If You Plant It, They Will Come
Native Flora to Restore Native Fauna
In order to make the new native garden work, we realized we need to blend the height of the raised Douglas fir bed with the rest of the native plant garden. To that end, I ordered twelve cubic yards of three-part topsoil from Pacific Topsoils. The order was delivered Tuesday on the lawn and I plan to move it around as needed today. Here’s what I’m faced with:
Stay tuned for an “after” photo.
Leon was able to get a large part of the brick wall moved to its new location. This part is mostly finished.
I ordered twelve cubic yards of soil to be delivered Tuesday, hopefully right on the lawn in this spot.
After the soil is delivered and used to even out the area and transition from the higher Douglas fir flower bed to the lawn area, then I will order some bark chips and logs to be delivered.
I worked a little last weekend on designing the garden itself. Here is an early draft.
There is a native plant nursery nearby (Seattle Native Plants) that delivers, so once everything is ready, I’ll place the order and get the plants in the ground this spring, or at least any plants I don’t think I can grow myself.
I went for a run this evening and near a restored wilderness area I saw a big old willow tree that has seen better days. But the trunk was amazing and had a lot of character. It doesn’t have leaves yet, so I couldn’t identify the species. Since willows are tops in the food web and my garden plan includes one specimen, I approached the tree and found only one small twig within reach. I jumped up and grabbed it. I now have four little cuttings of what I hope is a native willow tree.
I have some birch trees seedlings that could be added to the native garden, as well, but I need to identify them, too–no idea if they are native or not. My botany knowledge is going to have to grow by leaps and bounds for me to do a better job of identifying all these species specifically.
Coronavirus has had such a negative impact on so many things, I thought it would be great if something good came of it, too. My partner, Leon, and I are staying at home as much as possible. We have been talking about my plan to cover up much of the lawn with dirt and wood chips and plant it with native plants. He seemed skeptical at first. Lately, though, due to my persistence and excitement, I’ve converted him.
In my ideal world, the existing brick retaining wall that makes up what I call the Douglas Fir Bed needed to be adjusted so that the new garden could meld more seamlessly with existing plantings. That Douglas fir is a major native tree in its own right. I estimate it is seven or more feet around the trunk near the base and at least seventy feet tall. It is probably as old as this house, which is 72 years. Douglas firs are known to host 121 species of butterflies and moths! So, this tree will provide a wonderful cornerstone to my native plant garden.
I imagine that the brickwork can be completed next weekend. I will order additional bricks to be delivered to complete the border. I also plan to have fifteen yards of soil delivered to transition the raised existing bed to the street-level rest of the garden. We will have wood chips delivered soon, as well.
I will always remember when this pandemic hit because there will be something beautiful that sprang from all the chaos and fear.
We’re in the middle of March and in the middle of a hideous pandemic (coronavirus, COVID-19). Since we’re being advised to distance ourselves socially, the garden seems the perfect place to spend some time.
I have been reading more books, educating myself more on native plants and how best to landscape with them. Specifically, I finished The Living Landscape by Rick Darke and Doug Tallamy. The authors did a great job of describing the natural, layered way that plants grow in nature and how that could best be replicated in our yards and public spaces. Doug Tallamy brought a lot of his amazing biodiversity and food web findings into the book, as well. It was not telling people to only plant natives, but encouraging them to include them in natural-looking landscapes.
I’m currently in the middle of Gardening with Native Plants of the Pacific Northwest by Arthur Kruckeberg and Linda Chalker-Scott. This book is very useful for getting familiar with the flora of the Pacific Northwest and how it might be incorporated in local landscapes. The book does a great job of breaking down by family and by size the plants in our area. My one challenge with the book is that the descriptions of the plant ranges are too vague for me to determine if plants are Seattle natives or not. Luckily, there are other resources for that. Reading this book has charged up my enthusiasm for the beauty and diversity of the native flora we have available.
Today, I ventured out to do some spring cleaning. One of the new rules that I’ve adopted is to not see “clean” the same way in the garden–and life is so much simpler. To protect the possible bee babies or other insects hibernating in the pithy stems of perennials such as Echinops, Aster, and Verbesina. So, I carefully cut their stems back the ground and then cut them into six- to eight-inch lengths.
The second rule I followed today is that I just leave whatever I cut near to where I cut it. This was important for the bee babies, but also it just keeps natural resources where they belong. In nature, plants create their own mulch. So, rather than hauling the clippings away to compost, then hauling mulch in to suppress weeds and retain moisture, I just compost it in place and the plants and I are both happy! I am doing this with even large branches around the yard. It doesn’t take the smaller clippings around the perennials long to disappear under spring growth. The branches take longer, but I nestle them among shrubs and out of the way.
