Do you garden with Native Plants?

Some native plants you just wait for every year...like this gold columbine!
http://www.wildflower.org/gallery/species.php?id_plant=AQCHH

I've got one columbine bud on a new plant I just put in. My old plant has only bloomed once in three years, but has reseeded and is growing just fine. Hope mine looks half as good as that one, Linda.

Here is one of my plants blooming now too.

And a close up of the flower.

So pretty! And here's another one that just started blooming in my yard. Squarebud Primrose, Calylophus Drummondianus. It couldn't get much prettier than this!

Linda, that is beautiful!

Cedar Sage, Salvia Roemeriana is another wildflower that does well here. A single plant seeded out years ago and over the years it spread to quite a few parts of the yard....not always where I want it to be, but they can usually be moved.

This one really prefers a moister area with better soil than I have. So I try to put it in a raised bed where it might be happy and water it. Baby Blue-Eyes, Nemophila phacelioides. There are other plants with the same common name....happens a lot with plants.

I love all of them Linda, wildflowers are so pretty.

Those are so pretty. I have always liked columbine but just can't get it to grow for me altho it grows wild in the mountains near by.

Ah, that's probably why I lost two of my baby blue-eyes. They were OK while we had rain off and on, now only one is left. 'Course, it could have been all those weeds that were choking them. :-)

Beautiful flowers everyone. :-)
Linda, I had never heard of the Squarebud Primrose before. It is so pretty!

That kind of Squarebud Primrose grows around the hill country areas north and northwest of San Antonio. There's another variety of the species (that grows over a wider area, I think) that's all yellow that some nurseries sell. Someday they'll probably discover this one also.

I just found this thread, so I will share some thoughts now and some photos later.

We bought ten acres near Springfield MO in 2003. Half the property is wooded and the other half is old pasture. The previous owners mowed about 4 acres of extremely poor turf. I wasn't too concerned about that, but I wanted to know what to do with my woods, so I contacted the Missouri Department of Conservation and had the forester come out and visit. She had some advice for the woods and almost as an aside suggested that I contact the Private Land Conservationist to discuss what to do with my lawn/field. A visit with him, the arrival of a couple of catalogs, and some time spent Googling, and I was hooked. Our land is on a glade -- an outcropping of bedrock at the surface. I am trying to establish 4 acres of native flowers and grasses that would naturally occur on a glade at the transition from the Ozark mountains to the prairie. The seeded glade planting has been challenging, with some success and some failure. Around the house, we have been blending native flowers, trees and shrubs with non-natives, planting mostly container plants. My commitment to natives was strongly reinforced in the spring of 2008 when a week of temperatures in the teens followed 3 weeks of temps in the 70's and 80's. It was a fluke, but all of my natives survived. I lost 800 dollars worth of Japanese maples and several other "exotics".

Missouri, like Texas and some other states is doing some very good things in promoting and developing interest in native plants. Check out the grownative.org website sometime. One program I am an ardent supporter of is the George White Nursery. Each spring the nursery sells native trees and shrubs for 7 to 14 dollars for a bundle of 25 plants. Yesterday my wife and I planted Sweet Gum, Black Gum, Tulip Poplar, and Bald Cypress. The day before we planted Hazelnut and Roundhead Bush Clover. A couple of weeks ago we planted Witch Hazel -- 175 trees and shrubs. In previous years we've had success rates from 100% to 0% with these -- 33% I consider a huge success.

In the back yard, from a couple of nurseries dedicated to natives, we have a Smoke Tree, a couple of Golden Currant, Willow Leaf Sunflower, MO Evening Primrose, Indian Physic, Arrowwood Viburnum, Purple Poppy Mallow, Columbine, Buckeye, Red Buckeye (brand new), Serviceberry (also new), Native Hydrangea, and some others I can't think of right now sitting here at the keyboard.

I am very careful these days about buying any non-natives. The natives just fit better. Alson, when folks visit, the exotics are common and the questions are always about the natives. We also have a completely natural aviary going on in the backyard -- more birds than I've seen in any backyard anywhere.

Congratulations Jeff, it sure looks like you have a great place and are doing the right thing, I wish i had that much space, I would probably not know what to do, but i am sure I would soon figure out something.
I think you are doing great!!
Josephine.

When our N.W. Missouri ice storm in Dec. 2008 hit it was the native trees that faired the best overall. Many natives were damaged of course from the heavy thick ice coating and clean up is still ongoing in our area. Many other nonnative trees though were broken off like toothpicks or their limbs were snapped off then splitting the centers of the tree many all the way to the ground. Those simply won't make it and will die. Nature over time has prepared the native trees to survive the best in there own native regions. The midwest has some awful weather and native trees and plants somehow survive better.

Cuckoo

Your property and efforts sound awesome Jeff. I look forward to hearing more from you.

I hope every one will post pictures of their native plants in gardens when they start to bloom. One native plant I've had for years is Rocky Mountain Penstemon. It is very common here. This year I had most of it die. Others I talked to here also lost theirs. I wonder if it was the particularly cold winter.

