Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens
Healthy Gardens. Healthy Planet
This week is National Pollinator Week and to continue my series of posts about pollinators and insects in our wildlife gardens, this post will feature the breathtaking native bees that visit our wildlife gardens. Previous posts in this series: Fantastic Flies, Wonderful Wasps and Beguiling Beetles With approximately 4000 species of native bees in North [...]
Mesquite is marvelous in myriad ways. Mesquites grow into large and lush shade trees. Mesquite wood adds special flavoring to foods over a barbecue, plus it is a dense wood, ideal for hot, slow burning fires. Native peoples long ago discovered that mesquite trees provide wonderful wood for building homes and shady arbors. The early [...]
What to plant? We have a sizeable bed of soil and want to get a crop in before the season slips by. But what should I plant in our sidewalk veggie bed? I don’t usually get too involved with shoulds in my garden but there are some mindsets that are starting to rule me. Native [...]
Eastern Nebraska’s drought has broken this spring. Last week we had 5” of rain, several times the amount we saw in almost three months last summer. The garden is thick and lush. The lawn is growing far too fast for my taste. In the side garden (an 8’ by 30’ space) we have nesting cardinals, [...]
They did it again! The plants in my garden have migrated from one part of the garden to another. Plants that I had purposely placed in the partially shady area thinking that was the best place for them have suddenly sprung up in hotter, drier spots. Plants that I thought would be great specimen plants [...]
June is the time to honor pollinators for all the benefits they bring to us and to the ecosystems. We often hear that we owe them one bite out of three of our food. What is rarely mentioned is that much wildlife also owes them a significant amount of their nourishment. Just think about all [...]
Stage one: Lawn removal & three bunching grasses Last September I began this set of garden adventures with the purchase of some Elliot’s love grass (Eragrostis elliottii) at a native plant sale. I knew I was going to reduce the tongue of lawn out into the front meadow and wanted to have the grasses to [...]
It’s the beginning of June, and the meadows here at Native Return® are exploding with life. Back in March, we had cut down to ankle height anything left standing from winter. Within a week or so of warmer temperatures and increased sunlight, green began appearing through the debris. Then began the process of eliminating [...]
The Salal chapter of the Washington Native Plant Society began creating a native plant demonstration garden a few miles west of Mount Vernon in the early 2000s. It is adjacent to the Master Gardeners demonstration garden and the Washington State University Research Station, 16650 State Route 536. The garden is an all-volunteer effort, supported by [...]
When I give talks about landscaping with native plants, one of the points I am always sure to make is that landscaping with natives doesn’t necessarily mean a yard that will look like the side of the road. Many people have an idea that gardening with natives has to be messy. And while it [...]
