Protecting native habitats is important to regional conservation efforts because some habitats are disappearing quickly. Native habitats are home to a variety of wildlife and support a high diversity of species, some of which may be declining in urban and suburban settings. Higher diversity enriches the quality of life for humans as well. The greater the diversity of plants and animals present at a place, the richer the experience that nature provides those visiting that place.

To maintain a healthy environment, natural processes must be allowed to continue – even when humans have become part of the landscape. Nature is not static. Rather, it is characterized by continual change, this change coming in the form of different kinds of disturbances. Large scale disturbance, such as fire, sets back the successional clock and many pine savanna species require its presence. Small-scale disturbances also play an important role in the ecology of a forest. These disturbances set the stage where essential natural processes can occur. For example, each time a large tree crashes to the ground it creates a gap that allows sunlight to reach a patch of otherwise shady forest floor. This sunlight will nourish a small shrub thicket in the understory, providing cover for nesting songbirds as well as host plants for insect species.

Non-native species have damaged native habitats in several different ways, most of the non-native species having arrived as landscaping plants or agricultural crops. Non-native plants that outcompete native species of plants include Asian species of bamboo, kudzu, fescue grass, English ivy and Chinese tallow tree. These species thrive in a new environment because there are no insects or predators adapted to feed on them. Other non-native landscaping plants have produced devastating results by inadvertently introducing strains of Old World diseases or insect pests into North American populations of closely-related plant species which were not resistant to these new strains or insect pests. This has resulted in the disappearance of the American chestnut, chinquapin, Eastern hemlock and redbay from forests of the East Coast. Soil from Central America led to the introduction of the imported red fire ant into the United States. This pest species has caused the decline of ground-nesting birds and local insects. These examples demonstrate why use of non-native species in landscaping must be done cautiously and show the benefit of using native species for landscaping whenever possible.

Four parameters are often used to characterize habitat quality:
1. The rarity of plants and animals
2. The number of different species
3. The abundance of targeted species
4. The habitat aesthetics

Habitats do not exist in isolation. When different habitats are found together they create a mosaic of different conditions for plants and animals.