Letting my yard go wild was never a question for me. First it was for the flowers, talking up every corner. Then insects came that I've never seen before, everyday - it became like living in an exotic jungle. I brought old wood and rocks to the perimeter and fence line, began finding salamanders everywhere. All thick mats of grass soon laid down blanketing the ground, and there was no high grass to contend with, but an entire world for rodents and snakes to be each others business. There's a blackberry patch in the front yard. Trilliums by the front door.
I found stinging nettle where I had sprinkled seeds into a raised bed too soon before a freeze and forgot about. A year later here they are. It's always amazing when a plant you've yearned for many years finally appears.
I think that the oak branches covered in usnea dropped to the ground by the huge grandmother tree in the back was my initiation to the otherworld of plants.