Wildflower Wednesday Part 3: Thanksgiving Celebration~This Time A Tree

The Dancing Tree kicks up her heels and reaches for the sky earlier this November

There is the loveliest tree in my garden. I call her my Dancing Tree.  Ostrya virginiana is a naturally occurring understory tree in dry woodlands like Clay and Limestone and it's planted itself among the oaks and shagbark hickories that populate my garden. Hophornbeams are totally under appreciated native trees that would be lovely in our gardens, if only we knew about them! 

It has an attractive shape and form that looks lovely on the edge of the wildflower garden. As it ages the branches become irregular and have a beautiful layered grace to them. You just have to look up to see the Dancer in the Tree reaching for the sky while performing a high kick.

It's small, rarely growing taller then 30 feet or so. An easy tree that thrives in the dry mesic soil of my garden. It doesn't mind rocky slopes or ridges; it's very shade tolerate, which makes it a perfect small tree to thrive under larger oaks or pines. I can see it as a specimen along walks, in parks and of course, in a naturalized or woodland garden like mine. Hophornbeam is a native of the eastern half of the US and Canada; including most of the Midwestern states and Texas.

O virginiana (Betulaceae family) has serrated leaves that resemble an elm. The stems are very slender, giving the tree a fine textured appearance during the winter season. The fall foliage turns a most becoming yellow....and when the wind blows they flutter and bounce a golden light around the garden.  Sometimes the coppery brown leaves stay the entire winter accenting the textured bark and twisted and knobby trunk.

I find this tree completely charming and recommend it highly for your shady native garden. 

It's a perfect understory tree for the taller oaks and the graceful  lower limbs don't crowd the witch hazels, hypericums and dogwoods at the shrub layer.  Spring Beauties, toothworts, false rue anemone, Iris cristata, Phlox paniculata, ferns and other wildflowers dance at  her feet all spring and summer.

 
It's a gem of a tree!

It's not a picky grower; will tolerate dry shade; and even high winds. It isn't bothered by most insects or fungal diseases.  It has both male and female flowers (monoecious), so, it needs no pollinators, just the wind.

leaves often hang on all winter making it quite striking in a winter garden

In the forests and woodlands, the buds and catkins of Eastern Hophornbeam are important winter food for ruffed grouse,  sharp-tailed grouse and wild turkey. It's eaten  by bobwhite, red and gray squirrels, cottontails, white-tailed deer and ring-necked pheasant.

Suburban dwellers, like me, will appreciate that it provides food for purple finch, rose-breasted grosbeak and downy woodpeckers. It also is a host plant for the larva of several winter moths.

Small native trees like Hophornbeam might be hard to find, but, they are available.  Try an internet search if you haven't a local native plant nursery nearby.  Middle Tennessee gardeners can find them at GroWild Nursery.

xxoogail

Welcome to Clay and Limestone and  Part 3 of  the Thanksgiving week long celebration of wildflowers. It's our annual celebration of the "First Thanksgiving" when colonists celebrated arriving safely in the New World and all across America families and friends gathered for Thanksgiving dinner. It's traditionally a time for appreciating the bounty in our lives.

Carya

This year, I am especially grateful for the health and well being of my family; for loving and supportive friends; for rain that finally fell in Middle Tennessee; for wildflowers that bloomed no matter how horrid the weather has been and for the trees that shade my garden and add to the beauty that surrounds our home.   Thank you all for joining me all this week to share and celebrate the wonderful wildflowers that live and thrive in our gardens. Remember, it doesn't matter if they are in bloom or not, you can still share them.  Please leave a comment and add your name to Mr Linky so others can pop over to see your Wildflower Wednesday 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."

Into Every Wildflower Garden A Little Rain Must Fall

Practically Perfect Pink Phlox pilosa after the rain

We've had some rain~

A lot of rain. Not like last year, when we had well over 18 inches of rain and experienced a 1000 year flood. But, enough that the Cumberland River will crest 3 feet below flood stage. Enough, that if I had a cistern I would not need to use city water during the Summer drought. (Although, I will get to practice my Zen Watering techniques) Or, enough that the wildflowers are looking just a little bedraggled!

I love Spiderworts during the Spring!

Not all of them! Some thrive in wet soil. Some revel in wet soil. Some sing their best song in wet soil.

Bumblebees pollinate spiderwort and some mammals eat the foliage

Like Tradescantia virginiana, a Central/Nashville Basin native that causes some gardeners to declare:
"Friends don't let friends plant Spiderwort!" (Cindy, My Corner of Katy) There's a rumor going around that this fantastically gorgeous flower is considered a thug! Yes, a native plant thug~It happens! I prefer to think of it as colonizing! Which means their roots and rhizomes spread to make a large and dramatic impact in a garden.

Tradescantia 'Sweet Kate' is a hybrid I planted for the foliage color.

A large and dramatic impact in the garden. Does that sound thuggish?! Some people use the word invasive. I like to save that powerful word for exotics that are on the state noxious and invasive species list.

Instead, I refer to them as colonizers, aggressive natives, endemic thugs, highly competitive natives, or as one ecologist quipped to me, “competitive superior natives”. That made me chuckle. (source: authors article) Spiderwort is one of those plants that is thuggish SO successful at self propagation, that I am offended that any garden center expects me to pay for it! (False Dragonhead is another excellent colonizer that could be given away~I know we all can name another colonizing plant or three).

yellow stamens float above the exquisite spidery violet hairs

But, I still love the striking purplish blue flowers with its three petals, 6 yellow stamens and the most exquisite spidery violet hairs. * The flowers bloom in clusters and each flower lasts just one day. By mid July the narrow, strap like leaves start to look ratty....just cut them back and you'll be rewarded with fresh growth and possibly more bloom. Even though it prefers a moist soil, when grown in shade, it's drought tolerant. Tradescantia virginiana is native to the eastern half of the US and Canada. T occidentalis is native in the Central and Western states. T ozarkana is native to Missouri, Arkansas and Oklahoma. For a more complete listing of Tradescantia species go here.

The wildflower week of celebration continues! Please join in and add your url to Mr Linky~He's in the sidebar.

xxoogail

*..."these plants are being studied for their environmentally sensitive responses to radiation and other pollutants like pesticides. In the presence of radiation, the stamen of certain species of spiderwort are said to turn pink. Additionally, spiderwort has large chromosomes, making them ideal for specific types of genetic research." (source)


This post was written by Gail Eichelberger for my blog Clay and Limestone Copyright 2011.This work protected under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Please contact me for permission to copy, reproduce, scrape, etc.