If You Plant It, They Will Come

My recent interest in photography now includes using a macro lens to get closer to flowers and the little things that run the world (insects).

This week, on a Douglas aster bloom, I saw a cute little bee and got some photos. It wasn’t until I was reviewing the captures that I realized how amazing the little guy was! He is a male metallic green bee, from what I can tell, and it looks like he’s been dusted in gold.

People do not realize that bees have five eyes, but you can see the three eyespots on top of this guy’s head.

Native plants bring in amazing bees like this!

I found many other pollinators around the garden. It is a fun time to wander the garden with a macro lens.

Getting organized enough to propagate all the native plants I want to increase seems like a bigger challenge every year. I asked ChatGPT to create a calendar for me, and this is what was produced. I plan to follow the advice here and start collecting seeds in my own yard and in plantings around the area. Stratifying seeds in sand in the refrigerator seems like a great option to try and increase success, so I’ll try that this year as well.

King County Native Seed Calendar (Full Cycle) 

Plant	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr
Madrone			Collect seed	Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification			Sow after stratification
Osoberry			Collect seed	Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification			Sow after stratification
Western dogwood				Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification
Oceanspray	Collect seed	Collect seed;		Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification		Sow after stratification
Ninebark	Collect seed	Collect seed		Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification		Sow after stratification
Douglas aster	Collect seed	Collect seed	Direct sow		Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification	Sow indoors	Pot up seedlings
Western columbine	Collect seed	Collect seed	Direct sow		Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification	Sow indoors	; Pot up seedlings
Puget gumweed			Direct sow		Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification	Sow indoors	Start in pots or direct sow
Red alder	Collect seed	Collect seed;		Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification		Sow after stratification	Pot up seedlings
Oregon grape			Collect seed	Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification		Sow after stratification
Red osier dogwood			Collect seed	Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification			Sow after stratification
Fringecup	Collect seed	Collect seed	Direct sow	Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification	Sow indoors	Pot up seedlings	Sow after stratification
Geum macrophyllum	Collect seed	Collect seed	Direct sow	Start stratification	Maintain stratification	Maintain stratification	Sow indoors	Pot up seedlings	Sow after stratification

The seed collecting began last month when I started harvesting seeds from geum, western columbine, and Douglas aster in our yard. I can be more focused with a tool like this! I’m eager to see how it enhances germination.

ChatGPT might help with a vegetative propagation calendar. I will check on that next!

Spring may be the season that comes to mind when we think of renewals, but late summer is a very close second in my native propagation efforts. Late summer is the time when cuttings are striking, and seeds are germinating. It is the season when I dedicate my time and energy to individually potting cuttings and seedlings, hoping they will grow into strong transplants that can be planted in the garden this fall.

I might have been a bit premature in potting the red-flowered currant cuttings on. Some of them had numerous roots, while others had none at all. I chose to pot them all on to 4″ pots, knowing that even those that are slower will get roots any day. Sometimes I make choices based on capacity. Would I have time to get back to these cuttings and pot them on later? Maybe not. So I took a chance.

The redder red-flowered currant cuttings that I took a week later did not get potted on. I will work on them in mid-September. The other native cuttings are on hold, as well, until their roots are fully formed, including salmon berry, philadelphus, and osoberry. The cuttings are still showing strong signs of life (big leaf buds), so I remain hopeful they will strike in the next few weeks.

Regarding seedlings, the Mahonia (Berberis) aquifolium seedlings are strong, and I thought it made sense to move them to individual or small group pots so they can be transplant-ready next spring.

Regarding favorite native perennials, I would be hard-pressed not to choose Douglas aster or Puget gumweed. Oh sure, Western trilliums are striking, and fringecups put on an elegant show, but the asters and gumweeds put on an amazing late summer spectacle for months that pleases human eyes and meets pollinator needs.

May to early July is the best timing for softwood cuttings of shrubs. I left it a bit late this year, but I’m hoping that a few days will not render my efforts worthless.

This morning, I prepped some larger six packs with potting soil. I clipped 4″ to 6″ branch tips from red-flowered currants, Lewis’ mock orange, salmon berry, and osoberry.

