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The Deep Middle


Gardening & writing in the prairie echo

Milkweed and Flowers, Habitat and Design

7/22/2020

10 Comments

 
I struggle with finding the middle ground for advocacy. On the one hand are folks concerned primarily about plants as being hosts for insect larvae, yet not paying enough attention to the designed community of plants and how that creates the needed habitat for egg laying to even occur. And then on the other hand are folks who focus on the designed plant community while privileging flowers as being critical for adult pollinators, yet not paying enough attention to producing more insect young via host plants.

These two groups can broadly be labeled as wildlife enthusiasts and landscape designers, respectively. They both "get it" but from different ends of the spectrum that are essentially the same. The former group tends to eschew tenets of design -- succession, community, form, texture -- while the latter tends to eschew wildlife reproduction in favor of color and ambience. (These are broad generalizations, so forgive me if you don't agree or fit in neatly on one end of the spectrum -- I'm just making partially unfair blanket observations to get to a point.)

My new book will attempt to better align these two perspectives, as both are critical for the success of urban gardens that both appeal to and involve people and wildlife together. It is critical that people find nature-inspired gardens beautiful, while it is just as critical that wildlife find them beautiful as well. Just because one has host plants does not mean the garden is beautiful to wildlife, and just because one has a diversity of flowers doesn't mean the garden is beautiful to wildlife.

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Take monarch butterflies who must have milkweed to reproduce -- especially in spring and summer. They also must have a community of plants that both provide habitat for other species in the same food web as well as providing ecosystem services year round (cleaning water, amending soil, cooling the air, preventing erosion, creating winter habitat for hibernating insects and bugs, etc). And a critical part of that plant community is nectar plants for adult migrating monarchs come later summer and into fall, especially a diversity of aster and goldenrod species among others (late boneset, ironweed, blue sage, sunflowers, etc). However, growing certain milkweed species will result in plants that may spread too aggressively or become too tall, or otherwise might need selective thinning to maintain a design that isn't a threat to the mow and blow crowd.

Sure, plant Asclepias syriaca, but it tends to work better aesthetically in a larger landscape or as a few individual stems in the back or middle of a border. Shorter, more clumping-like species such as A, tuberosa may work, or even those that are short yet also seem to self sow around like A. verticillata. And among these milkweed ensure you have layers of diverse native plants that provide flowers (and host larvae of other insect species) from April to October, along with an intermix of sedge and grass -- and even a clump of shrubs and trees -- that mutually support one another and even more wildlife than just one butterfly species all year round.

I suppose my greatest concern is this: that we might garden for one species at the exclusion of others while justifying that exclusion with whatever validates our point of view. That can be unkempt wildness without a nod to structural diversity and necessary aesthetics (uber gardening for one butterfly species even), or a focus on flower color and diversity for human appreciation / acceptance that may primarily support adult insect species at the exclusion of a diversity of plants that produce insect young.  Are these ideologically-opposed perspectives? Heck no. But the balance can easily get out of whack as passions grow. Creating gardens that are as beautiful for all species together, at once, is a hard task that requires focus, knowledge, and in many respects a type of gardening that balances the very fine line of too wild and not wild enough. That's the gardener's dilemma in a world of mass extinction and climate change, where one species has privileged itself at the expense of others. How much do we "garden," and what does "gardening" look like in a world we've reshaped in our own image?
10 Comments
ALLISON
8/1/2020 11:47:28 am

I am eager for your new book! I've been trying to work towards the design side of things so that my yard is more functional both for the animals and for my family.

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Victor Cicansky link
8/2/2020 12:25:42 pm

Look forward to your new book.

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Lisa Wolfe
8/2/2020 07:23:23 pm

I always look forward to your posts! I am curious however, how many people actually just plant for one species- milkweed, for example.

My impressions have been there are "regular" gardeners who find out later about pollinators, Monarch decline etc, and maybe some of them stick in some milkweed or let it grow. But they have other flowers some of which will be decent nectar plants (and maybe by chance host some other things, too, like a baptisia. Chances are there are oaks or wild cherry nearby (around here, anyway) which will host lepidoptera. So at least that's a good start- I see that happening in my neighborhood, people adding milkweed to their more conventional gardens.

Then there is a group who are really starting to get into the native plant/pollinator thing, and I don't know anyone from that group that would ever focus on one species. And most of them want their gardens to look good too, so no one has just a mess.

