Is there a prairie forum?

I would be very interested in a Prairie Forum. I'm trying to learn more about Prairie plants and a dedicated Forum would be a great learning place.

Kelly

I'm with Kelly and all the others! I'm trying to create my own prairie on my city lot. I could use all the help I could get. Please add a Prairie Forum!

Terry

I love birds andwould love to grow prarie plants just for my birds..I think a prarie garden forum would be great..
Please add one

Someone sent this thread to me, despite knowing that I restrict myself to one forum only (trees & shrubs) due to limited time. It seems IMHO that y'all are trying to handle too many issues at once, and tempers needlessly are flaring out of the confusion.

I have no interest in entering the native/indigenous/foreign debate. But I do agree that prairie ecosystems and "prairie gardens" are popular, at least here in the Midwest. Terry, since there are some people clammoring for a forum on them, maybe DG could try one and see where it goes -- couldn't hurt, right? Those who are afraid of hawkweed questions or xenophobic about non-US participants can choose not to participate; or they can choose instead to try to bring something useful to the discussion, like many of us try to do for newbies over on the trees & shrubs forum. Like it was said above, everyone has to start somewhere, and we all can learn from one another regardless of our status.

If I had unlimited time, a prairie & meadow forum probably would be the fifth or sixth one I'd hit (out of 180 or so available at DG). But I don't, so I won't -- good luck with whatever you decide.

Bye --
Guy S.

Baa,

Hybrids and cultivars are still plants derived from plants that are native somewhere.

Hey, how'd you really end up over here out of your corner of the world over in Trees & Shrubs? I didn't contact you because I know you rarely venture out of that particular forum so tell me tell me tell me do! Striking out to experience other areas of interest are you? Why Guy! I think a Prairie would be so you. I didn't know you might be interested in them. I thought you were strictly a tree & shrub man. Oh the many facets of Mr. Wonderful.

I, too, would be very interested in a prairie forum. We have an area that we want to restore to tall grass prairie.

Audrey

Dodecatheon

Species cultivars and hybrids of garden origin don't fit the definition of indigenous.

From Ask Oxford
indigenous

• adjective originating or occurring naturally in a particular place; native.
— DERIVATIVES indigenously adverb indigenousness noun.
— ORIGIN from Latin indigena ‘a native’.

From American Heritage
1. Originating and living or occurring naturally in an area or environment. See synonyms at native. 2. Intrinsic; innate.

Plants such as the red flowered form of the so called Primula veris simply do not occur in wild populations anwhere in it's native range, they are of garden origin. Plants of generic and specific hybrids which do not occur in the same regions have been bred by human hand just don't conform to the definition of indigenous or native.

There are differences ranging from slightly to somewhat in the cultivation of true species to cultivars too, hardiness and propagation are probably the two most noticable. There are those plants that for whatever reasons are ignored by mainstream horticulture, like those who require very specific habitats or those that have been deemed uneconomical by the industry among other reasons. These plants all have a place here and who better to discuss and help to expand knowledge of these plants than the people who grow and enjoy them for what they are, not what they might be with 100 years of hybridisation?

Cool.. prairie forum!!!!

Baa,

You're right...they aren't species, they're hybrids or cultivars...BUT they are descended in large part from plants that are native to whatever part of the world they are native to. Take a common red tulip for instance, they're much changed from their humble ancestors in Turkey, but they're still native to that area.

In this continent, there are cultivars of switch grass and little blue stem and echinacea. They're definitely not the species but are certainly direct descendents of the species. Hopefully they will not be able to crossbreed with species plants.

I'm interested in a prairie forum.

Lori

My dad is participating in a Federal grant program to retire farmland and replace it with habitat for quail and pheasant in order to reintroduce them to parts of the Midwest. I think a prairie forum would be very interesting. Personally, in my home garden I prefer bigger flowers than most prairie plants have - yeah I know, I'm tacky. But - like many others I enjoy learning, and now I have a reason to research and learn about natural grassland. I can barely follow some of the arguments used above and would just like to get on with it. Maybe the Indigenous Forum covers it - I don't really care, but we have to have a way to guide people to the right discussion or the few faithful will give up after a while.

I also have a concern about the trend in the industry to hybridize the life out of plants so we can have one more color of the same thing, or some minute difference in leaf pattern, yielding all too often a weak plant that shouldn't be sold. Coreopsis Limerock Ruby, yellow echinacea, heucheras ad finitum, thousands of look-alike hosta cultivars, etc. If the conversation led to ways to stop unintentional crossing of natives with hybrids, I'd be even more in favor. The pure gene pool needs to be preserved. I consider prairie natives to be a different story than crossing iris's or daylilies, which are sort of the french poodles of the garden plant world. Except those batik irises should be banned - ugh I know they are trendy and hope the trend ends soon.

Years ago I participated in a trip to see Ruffed Grouse mating in a small remaining patch of prairie in Missouri. It was a wild trip - (ha ha) but fascinating. Sad to see that at that time there was so little prairie left in the US that the grouse population had dwindled to a handful. The Missouri Botanical Garden was in on that project. I think a lot more people are interested in this subject now than a few years ago.

Anyway the subject of prairies is interesting and I hope it is discussed here.

I would love a prairie forum - my worry would be the would I have form the Tree and Shrub forum from harsh words and cruel posts over there would be the norm in the newer forum too. I know a lot of the Texas Native folks never come over here but rather stay in the Texas Forum and have loads of threads over there with this forum being so slow. I am working on a prairie right now and I have the Texas Wildscape cert, my yard is mostly natives but I also plant somethings deemed evil near the house. ... long story short if people would keep their mannors it would be a great forum and I would love it.

I'd like a prairie forum too. I understand (I think) Terry's POV on things...but I don't see why if a forum offends ten people that visit it, they can't simply not visit it...after all there are over a hundred OTHER forums for them to visit, if it pleases them not.
As long as people have a guideline to either ignore (if you can't trust yourself) posts that might be regarded as baited/(or truly ignorant), or simply to use a matter-of-fact educational tone, I don't see the problem. If they can't do that after some warnings, then perhaps consider asking the person to leave DG?
I appreciate being able to ask questions that might have a knowledgeable (focused) group of people to answer and share experiences.
I'm not a pure "nazi", however, I'd rather someone doesn't advise me to plant Japanese knotweed because it looks so nice in their garden :)
Suggestion: Perhaps put it under North American Central Prairie habitat (regional garden?)

This message was edited Jul 8, 2006 7:19 AM