Constructive Plant Rescue (CPR) wants to conserve biodiversity, starting with the base of the food web.
Most of the land in the North Carolina piedmont was farmed fairly intensely for a hundred years or so, from the early to middle 19th century through the middle to late 20th century. By the late 20th century, many land owners in the Carolina piedmont had decided that career paths other than family farming would be more lucrative. At that point, they either planted the land with loblolly pines (to produce cheap lumber on a 30-to-40-year cycle) or simply let the natural woodland succession take place.
As more people are migrating to the Carolina piedmont from other regions, many of these young woodlands are being cleared for development. As far as eastern deciduous forest biodiversity goes, due to the century or more of intense farming, these small forest patches are not very species-rich, but they do harbor many small, native plants that can easily be dug up and moved to new homes. As is common in most small, wooded areas today, there are typically many non-native, invasive plants in the areas from which we rescue plants, and we pay close attention to what we are removing from the site to do our best to not spread those plants.