By the way, you can cut down common milkweed at varying heights early in the season, so some won't get too tall, and you will have them producing flowers at different times, and fresh leaves sprouting during the season. The Monarchs here (Northeast) prefer common milkweed over A. tuberosa for host plants; a close second is swamp milkweed which is beautiful, clumping and will bloom all season with deadheading.

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Heidi
8/22/2020 02:00:03 pm

Lisa wrote, "I am curious however, how many people actually just plant for one species- milkweed, for example"
My neighbor for one! Lots of different types of milkweed - including cultivars, but the rest of her yard is mostly invasive non-natives.

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Barbara Chapman
8/3/2020 08:16:44 am

Very prescient comments. I've created a native plant meadow using plant plugs preselected by the New England Wildflower Association. I was noticing recently that the milkweed has become a big of a thug and is crowding out the other wildflowers, the cardinal flowers for example, I've been worrying about how to correct the situation but afraid to wade into the tall meadow for fear of ticks. 😬 I look forward to your book!

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Amy Henderson
8/3/2020 11:05:28 am

I'm pretty sure most people aren't so knowledgeable about wildlife needs of all kinds, and can't get nearly so thoughtful about what to plant in their garden. In any case, in a small urban lot it would be difficult to plan a "complete" environment. But if multiple neighbors all try to do the right thing in some way, whether that's planting a whole bunch of milkweed, or planting a varied and flower-dense pollinator garden... don't those efforts work together? So let's keep educating, yes. But let's make sure to be encouraging and empowering. And let's use design to make the plantings beautiful to people too, so our neighbors will join in and help make a movement.

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Lisa H Wolfe
7/16/2021 07:23:18 am

Great comment! I think that is one of the points of Doug Tallamy's book, that we can create habitat with a group effort. That is what is happening a bit among my neighbors, with our small urban lots (my corner lot is a bit bigger but still smallish). I have shared milkweed, perennial sunflowers, mountain mint, liatris, and senna -(the last of which my neighbor put in her hellstrip, it's doing fantastically there!) which seem to be creating better habitat altogether.

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Mimi
9/1/2020 11:54:15 pm

It might be that there is also a third group, the permaculture crowd,many of whom are also into supporting wildlife etc, but who come at it all at least initially from a food growing perspective. ( It would be great if your new book could include a chapter on native plants and their uses for food, maybe? Another way of promoting diversity and native plantings.) Also, is there any chance of a chapter on plants for high alkaline soils? I think sometimes the reason people use flowers such as daylily and butterfly bush is because so many of the readily available native plants just can't survive in an alkalinity of 9 or so, while both day lily and butterfly bush will continue to live, also most of the mediteranean herb plants.. If you try planting bleeding heart, most echinaceas, etc they will die fast.
I do think that as Amy points out, even if people do different things, in total, the more people that plant something useful to wildlife, the better, as it all adds up and combines to help.
.Even a monoculture of milkweed can provide some nectar at certain times, to many different species, as well as leaves for monarch caterpillars. I do agree with Benjamin though about the need for balance. I had mainly shrubs and trees, yet noticed several years ago, that my neighbor, who has a nice vegetable garden, lots of non native flowers,liked to kill off her thistles, and if she planted a native plant, it would be purely by accident, had more butterflies than I did. The need to keep nectar and pollen providing plants blooming throughout the year has become much more of a focus, since without the flowers, the butterflies etc are not going to come, whether or not there are host plants. Still learning but my milkweed patch finally started to grow after three years, and i have started to get a mix of other stuff that is blooming and good for pollinators as well. Very interesting to notice the shape differences that seem to attract the dfiferent pollinators; with bell shaped flowers for bumble bees, and small multi headed flowers for the tiny pollinators. Still working on what is best to attract butterflies, though I have far more than a couple of years ago. It is all a journey,and does take time.

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Nirman link
7/16/2021 06:22:30 am

Hey, Thank you so much information about milked flowered habitat and design. And Your content article was very unique and important for us.

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Anjali link
6/2/2022 01:45:50 am

The article was well written and good content about
Milkweed and flowers, habitat and design & the way of expressing the whole article were too good waiting for a new book.

Reply



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    Benjamin Vogt's thoughts on prairie gardening in Nebraska. With a healthy dose of landscape ethics, ecophilosophy, climate change,  and social justice.

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