January 2026: Taking Care of Wildlife in Our Gardens Monthly Challenge.

 

Welcome to the 2026 Taking Care of Wildlife in Our Gardens Monthly Challenge. Taking care of nature has been the overarching theme of this blog for a very long time. It's what I do as a gardener, it's what I write about and it's what I encourage all of you to do. January 2026 will be the start of the fifth year of the taking care of nature challenges and it's even more relevant in the midst of the many challenges facing wildlife today.

Wildlife is facing major threats from habitat loss and fragmentation, climate change, pollution, overexploitation (poaching/overhunting), the effects of invasive species, disease, and human-wildlife conflict. Although the population of earth isn't growing as fast as it once was there are still over 70million people added to our world populations each year. The more crowded we get the more we continue with our unsustainable practices that disrupt ecosystems and consequently push species towards extinction. 

Radnor Lake in winter

 What can we do? I suggest we start taking care of wildlife.There any number of ways we can do this and the Taking Care of Wildlife in Our Gardens Challenge is one I especially recommend.

What the challenge is all about!

The first part of this challenge is to do something or even lots of things each month that supports nature. 

• Be it for the critters living or visiting our gardens, 
• volunteering at a nature center or 
• joining an advocacy group. 
• Adding native wildflowers, shrubs and trees that make sense for our ecoregion is a good place to start or continue (as the case may be).
• Activities that increase our knowledge of the natural world are equally as valuable. 
• Helping others learn about nature is included. 
• Golly gee whiz, there are so many things you can do. 

The second part of the challenge is to post about it somewhere: Your blog, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or even your neighborhood listserve. Share your activities with everyone. Wouldn't an article in the local paper be a coup for nature!  

Why post it? Because positive publicity is needed to educate our friends, neighbors and communities about how important even the smallest changes we make as gardeners/citizens can be for pollinators, birds, insects and mammals, including humans, that live all around us. 

Why now? Our neighborhoods are changing. Almost everyday in my own neighborhood an older home along with many (if not all) of the mature oak, hickory, maple, Eastern cedar, hackberry and other trees are cut down. Insects, birds, even mammals lose their home site and food supplies when trees are lost. During construction soil is compacted by bulldozers, trucks and piles of debris causing runoff; surface runoff that can carry pollution to streams and rivers. It's extremely important that information about the role trees play in our ecosystem is shared. Trees contribute to their environment by providing oxygen, improving air quality, climate amelioration, conserving water, preserving soil, and supporting wildlife.

The "bee lawns" in my neighborhood that are composed of Claytonia, Salvia lyrata, Ruellia humilis, fleabane, Western Daisy, Violets, self-heal, clovers, native grasses  and sedges are disappearing. Instead, they're sodded with non-native grasses. These monoculture turf lawns contribute nothing environmentally.  Here's what we lose when our diverse lawns are replaced with pristine turf grass:

 

• Gone are the lightening bugs.
• Gone are the ground dwelling/nesting native bees.
• Gone is the habitat for insects, spiders and other critters. 
• Gone is plant diversity. 
• Gone are trees that provided for hundreds of moths, butterflies and other insects.
• Gone are the nesting sites for woodpeckers, hummingbirds, Chickadees and other birds. 
• Gone is a healthy foodweb.
  

 It breaks my heart. 

We can't stop the progmess, but, maybe we can make a lot of educational noise and help all our neighbors, new and old, see the value in providing for critters and ultimately helping the environment.

A gardener can hope! 

Here's 5 things that might inspire you this month.

• Join a local WildOnes. They offer fabulous webinars, opportunities to volunteer, garden tours and monthly meetings where you can meet and chat with other members. Here's a link to my local chapter, Middle Tennessee WildOnes. You can join the national chapter and help form a local chapter where you live!

• Allow a fallen tree to remain in the garden. Limbs on the ground are a perfect shelter for small animals such as rabbits, chipmunks and squirrels and a habitat for beetles, termites and other insects. 

  
• Join your state native plant society (Tennessee Native Plant Society)
• Take an online course on designing with native plants. Winter is a great time to begin planning changes in your garden that support wildlife.
• Take a walk in your neighborhood and observe nature. To quote Joanna Brichetto in Sidewalk Nature "Look Around. Nature is here, is us, our driveways, our parks, and parking lots.

Thanks for reading and I hope you feel inspired to take up the challenge.

I'd love for you to comment and share your thoughts, your frustrations, your successes in your garden or within your community. Please feel free to suggest topics and I hope you know that any input or feedback you care to offer is greatly appreciated. 

