“If our native insect fauna cannot, or will not, use alien plants for food, then insect populations in areas with many alien plants will be smaller than insect populations in areas with all natives. This may sound like a gardener’s dream: a land without insects! But because so many animals depend partially or entirely on insect protein for food, a land without insects is a land without most forms of higher life (Wilson 1987)” (Tallamy, 12).

“Nearly every creature on this planet owes its existence to plants, the only organisms capable of capturing the sun’s energy and, through photosynthesis, turning that energy into food for the rest of us. Only in the deepest reaches of the ocean do life forms survive that don’t require this food, deriving their energy through chemosynthesis of sulphur’ from deep-sea vents (Ruby, Wirsen & Jannasch 1981: Novomv et al. 2006)” (Tallamy, 15).