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The Deep Middle


Gardening & writing in the prairie echo

The Easiest Native Plants to Grow (Not Really)

1/3/2020

6 Comments

 
I’m often asked what are the easiest native plants to try. That question might be asked by folks new to gardening, those transitioning to native plant communities, or those with lots of experience looking to make things simpler.
 
There is no clear answer. The easiest native plants are those fitted to your site conditions and the other plants growing alongside them. And sometimes “easy” means you don’t have to water, the plant doesn’t spread too much, or the plants doesn’t get too tall and flop over messily. These three scenarios don’t have blanket answers, but I could say that, in order: 1) match the plant to soil and drainage; 2) match the plant to site conditions and other plants; 3) maybe the plant is in the wrong spot, tended too much, or isn’t in the best plant community.
 
We’ve first got to take our cues from wild plant communities -- observing how specific species perform together in specific scenarios. But we also have to know that when we try our best to match these realities in suburbia -- at home or at work and school -- the outcome will always be a bit different. For example, the soil life and profile is changed and the environmental stressers are somewhat novel. But that doesn’t mean we can’t translate well and help support the same fauna (like insects) that use both wild native plant communities and their urban analogues.

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E. pallida and B. minor surrounded by grasses.
Here’s a plant community that tends to work more often than not on sunny, dry clay sites around homes (50% sun is good, too, especially on a western exposure):
 
  • Baptisia minor
  • Heuchera richardsonii
  • Echinacea pallida
  • Callirhoe involucrata
  • Liatris aspera
  • Symphyotrichum oblongifolium
  • Schizachyrium scoparium
  • Bouteloua curtipendula
 
There are many reasons these plants work well together, from human aesthetic concerns to filling ecological niches and layers. The grasses, mallow, and alumroot all work as a ground cover or green mulch. The forbs serve as seasonal color and resources for pollinators of various species. There’s different texture, structure, and height for humans to enjoy. Many of the plants look good in winter. Some plants have fibrous root zones, some are tap rooted, and others have corms -- this mixing ensures plants don’t always compete at the same levels for nutrients, but also helps stem erosion and rainfall absorption as the soil layers are amended. Well, I could REALLY go on about all of this, but that’s for another time. If you crave more specifics please ask away.

Ultimately, the above plants are fairly low worry, adaptable, and thrive with loving neglect. You still have to "garden" of course -- weeding, thinning, replacing, cutting back in spring, etc -- but the above short list does tend to be fairly reliable.

6 Comments
Tucker Coombe link
1/11/2020 07:26:36 am

I thought that if you are trying to attract new and less experienced gardeners, you might want to include the common name for the plants you recommend. Just a thought. Thank you.

Reply
Benjamin
1/11/2020 08:53:18 am

I use Latin precisely because I want to help people. Common names can often apply to several different plant species. When doing an internet search for a new plant to learn about, entering the Latin name is the most reliable and precise and helpful way to research a plant.

Reply
Nancy Field
1/11/2020 05:41:46 pm

Do you know of anyone who can translate this list into a Pacific Northwest version of these plants?

Reply
Benjamin
1/13/2020 01:24:29 pm

Your internet search is as good as mine. But do find someone local.

Reply
James McGee
1/21/2020 09:33:53 pm

I have been progressing through the reading list at the back of Benjamin’s book, “A New Garden Ethic: Cultivating Defiant Compassion for an Uncertain Future.” One of the books on this list is titled “The Living Landscape: Designing for Beauty and Biodiversity in the Home Garden.” In the back of “The Living Landscape: Designing for Beauty and Biodiversity in the Home Garden” is a section titled “Selected Plants for the Southeast, Southwest, Pacific Northwest, Midwest and Mountain States, and New England.” Listed in the sub-section titled “Selected Plants for the Pacific Northwest” are 39 “Trees”, 46 “Shrubs”, three “Vines”, 46 “Herbaceous Perennials and Bulbs”, seven “Grasses, Sedges, and Rushes”, and 9 “Ferns.”

Reply
Mimi
1/30/2020 10:00:16 am

Hi Nancy,
The Pacific Northwest can cover a lot of different climates; this website can give you a beginning, and it locates your environment type by zipcode which can be helpful.
https://www.pollinator.org/pollinator.org/assets/generalFiles/IntermtSemidesrt342.rx2_171017_085202.pdf
Benjamin's blogs can teach you a lot about basic information for native planting,how to group things, etc that you can apply as needed to your own situation, and you can also do a lot of research yourself, even though it does get frustrating at times..
Some things to think of when you research for your own particular piece of ground; rainfall amount , soil type ( clay or sand?) alkaline or acid ( it matters more than you would think), length of gardening season ( if it is very short, some fall plants just won't have time to flower) and then what pollinators are local, and then what host or nectar plants they need.
Some things I learned from Benjamin's blogs; plant in groups ( easier for butterflies to see them) and plant less varieties of plants, at least initially ( unless of course you are in a harsh environment like mine, where ability to survive is your basic planting criteria;in that case,planting a bit of different things and seeing what can actually make it and what the pollinators actually like and using that to figure out what to plant more may be a viable alternative option.)
And ; research twice, plant once...A gardening variation on the old carpenters rule of measure twice, cut once.Just planted a hackberry tree( researched it, it is a host plant for multiple area butterflies, provides edible food, likes alkaline clay, can handle a bit of spring flooding,) and just found out that Wa state is not its natural range and its mildly allopathic ( likes to kill some other plants.) Grr. Still I will keep it and hope it is still a useful host plant, and that maybe the people who wrote the range guides weren't really including eastern semi desert in their very "broad picture" guide..
Good luck with your gardening adventure, and thanks to Benjamin and all those who provide lots of helpful information.

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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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