May this be the start of a hope filled year for all of us. Happy New Year.

xoxogail

Need more activities? Here's an incomplete list of things you might consider doing or changing in your garden, and things you can do for and/or in your community. But don't limit yourself to my list, make your own list or check out the internet for ideas.

 

Buy the best wildflower, butterfly and bird id books for your state.

Read nature books to your children and grandchildren. Buy them nature books.

Get in the garden with your children and grandchildren.

Give nature books as baby shower gifts (Nature books for infants and toddlers)

Shrink your lawn and make your planting beds larger.

Plant your favorite native perennials and shrubs. Leave them standing after they've gone to seed to continue to provide for wildlife. What you plant in your yard makes a difference to wildlife. I garden for wildlife so every tree, shrub and plant is chosen with wildlife in mind.

 

Plant more natives and then consider planting even more. "A typical suburban landscape contains only 20-30% native plant species. Try reversing that trend in your own landscape by using 70-80% native species." (source) 

Plant for bloom from late spring to early winter. Bees are most active from February to November (longer in mild climates) late winter blooming Hamamelis vernalis and the earliest spring ephemerals (like the toothworts, hepaticas, spring beauties, and False rue-anemeone) are perfect plants for a variety of pollinators.

Commit to never, ever, ever, ever using pesticides in the garden.

Stay away from native plant hybrids and cultivars that are double flowered. They are sterile and have no pollen or nectar for insects and no seeds for the birds. If possible plant “true open-pollinated native wildflowers”

If you want to garden for wildlife and pollinators, don't let lack of space stop you! Plant your favorite wildflowers in large containers. You just might have the prairie or woodland garden you've always wanted...in a pot!
 
Create a water feature. Provide water year round that is accessible to birds, bees and other critters.

Make a rain garden in low spots to collect and mitigate runoff.

Show some soil! Our native ground nesting bees nest in bare soil, so don't mulch every square inch of your garden. 

Get rid of the plastic weed barriers in your garden, it's not good for anything.

Invite bugs into your garden. Plant annuals that attract beneficial bugs.

 

Learn to tolerate damaged plants. Imperfection is the new perfect.

Don't be in a rush to clean up the fall garden. Leave plant stalks and seed heads standing all winter. Leave those fallen leaves or as many as you can tolerate! Insects over winter in the fallen and decaying leaves. Leave a layer of leaves as a soft landing material under trees for moths and butterflies to over winter. Many caterpillars drop to the ground from the trees in the fall and need a soft landing site and a place to live over the winter.

Allow a fallen tree to remain in the garden. Limbs on the ground are a perfect shelter for small animals such as rabbits, chipmunks and squirrels and a habitat for beetles, termites and other insects.

Make a brush pile. Stack fallen brush, cut tree limbs, broken pots for ground beetles. Ground beetles are excellent at eating "bad bugs". Bugs are also good bird, toad and small critter food. 

Rethink what you consider a pest. Lots of good bugs eat aphids. Spiders are important predators and they're great bird food!

Add nesting boxes for birds. 

Turn off your yard up-lighting, eave lights and porch lights after 11pm. This is important for nocturnal critters including mammals, snakes, insects, bats, birds (especially during migration). (Birdcast suggestions)

Plant shrubs and small trees that provide berries and nuts.

Keep a nature journal: You can observe visitors to your water feature, make note of when they visit. Notice which flowers attract the most pollinators and which ones are just pretty faces. 

Join your state native plant society (Tennessee Native Plant Society)

Join WildOnes even if there's no local group you can join the national organization.  (Middle Tennessee WildOnes)

Support your local native plant sellers. (GroWild in middle Tennessee, Overhill Gardens in east Tennessee,  Resource Guide TN Native Plant Society)

Encourage your local garden clubs to offer native plant talks.

If your garden club has a plant sale encourage them to sell more native plants.

Get trained as a naturalist (Tennessee Naturalist Program. Almost every state has their own Master Naturalist training program

Take an online course on tree, fungi and wildflower id. 

Take an online course on designing with native plants.

Take a walk in your neighborhood and observe nature. To quote Joanna Brichetto in Sidewalk Nature "Look Around. Nature is here, is us, our driveways, our baseboards, parks, and parking lots."

Read! There are hundreds of books on gardening for wildlife, the environment, and rewilding our world. There are delightful blogs with wonderful and informative articles.

If you are already gardening with wildlife in mind then add a few signs that help educate your neighbors. (Xerces Society, Pollinator Partnership)

Join the Xerces Society.

Set up an information station where neighbors can pick up brochures about your garden and other info. 

