Some personal favorites: The Farm Alliance of Baltimore. BlueWater Baltimore. Baltimore Tree Trust. Habitat for Humanity of the Chesapeake. Interfaith Partners for the Chesapeake. Chesapeake Bay Foundation.
BFB: What gives you hope?
I have been entirely invigorated by the collaborations in Baltimore City between scientists and community groups working on these multidimensional issues. Ecological restoration knows no borders, whether between county and city or neighborhood to neighborhood. Poor communities in the city are working to reverse decades of deforestation, flooding, and air pollution; some wealthy suburban communities, especially those with countless acres of lawn, are beginning to understand the need to replace their grass with native plants. All of these communities, of course, exist within the same watershed. We all need to join together to realize the mutual benefits we all—human and nonhuman—will realize once we get to work.
Launch Event
Come to The Ivy Bookshop patio at 6:00 p.m. on Thursday, June 5, 2025, to hear Jenkins in conversation with Lia Purpura.