My penstemons are blooming now. I really love them! And we also still have damage from an ice storm we had early last year. There's no way for me to reach the broken limbs hanging off the trees Way too dangerous!
This is Penstemon cobaea or Fox-Glove.

Hi folks- I've been following this on and off.
use natives although casually,(I don't go to special nurseries to get them) Love nature , feel like I'm helping and interesting to not know what something is going to be. (I might be helping more if I went and got the things that can't come in on their own) I use what plants itself and seems to have potential. A benefit of lazy weeding!
This is Snakeroot. Its just green all summer until late, then covered with these clusters of tiny flowers. I believe its related to Joepyeweed. Awesome scent! Bugs love it. I had one last year that had room to grow and it had a nice tall/rounded shape.
I also have venus looking glass, spiderwort, evening primrose, rabbits foot clover, an aster, had horseweed but don't recommend that.- All from watching the weeds. If you let one bloom, you usually get more the next year~~could be good or bad.

So far, I only have a few of my natives actually blooming. This one relates both to this thread and another (the one on fragrant natives). Ribes Odoratum -- Golden Currant. I've had this plant (and another that's in a slightly less desirable spot a few feet away) for three springs now. I didn't expect or get blooms the first year. Last year we had a bitter hard freeze for 4 days in a row in early April after weeks of 70's and 80's in March, so no blooms last year either. This year has made it worth the wait. The fragrance is intoxicating and the yellow is just so "Spring!".

A close-up.

My other early bloomer is a bed of rose verbena in a troublesome bed next to the house. It's a little thin now, but will be full by the end of May.

Close-up.

Very nice plants Sally and Jeff.

Nice plants. We also have golden currant , red currant and a black currant. All are blooming now and full of bees.

About 80% of our landscaping is done with natives. For the most part we only plant, plants that can provide food for us or wildlife. 10% of our landscaping are 'natives' but not native to our area, but things like blackberries (they just don't live naturally this far north) and presimmons (unrecorded in our county, but recorded historically just 30 miles away), I couldn't do without when I moved here from Kentucky. The other 10% are daylilies, bulbs and fruit trees. We generally try to landscape natural habitats.. two small prairies and a small woodland area are our pride and joys. The best excuse for natives, besides the fact they are wonderfull plants, is that the are very adapted to our climate.. after the first year the cost of watering, and the labor caring for them is much less then some exotic from god knows where that doesn't really fit in our climate.

You are so right Colquhoun.

A picture is worth a thousand words.. this was a dry cracked lifeless piece of ground under a black walnut 5 years ago. Thanks to many hours of work, leaves from our nieghbors that thought we were a bit nuts.. its full of life again. And never fails to make me smile.

Canadian Ginger growing in the same area. You know it just hit me... their is alot of work in making my woods look like their is no work in them.. lol

This message was edited Apr 20, 2008 9:34 AM

Here is one area of my wildflower slope, with Pink Evening Primrose, White Yarrow, Purple Coneflower, Salvia greggii, and Coreopsis.

How pretty! I don't always remember which plants are native in my garden. I'll have to "study up on it".

I am glad I came across this thread of like-minded people. There is a number of reasons why I use natives in my landscaping. One being the adjacent shared lot that works as a natural preserve for the neighborhood. It's planted with Trillium grantiflorum, ostrich and sensitive ferns, native wood geranium, Solomon's seal and plume and other natives. By continuing into my yard I get a natural transition to this beautiful property and visually extend my garden giving it more depth. Also I found that natives are by far more reliable than exotics in my zone and as much shade as I get :) The other advantage I find is that they seem to be better neighbors to each other and as such require very little if any maintenance. Nicely working together they create stable eco-systems and give undisturbed safe home to wild wife. One more plus is that they don't require chemicals in their maintenance and I'd like to see the usage of those reduced.

As I observe them more, I find that it's not that hard to get more plants by just slightly facilitating the nature. It's become popular gardening trend and I hope that I'd be able to share native plants with people in the neighborhood to spread all those benefits :)

What can beat this on a wooded lot? And my neighborhood is old with many large trees :)

That is gorgeous Enya, I share your philosophy and will add to it the public education factor, people need to know and appreciate the plants native to their region. It is a shame that some people go through life without knowing them, I think it is such a loss. So if in a small way we can introduce people to plants that they might have never seen, I think it is a wonderful thing.
Josephine.

Beautiful spot and good thoughts, too. I keep trying to get my neighbors to embrace the native plant philosophy. Not much success yet, but I'll keep trying.

Bloody Cranesbill Geranium.
One of my favs from our property.

It's interesting how slow the changes are :( But they can happen. People don't like to spend money so when you offer free plants that are care free they take them especially if they look nice. That's my sly way to preach natives ;)

I love native geraniums! Funnily, I got a bag of those from a neighbor, added to mine, shared, posted on Trade forum here. Got no responses and passed the rest on at work:)

This message was edited May 16, 2008 12:28 PM

I do that too, as a matter of fact I can hardly pass up a seedling without potting it, as a result of this habit I have lot of potted plants everywhere, but they come very handy at swaps and meetings.

I love the native geraniums, too. I hope to get out a little more now that we've had some rain and the fire danger is lower.