Get certified (National Wildlife Federation, check to see what your state offers)

Support trees by joining the effort to make sure developers don't remove more trees than are necessary for their project. Work to make sure there are tree removal permits and that they are actually enforced in your community.

 

 

Gail Eichelberger is a gardener, Tennessee Naturalist and nature writer 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.

Wildflower Wednesday: Panicum virgatum

My Panicum virgatum is still standing tall in the garden, I hope yours is, too.

It dances all winter in the wind...

Panicum virgatum or switchgrass as it's commonly known, has a long history on this continent. It's native to the tall grass prairies of the Great Plains from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean (including Tennessee and other southeastern states)* Grasses like switchgrass, big bluestem, little bluestem and Indian grass dominated the tall grass prairies and were grazed by bison, deer and elk. It’s an upright, warm season bunching grass that can still be found growing in ‘remnant prairies’ and along interstates. These grasses are sometimes called "The Four Horsemen of the Prairie". (source)   

Would you forgive me if I say that Panicum virgatum is a work horse in my garden? Keep reading to find out why I love this plant and value it as a hard worker.

Despite its long historical association with most of the United States, it's rather ironic that it took European plant breeders to open our eyes to the versatility and beauty of Panicum virgatum. They've brought us lovely cultivars and spurred American breeders to get on the native grass bandwagon. It seems that each year a new cultivar is introduced to gardeners. I look at them and hope that their best wild characteristics haven't been bred out of them. I love a good looking plant that also has great wildlife value. 

One of my favorite cultivars is 'Northwind'.  I am happy to report that it's as wildlife beneficial as the straight species.

'Northwind' planted in 2009

Panicum virgatum is climatically adapted throughout the most of the United States, except California, Oregon and Washington state and in all of Canada except, British Columbia and Alberta. Wow...that means almost any of us can successfully grow them.

 

Switchgrass is a perennial, warm season native grass. It is drought and salt tolerant, needs no fertilizer and does well in shallow, wet soils and even droughty soils in the eastern USA. Its long roots improve soil and water quality by absorbing nutrients and sequestering carbon dioxide. The tall bunch grass benefits wildlife, offering optimal nesting and cover.

I am thrilled that it's happy in my shallow soil that's dry in the summer and wet in the winters. That's one reason it's called a work horse in my garden.

Panicum virgatum has year round beauty. Summer color is an interesting olive green that works well with Phlox, Iteas, Penstemons and other native wildflowers.

It's a warm season grass and produces growth from April to September. Look for the airy, pink-tinged flower spike blooms that rise only about a foot or two above the foliage. The inconspicuous flowers with burgundy anthers and stigmas dangle from the well-branched panicles. Teardrop-shaped seeds about 1/8 inch long develop from single-flowered spikelets. (source) The seed plumes persist well into winter, with the seeds eaten by songbirds and upland game birds. Self-sowing is usually minimal but can be prolific under ideal conditions.

It's the perfect partner for most summer blooming wildflowers. My favorites are Phlox, Echinaceas, Rudbeckias and Hypericums. It really shines in the fall when Vernonias, Solidago, and the ex-asters bloom.

But, holy-moly, what really makes this grass attractive is the long season of golden color starting in September in my garden and continuing all winter.

 fall color is especially gorgeous in the late afternoon when it's backlit by the setting sun

It's a tawny gold for several months, but, by the end of the winter it's a striking pale blonde that looks incredible in my almost total brown landscape!

Late winter is the best time to cut it back! 

I promise, you won't be sorry to let it stand all winter.

                         Floppy grasses have softened the sharp corner of my house along the path to the porch

 I am on a mission to convince my neighbors and any readers who still have their mow and blow crews buzz cut their ornamental grasses back in October to adopt late winter cut back as their preferred practice. Btw, the only plants I cut back after the first frost are Phloxes, because their stems can harbor a rather destructive phlox bug. I leave everything else standing until late winter.  

Here's why I cut my grasses back in late winter or early spring before the new growth emerges for:

•  wildlife: they provide food and shelter. Ground-foraging birds (Sparrows, Juncos, Robins) eat the seeds that persist on the grass most of the winter and shelter in the foliage
• winter interest with warm colors and dancing in the wind
  
• ease of maintenance: it's easier to cut cut after a winter of being buffeted around
• the little grass skippers that lay eggs and overwinter on base of switchgrass stems

Just in case I haven't made my case to convince you to switch to cutting switchgrass down in late winter, consider this: They fill the garden with movement and beauty all year long.