The native seeds I planted are starting to sprout! I have myriad Mimulus and several other types that are just getting started.
A neighbor over in Broadview posted that she wanted advice about her garden. I jumped in and sent her a bunch of links about native plants and the benefits of growing them, how to choose them and where to find them. She replied in a very positive way, so that felt good. I have a lot of work to do to get a concise way to explain my goals and bring people in, but I think there will be some great receptiveness and excitement as I move forward.
I took a tour of the garden today with an eye towards alien invasive clean-up. I found plenty to deal with, but not so much as to be overwhelming. Here are some things I’ll work on in the coming weeks:
English Ivy is taking over the Douglas fir bed and the Douglas fir itself. I did cut the vines back off the trunk in the autumn, but I will work to cut the plants all the way back this year. The goals are two-fold: to remove the plants from spreading all through the bed so I can get natives planted there, instead, and also keep the vines from blooming and producing seeds that would spread them to forests near and far.
Variegated Algerian Ivy–Hedera canariensis–is taking over the northwest edge of the Douglas fir bed and has crept across the dog enclosure. I will cut it way back this year to make room for natives and ensure that it doesn’t spread places it might be a problem.
Creeping buttercup–Ranunculus repens–is creeping all over the beds in front of the greenhouse and also the bed along the fence in the orchard bed. I will need to weed them out. This weed is classified as a “weed of concern” in King County. It takes time to weed it out but it isn’t difficult.
Spurge laurel–Daphne laureola–is growing in the Douglas fir bed and also under the Camellia near the orchard bed. This is a tougher plant for me to eradicate, simply because I like it. The plants in the Douglas fir bed are fragrant when they bloom (now). In addition, the chartreuse flowers are attractive and it is easy to grow. And yet, it is a noxious weed that is also poisonous to humans and pets and can cause contact dermatitis. So, off with their heads! I will cut them all back and rip out the stumps.
Hedge bindweed–Calystegia sepium–not visible right now, but this is a very big problem invasive in my garden. The King County site even mentions how hard this plant is to eradicate. I do think I can do a better job of it, though.
Tartarian honeysuckle–Lonicera tartarica–There is just one large shrub of this at the northwest corner of the orchard bed. I plan to cut this one off at the roots and then do some non-toxic stump killing with Epsom salts to make sure it never comes back.
Doug Tallamy’s new book arrived last week–you can find it on Amazon HERE. I have been reading it on Kindle and ordered three hard copies that I plan to share with interested neighbors.
Mr. Tallamy tells us that a lot of the hard work of determining which native plants to put in our gardens has been done for us and we can find plant lists in several places, like the National Wildlife Federation and the Audobon Society.
For my own garden, I am considering the following to add to my parking strip memory garden and to replace part of the lawn:
More seeds arrived in the mail this week. I took the same approach as with the first batch. Several of the packets had just a few seeds, like the Delphiniums, but others had thousands.
In my enthusiasm to bring native bugs back to my yard and neighborhood, I ordered a bunch of native plant seeds. They are not necessarily easy to find and are not necessarily inexpensive. Clearly, though, for me to expand my own garden and provide material to the neighborhood I need to flex my seed-starting muscles. I used Amazon.com as a resource and also Plant World seeds. My hope is that getting the right species in place will be sufficient–that the local fauna will be adapted to that species regardless of its origins. Below are the seeds that had landed by last weekend:
To maximize my chances of success, I planted a number of each seed in a repurposed plastic egg carton and popped them into a crisper in the fridge for a couple of months.
These were planted on January 11th. I’ll keep the packets with the rest of the seeds in my seed drawer and plant them closer to spring. More seeds are coming, as well!
Thanks for visiting my blog and welcome to my new adventure: IF YOU PLANT IT, THEY WILL COME, with a goal of covering 25% of my yard with highly productive native plants, and at the same time spreading the word on local biodiversity to get my neighborhood, in Seattle, Haller Lake, to increase native plantings to 25% of private and public lands.
My inspiration for this work comes from the brilliant Doug Tallamy, a professor of entomology at the University of Delaware. You can find an excellent video of Doug explaining what he found and how we can start to heal our world HERE. His books are available on Amazon.com–Bringing Nature Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants, Updated and Expanded and Nature’s Best Hope: A New Approach to Conservation that Starts in Your Yard
Implementation in my own yard will involve growing and adding native plants amid the myriad alien ornamentals I’ve already planted. Over time, I will eliminate many of the aliens and replace them with natives, too, to maximize the benefit to local fauna.
Some of the fauna I want to see more of include birds, but also these bugs that I saw near the house in the last year or so:
The first garden I’m looking to improve with natives is my Memory Garden, the parking strip garden I planted just two years ago with a cottage garden theme. I’ve ordered a bunch of seeds for perennial Seattle natives and will get those started