Home of the Practically Perfect Pink Phlox and other native plants for pollinators

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Wildflower Wednesday 2012 Roundup

Verbesina virginica

Welcome to Clay and Limestone's 2012 Wildflower Wednesday December Roundup!  

Wildflower Wednesday is about sharing wildflowers/natives/naturally occurring plants no matter where you garden~the UK, tropical Florida, Europe, Australia, Africa, South America, India or the coldest reaches of Canada. It doesn't matter if we sometimes show the same plants, how they grow and thrive in your garden is what matters most.

I hope you join the celebration..It's always the fourth Wednesday of the month!

 

Without further ado,  here are the best and brightest of Clay and Limestone's 2011 wildflowers.

 January's Bee-Witching Flowers
Hamamelis vernalis
Hamamelis vernalis is a lovely native shrub that blooms when you have just about given up hope that winter will end and warmth will return to the world...Unless, you live in my Middle Tennessee garden and you're wondering where the heck winter has gone! 


February's Poverty Oat Grass

Danthonia spicata won't be found among the ornamental grasses offered by most nurseries.  It isn't a big sexy grass with showy inflorescence, but, it has much to offer for gardeners who love native plants.  It will grow on dry, rocky and poor soils, has attractive twisted beige winter foliage, great  wildlife value and is delightful when allowed to grow and set seed. Trust me, it's a wonderful lawn alternative for tough spots!

March's Passalong Plant~Collinsea verna
One look at those bicolored flowers and you'll know why I walk the garden looking for seedlings of Collinsea verna in late winter and early spring.  Don't you think the blue and white petals are a perfect match for a spring sky. Sigh.  It's a sweet little annual that deserves to be sown in many more gardens... 

April's Never Fail Wildflower Favorites
Tradescantia virginiana
Spiderwort, Entireleaf Western Daisy, Practically Perfect Pink Phlox pilosa, Penstamin X are just a few of the mainstays of my Spring garden. They are a part of the Rough and Tumble wildflowers that make Clay and Limestone the garden it is today.

May's The Dragons At The Bottom Of The Garden
Green Dragon (Arisaema dracontium) is a  marvelous woodland wildflower that is happiest in dappled sunlight and a moist, rich woodland soil and yet, it's tolerant of our wet winters and dry summers. If it's happy you'll have a nice colony that disappears mid-summer leaving behind the red/orange ripened seed head that topples to the ground and spills seeds everywhere. 

June's Fill Your Garden With Native Plants
You'll never be sorry if you fill your garden with plants native to your part of the gardening world. I know I'm not...My garden is a Central Basin plant community with plants native to cedar glades and the adjacent oak-hickory-red cedar forests. Anyone who has gardened near here knows we have heavy, nearly neutral clay soils that sit atop a limestone bedrock.  It's shallow and sticky wet all winter and dry as concrete all summer.  It took me awhile, but, I eventually figured out, that in order to have a garden that was beautiful and thrived, I was going to have to plant natives. Tough natives!
 
July's The Joes
I'm talking about the Joe-Pye-Weeds, aka as Eupatorium dubium, E. fistulosum, E. maculatum, E. purpureum and E dubium (aka Eutrochium). What all the Joe-Pyes have in common are great big mauve/lavender-pink flower heads that are magnets for butterflies, Bumbles and other pollinators. Can't you tell those beautiful flower heads are the perfect feeding and perching stations for nectar seeking butterflies.

August's Two Native Verbenas
I love Verbenas...and the purple flowers of Verbena hastata and Verbena/Glandularia canadensis 'Homestead Purple' are a treat to the eyes when all the Susans are in bloom!

September's Asteraceaes Rock
Here in Tennessee we have 320 different species (world wide there are over 23,000 recognized asteraceae species).  One could say that from Spring through fall they rock my garden.  In fact, I wouldn't have a garden without them.

October's Little Asters Everywhere
I fell head over heals in love with the blue and lilac flowers that were all over the yard and covered with bees and butterflies when we moved into this house 26 years ago. They so captured my heart, that I built the garden around them. These ex-asters look fantastic when they are allowed to plant themselves with abandon throughout the garden. If you can go with the flow you'll be rewarded with a blue cloud of shimmering flowers that bloom until frost...But, if you need more order, they are magnificent in mixed borders.

November's Hypercolored Hypericum Heaven
Hoky smokes gardeners! Tear out your Burning Bush, rip out your Barberry and trash your Nandinas and replace them with Hypericum frondosum!  You will love its  hyper-colored fall display, the exfoliating bark, the blue green summer foliage, and the pollinator magnet golden sunburst flowers.