Not bad for a plant, especially in winter.

 xoxogail
 

 The Particulars

 Common Name: switch grass

Type: Ornamental grass

Family: Poaceae 

Native Range: North America and most of Canada

Zone: 5 to 9 

Height: 3.00 to 6.00 feet 

Spread: 2.00 to 3.00 feet 

Bloom Time: July to February 

Bloom Description: Pink-tinged 

Sun: Full sun to part shade 

Water: Medium to wet 

Maintenance: Low 

Comments: Its long roots improve soil and water quality by absorbing nutrients and sequestering carbon dioxide. 

Tolerates: Drought, Erosion, Dry Soil, Wet Soil, Black Walnut, Air Pollution.

 

Uses: Naturalize, rain garden, butterfly garden

Flower: Showy

Good Fall color and winter interest/color

Wildlife value: In addition to the many birds and mammals that use Switch Grass, the Tawny-edge Skipper and the Delaware Skipper also use it as a host plant.  This bunch grass benefits wildlife, offering optimal nesting and cover. Switchgrass is a particularly beneficial warm season grass for use in riparian buffer zones

 * May Prairie in Middle Tennessee

 

 

 Welcome to Clay and Limestone's Wildflower Wednesday celebration. I am so glad you stopped by. WW is about sharing and celebrating wildflowers from all over this great big, beautiful world. Join us on the fourth Wednesday of each month. Remember, it doesn't matter if they are in bloom and, it doesn't matter if we all share the same plants; it's all about celebrating wildflowers. Please leave a comment when you add your url to Mr Linky.

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.

Native rye, Oh you beautiful thug!

Perhaps thug is too strong a word for this lovely grass, after all, it's not too difficult to transplant.

I really do like this grass. It has an interesting loose structure which fits nicely into a jam packed garden like mine.

But, there's the rub! When do you pull it out?

Certainly not once those lovely bottle brush seedheads begin to brown.
I

You wouldn't dare cut them down when the bristly seedheads look like this when backlit against the purple chairs.

Each of these will germinate!

You'll want to enjoy this beauty as long as you can, but still have time to collect seeds.

shade and drought tolerant

It's time for me to decide where I'd like a big stand instead of letting nature have her way...again!

It's a see through plant

It's August and the seedheads are a lovely beige and ripe for saving.

The Bottle brush seedhead is so good looking I often wait too long and the seeds gets dispersed by a late summer thunderstorm. They blow all over the place and germinate where ever they fall. When they show up in every container and in the middle of all the shrubs you might think it's a thug. 

Did I tell you we had a late summer thunderstorm the other day?

Oh you beautiful thug, I can't wait to see where you show up next spring!
xoxogail

PS


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. 

Wildflower Wednesday: Thankful for wildflowers and you

The flowers are gone from the garden, except a few blooms of the last to bloom ex-asters, one or two tiny fleabanes hidden beneath fallen leaves, a Blanketflower and Verbesina virginica's marvelous and magical frost flowers.

 I never tire of seeing the frost flowers blooming in my garden. All it takes is a warm winter day followed by a cold winter night. During the day, Verbesina virginica's roots draw water up into the stem and later that night freezing temperatures force the sap from the stems where they freeze into sculptural ice candy flower curls. I love finding them on an early morning walk, they remind me that magic is still happening and that the garden is just resting.

Amsonia's curlie cues are magical in the autumn sun

 In the mid-south the garden and gardener rest for a short time. Dreaming and planning don't stop.

 I walk the leaf covered paths and assess what worked and didn't. I notice that the Hypericum frondosum is moving toward its hyper-colored late fall look and that something has been snacking on its leaves. The Illicium parviflorum 'Florida Sunshine' that I've been trialing is doing okay despite a very dry summer. I like it enough that I added two more. They look good massed but, I am using them as specimen plants. This is a very green garden in mid summer and needs color where ever I can add it.

The Oakleaf hydrangeas are still brilliantly colored and their seeds heads are gorgeous.

The seedheads will stay put until late winter.

 I am so glad they're a part of the shrub layer in this garden, they add drama, color and texture.

  I noticed the native annuals and biennials have germinated.

Western Daisy

I've two annual natives that I am crazy about. Astranthium integrifolium/Entireleaf Western Daisy which I found naturally growing in the weedy back lawn almost 30 years ago and Collinsia verna/Blue-eyed Mary, which I added many years ago. They've both made a home for themselves in the shade of the taller rough and tumble wildflowers in the sunny Susans bed and as long as they are always allowed to go to seed they will thrive. One little plant can make a dozen offspring before you know it.

I hope you're fortunate enough to have a biennial like Phacelia bipinnatifida. The second year Phacelia rosettes are everywhere and that means early next spring will be dressed in gorgeous purple flowers covered with Mason bees. When I added Phacelia to the garden I was lucky enough to have first and second year rosettes.  I've had blooms every year since. Biennials are adept self-seeders and can be in your garden forever if you let them be!

