Topics
Special Series
Native Flora
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Spring Beauty—A Woodland Wildflower With Tasty Tubers
One of our prettiest and earliest-blooming wildflowers—spring beauty (Claytonia virginica)—is also a delicious vegetable.
By Scott D. Appell -
Rain Garden Plants
The following are some native plants suitable for rain gardens, listed by region. They are also attractive to butterflies, birds, and other wildlife. Be sure to choose species appropriate for the degree of sun or shade on the site.
By Janet Marinelli -
Ravishing Rudbeckia—Coneflowers That Light up the Fall Garden
Blooming from late summer through frost, coneflowers bring saturated warm color and height—they grow anywhere from three to ten feet tall—to beds and borders. Coneflowers are easy to cultivate and good for cutting, and they mingle well with other plants as long as their flower colors are compatible.
By Barbara Blossom Ashmun -
Native Viburnums
Viburnums have long been popular garden plants, celebrated for their white, often fragrant spring flowers and their fall color.
By Richard L. Bitner -
Planting a Native Grass Lawn Step By Step
Follow these basic steps to plant a lawn of native grasses no matter where you live.
By Stevie Daniels -
Low & Slow Fescues
For years fescues languished as obscure players in the turfgrass pantheon, relegated to second-class status as components of shade-tolerant seed mixtures. These attractive, fine-textured grasses are finally coming into their own.
By Stevie Daniels -
Native Azaleas
North American azaleas have soft-colored blooms and loose, natural-looking growth habits. Some species bloom in summer and even early fall, and many have colorful autumn foliage.
By Richard L. Bitner -
Milkweeds—Easing the Plight of the Monarch Butterfly
Modern agriculture has made much of the U.S. farm belt inhospitable to Monarchs. In the East, industrial, commercial, and residential land use is gradually effacing the habitat that supports them. This is where gardeners come in. We can make a big difference by growing the plants that are most important to the lifecycle of the Monarchs—milkweeds.
By Claire Hagen Dole -
Bumble Bees—The Essential, Indefatigable Pollinators
We live on a planet pollinated primarily by bees. Bees fertilize most of our favorite flowers, and pollinate a third of the plants we eat. They are also the exclusive pollinator of several rare and imperiled wildflowers, including native monkshoods and lady's tresses orchids. Without these essential insects, farm productivity would plummet and wildflowers would become extinct. In short, bumble bees and other bees are essential for our own well being and the survival of a good deal of the world's biodiversity.
By Janet Marinelli -
Wildflower Fever!—A Selection of Unusual Natives
Nowadays, I fill my garden with beautiful wildflowers. Besides increasing biodiversity in and of themselves by augmenting the shrinking populations and gene pools of native species, they provide a valuable source of food for insects and birds.
By Joan McDonald