My dear friends, Thank you for planting more wildflowers, thank you for taking care of the bees and all the  pollinators, thank you for tolerating pesky wildlife, and, thank you for another year of your friendship, visits, comments and joining me in celebrating wildflowers all over this great big wonderful world. You are the best and having you in my life has enriched it beyond measure.

xoxogail

Add  your Wildflower Wednesday link to Mr Linky and leave a comment!


Gail Eichelberger is a gardener and therapist in Middle Tennessee. She loves wildflowers and native plants and thoroughly enjoys writing about the ones she grows at Clay and Limestone. She reminds all that the words and images are the property of the author and cannot be used without written permission.

24 comments:

  1. Gail it was lovely to see each of those wildflowers again...I have one more for December...here's to even more wildflowers in 2013.

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  2. I do love these posts, I have learnt so much about North American natives, many of which are grown here as ornamentals in the UK. I might try and do the same with UK natives and join your monthly meme its just working out what is actually a UK native s we have had imports from the time of the Romans!!

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    1. Helen, That would be so cool! We have your horticulturist and hybridizers to thank for re-introducing the US to many native plants. Happy New Year.

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  3. It is difficult to think of wildflowerrs when I am sitting here looking out the window at 11 inches of snow. Love your photos. It makes me crave all that color.

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  4. Lovely post, Gail. There realay is something for every month in the wildflower garden.

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  5. A lovely retrospective. I'm going to try to post for Wildflower Wednesday on Thursday because we had a blizzard today!

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  6. Thank you, Gail, for hosting this each month and introducing us to so many different natives and wildflowers. I've learned so much about wildflowers from this series and am more in tune with what is beneficial to the pollinators, thanks to all your helpful information. The frost flower in the first photo still amazes me!

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    1. You're welcome Rose. That Frost Flower still amazes me, too.

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  7. Have you ever thought of adding diervilla to your garden? It's an attractive native shrub that thrives in dry shade and has flowers that attract pollinators/nectar feeding birds in early spring. It grows in my garden and is really tough. Ruellia humilis would grow well for you, too. :o)

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    1. yes I have but I haven't gotten around to getting it! Thank you for reminding me, I need to put that on the list again. I love Ruellia and have both R strepens and R humilis. Happy New Year.

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  8. I actually have a fair number of native flowers and plants in and around my garden. My new year's resolution is to pay more attention to Wildflower Wednesday in 2013 and do a little showing off. We are so fortunate to live near the New England Wildflower Society's nursery where they sell any number of properly propogated native plants.

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  9. A beautiful retrospective Gail. I need to put a calendar in the computer room so that I can write down reminders about Wildflower Wednesday!

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  10. Your photos and wildflower choices are superb, dear Gail. Thank you for turning the spotlight to shine on the wildflowers, natives and easy growers of the plant world. We are all richer for it.
    xoxoxo
    Frances

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    1. Frances, I do love them and there are so many more to share...Must keep adding them to my garden! xoxo

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  11. My garden is mostly green, golden wild oats, with blue flowers.

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    1. Your mountain is lovely...and the blue flowers are divine.

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  12. Gail...love your blog. You gave me some great ideas for some natives. We have quite a few natives and I love to use them in our cottage garden.

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    1. Thank you and welcome to C and L! If you like wildlife and I know you do, they'll flock to your wildflowers!

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  13. Gail, Tina just reminded me that I met you at the perennial plant society meeting when she was the speaker. You are the one that identified my Dog Fennel or as it was previously named "the mystery plant". Thank you so much!!

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  14. I do love that shot of Joe Pye and the Coneflower. I wish you many wildflowers in the new year, native ones of course.

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  15. All amazingly stunning wildflowers! Thank you so much for the eye candy and the inspiration, Gail! I will be joining in in the months ahead. Happy New Year!

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  16. Gail....where do you buy your natives? You have shown many that I am interested in buying for our garden, especially the Phlox Pilosa and the Verbenas. Thank you!

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    1. GroWild Native plant nursery in Fairview is my go to nursery. I also buy cultivars of natives from local nurseries and look up every plant on my smartphone to see what the reviews say about it. I don't buy native cultivars/hybrids that are sterile or unattractive to pollinators. There are also some very good mail order nurseries like Sunlight Nursery, Lazy S, Niche Nursery and Shooting Star nursery (in Kentucky) that I will occasioanlly order from...Hope this helps. gail

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  17. Great year wrap-up. While all the photos are outstanding, the Tradescantia just glows. Happy New Year.

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