The garden is a sea of browning leaves and seedheads. I think  they're beautiful. The promise of spring is in every one of those seeds. It's everywhere if you look carefully. Take a close look at your native shrubs. Dogwoods and Viburnums show their flower buds at the tips of their stems and the buds of late winter blooming witch hazels and spring blooming Spicebush line the stems.

Under my feet and hiding in the leaves are the acorns that keep the squirrels and chipmunks busy. I wonder when the deer will stop by to get their favorite bur oak acorns and I remembered to pick up a few to send to an OKC friend who wants to grow them in his garden. It will be beautiful by his lake!

Panicum virgatum

The panicum and phlox cultivars that I planted this summer were delightful. More will be added...That means plants like Verbena hastata that need wetter soil might need to be moved to a container near a faucet. They're too pretty to not have in the garden, but, they just aren't happy in the shallow soil.

Phlox in fall color

This year after irregular rains that verged on a drought, I am especially thankful for my rough and tumble take care of themselves wildflower beauties~Thank you Rudbeckia, Coreopsis, Pycnanthemum, Phlox, Penstemon, Eutrochium, and grasses, Danthonia spicata, Panicum virgatum and Schizachyrium scoparium~You make it worthwhile to garden with difficult conditions.

Schizachyrium scoparium

I am thankful for wildflowers. They have brought me so much joy. When I stop and think about it I have wildflowers to thank for helping me gain new knowledge, for great adventures and for meeting new people. Without wildflowers I wouldn't have met my first garden mentor, Paul Moore. I wouldn't know Mike Berkley and Terri Barnes of GroWild. Without wildflowers I might not have been drawn to the Tennessee Naturalist Program or volunteered at Owl's Hill.

Wildflowers led me to blogging and searching the internet to learn all I could about native plants. That's when I stumbled upon Pam Penick's blog Digging and read about Garden Bloggers Fling. I've gone to many Flings and met bloggers who have become some of my dearest friends~I cannot mention everyone for fear I will forget some. I count myself fortunate indeed to have made friends with folks from all over this country,  Canada and the UK....Some of them are even as wild about wildflowers as I am.

The mailbox from my late sister's garden makes me so happy

My love for wildflowers opened my eyes to pollinators and their importance to our gardens, to agriculture and to the earth.

Still blooming after a freeze, although, this photo was taken before the freeze~this garden is magic

I came to love wildflowers so much that I wanted others to appreciate them. That's why I started the Wildflower Wednesday monthly meme.

Which brings me to today's Wildflower Wednesday post about thankfulness.

I want to thank the best ever group of bloggers who join me on the fourth Wednesday of each month to celebrate wildflowers from all over this great big beautiful world. Diana, Donna, Rose, Sue, Alison, Janet, Kathy, Lea, Carol, Cindy, Ann, Dee, Frances, Hannah, Greggo, Aaron, Jason, Shirley and Beth, you are all the very best.* I am honored that you join me as often as you can. Thank you for caring about wildflowers, for taking the time to share your gardens and your knowledge with all of us. You rock.

Happy Wildflower Wednesday to all of you who visit Clay and Limestone.
xoxogail

Ps. *I hope I haven't forgotten anyone, please forgive me if I have.


If you are so inclined please join us this month with a wildflower post. Just add your name to Mr Linky so others can read your post.


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.

Blooms and Foliage December 2014

Today, there's not a bloom to be found at Clay and Limestone, the way too early Arctic cold front flash froze everything except two stalwart plants, Hamamelis virginiana and Symphyotrichum praealtum. They put on quite a nice show until just last week, so I felt fine sharing them for my Bloom Day post!

Willowleaf aster

What's left to make a gardener smile on a winter's day?

Ostrya virginica

 Trees that hold their leaves all winter!

Foliage that twists and curls.

 Grasses that accent evergreens.

 Ex-aster's seed heads.

 Amsonia hubrichtii beginning to curl

Fluffy Goldenrod ready to spread its progeny out into the world!

Copper tubing, cobalt containers and golden panicums!

Hypericum frondosum

Hyper-colored Hypericum frondosum!

I hope your garden is making you smile!

xoxogail

Now make this garden blogger smile and pop over to May Dreams Gardens, where our delightful hostess, Carol, has set up the Mr Linky magic carpet ride to take you to more Bloom Day posts than you can imagine and to Pam's Foliage Follow-up on Digging....because blooms aren't alone in making a garden beautiful.

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.