Backyard Wildlife Habitat and endangered plants

I Came across this on the web after watching a Discovery Channel show on encouraging wildlife in your backyard. For a nominal fee ($15), The National Wildlife Foundation will certify your yard as an offical Backyard Wildlife Habitat and subscribe you to their Habitats newsletter and a free year's membership to the NWF. The "certification" process is just an online survey, so clearly there is some measure of faith involved on their part. It seems unlikely, however, that people would lie just so they can pay money for a certificate and a newsletter. With the various types of "wild" terrain in our backyard already, qualifying was a breeze - as it should be considering deer, woodchucks, rabbits, skunks, turkeys, toads, snakes, all manner of small rodents, and lots of birds are pretty happy with our digs. There's also a red fox around, though I haven't seen him in our yard. It's a good sign that our suburban neighborhood is supporting a predatory population. Of course they've had bears and mountain lions nearby, so perhaps there is such a thing as encouraging too much wildlife in your yard!

Since part of the NWF's emphasis is on sustainable and native gardening practice, I got interested in tracking down the native/non-native/invasive pest labeling of a lot of our plants. I knew some of this already, because I have been intentionally choosing and cultivating native plants when possible (the violets, the lady's slippers, the snowball hydrangea, etc.). Unfortunately, some of the plants I like (hosta, daylilies) are technically interlopers and even invasive (in the case of the fulva species of daylily), whereas the barren strawberry weed that has spread annoyingly throughout our yard is actually considered threatened/endangered in New England. I don't know where they've been looking, because my yard is covered in it. I was happy to know the one plant (other than poison ivy) that I've been actively ripping out everywhere I can is an invader from Europe: Red Sorrel. This stuff if the bane of my landscaping efforts. It spreads like wildfire through subsurface runners, and you can never get all the runners out, which just means more pop up behind the ones you pull. It's the gardener's version of wack-a-mole. Apparently it is related to rhubarb and has some reported herbal/medicinal uses, but trying to keep it constrained to the "wild" section of the yard is a constant struggle. It is supposed to be good for sore throats, though. Maybe I should boil some up to help me get rid of this nasty cold I've got ;)