With the popularity of books like David Tallamy’s “Bringing Nature Home,” there has been a real push to include more native plants in our gardens and landscapes.
All well and good, but the first question that needs addressing is “Which plants?” Sounds simple. And it is if you are lucky enough to reside on relatively undisturbed land on the prairie or in the woodland foothills. You can opt to play steward to the plants that are already there. Remove the exotics, stay after the weeds, and you’re good to go.
When you live smack dab in the middle of a city that’s been there for over 100 years, trying to figure out what was there before we were can be a real challenge. Even on the outskirts of the metro area, where I live, few patches of undeveloped land remain to provide clues. It was in such places I searched for surviving remnants of the high plains environment that once was.
Within only a few miles of my home I discovered in spring starry-white sand lilies, baby pink Rocky Mountain phlox, rusty-pink showy dock, bluish-lavender one-sided penstemon and similar, but with its flowers arranged in whorls, narrow-leafed penstemon. I saw perfect daisies of erigeron with furry leaves and raggedy-petaled Easter daisies, Rocky Mountain locoweed, with silvery foliage and flowers that resemble an armada of white sailboats. Tiny yellow violets hid in the grasses. In a good year, after plenty of spring moisture, yellow golden banner and Western wallflower light up the plains.
Later in the summer, fueled by July’s monsoonal rains, big showy flowers like the common and the prairie sunflowers, golden cowpen daisy with pinked petals, lavender spikes of gayfeather, rosy trumpets of bush morning glory, fried egg prickly poppies and waist-high lavender-pink clusters of Rocky Mountain bee plant arrived. Whole fields became tapestries of white, purple and yellow asters.
Other clues turned up from seeds buried in my soil. At various times I was thrilled to find unbidden wildflowers, such as soft-yellow fringed puccoon, golden gum weed, golden asters, pink showy milkweed and white prickly poppy. Still, most of the wildflowers I want so badly to grow resist domestication.
Seeds collected from lavender gayfeather have grown into a thriving patch along the driveway. Other species have not fared so well. A full grocery bag of seeds of blazing star and silver lupine netted not a single plant. Cowboy’s delight, which grows only a few feet across the fence line, struggles to stay alive in my garden. Seedlings of bush morning glory, planted once a year for two decades, have never gotten a foothold.
I suspect the explanation lies in the soil. The next time you stop to admire Front Range wildflowers, take a moment to check out what they’re growing in — and you’ll discover the antithesis of “good” garden soil.
The sad truth is that if you’ve amended your soil, as I have, not many of our native plants are going to feel at home.
Marcia Tatroe’s most recent book is “Cutting Edge Gardening in the Intermountain West,” ($29.95, Johnson Books). E-mail her at mtatroe@q.com.