Immediately, I removed any lower leaves, dipped about an inch-and-a-half in rooting gel, poked holes in the six packs, and poked the cuttings in. I tapped the pots on the potting bench and made sure each cutting was secure.

In my experience, keeping the cuttings shaded and moist is critical to their success. Given the high temperatures this time of year, I elected not to put them in the greenhouse. Instead, I placed them in trays with about half an inch of water and set them on the ground in the yard in a quiet, shady spot. The trays will get refilled every time I water the potted plants, usually twice a week.

I would expect these cuttings to have strong roots within a month. I will pot them into 4″ pots at that time and ultimately, they can be set out in the garden in the autumn.

I have had success with red-flowered currant and salmon berry in the past. The osoberry and mock orange are experimental. I will update once the rooting is obvious!

There are about 4,000 species of native bees in the US. When you mention bees to most folks, they picture honey bees or black and yellow bumblebees. In late summer and fall, yellowjackets are top of mind for anyone trying to eat outside. Imagine, there are 3,997 other kinds of bees of every shape and size in this country!

I want to get close up and familiar with the native bees around Seattle. That is one benefit to planting native, for sure. But bees can often make a living on non-native ornamentals, or at least they hang out around them. I took some photos today of just a few of the bees and flies in my ornamental memory garden. There are some amazing creatures around!

Along with the beautiful bees, butterflies have begun to appear around the garden. Aside from cabbage whites, butterflies are uncommon around the neighborhood. As I’ve posted before, skipper butterflies are one of the target species for my native plant activities. Other butterflies are exciting and welcome, too!

I saw the below Lorquin’s admiral in our garden yesterday. It had some bird damage to its wing, but it was beautiful nonetheless, and was aggressively defending its territory.

The most amazing butterfly appeared on my dog walk today at Ingraham High School, just a block from our house. In 30 years in this neighborhood, I have never seen a blue butterfly! And here was an echo azure.

I am going to research larval food for this species and target them, now, too!

We focus so much on flowers when we think of plants, but seed structures can be incredible, too.

One of the biggest lessons my ‘If You Plant It’ journey has taught me is the importance of patience. I am familiar with growing ornamental plants from seed, and they tend to be quick and easy. Growing native plants from seed can be more exacting and much slower. But wow! The effort and wait are truly worth it.

These Erigeron speciosus plants are three years old from seed. They were big enough to bloom last year, but they threw blind stems (stems that appear exactly like flower stems but end up with no buds or flowers).

They are spectacular this year! Amazing! So very worth the wait.

Here are some other native plant images from around the garden. It is a boisterous time of year!

Native plants around the area are lovely this year. I have been taking photos of them as they grow and bloom. Below is a photo dump of some of my favorite images from my garden and beyond.

I believe the dark-eyed juncos that were nesting in the native plant garden started their second nest/brood in my greenhouse. There is a junco nest there with attentive parents and babies that have just hatched. Here is the mother. I call her June.

This is the hanging basket that June chose for her nest.

There is a pair of black-capped chickadees nesting in our old raccoon bird box in the orchard garden. They are busy all day finding food for their brood.

My friend Dean in Happy Valley, Oregon, is an amazing human being. His local native animals agree with me since he has added dozens of native plants to his suburban yard/garden.

Dean has shown that even a well-manicured yard can employ native plantings to support native fauna.

Along the left and front of his front yard, he has western columbine, large-leaved avens, Oregon iris, red paintbrush, and more.

He has a row of native shrubs along one whole side of his house, including Oregon grape, Lewis’ philadelphus, serviceberry, ninebark, vine maple, and more.

His backyard, though, is the most impressive. He planted a new native plant garden last fall with dozens of plants, including lupines, goldenrods, penstemons, grasses, prunella, sagebrush, blue-eyed grass, and more. Many of these are blooming in their first spring, and others are just putting on growth. He has a huge stand of Douglas aster in the same garden that provides hundreds of late-summer blooms for native bees, butterflies, and other pollinators.

The Lupinus rivularis were blooming on a recent visit–such a wonderful plant in flower, leaf, and structure.

I had to most fun watching and photographing the native bumble bees on the spectacular penstemon plants.

Dean’s yard hosts many bird species, including chickadees, finches, scrub jays, crows, hummingbirds, robins, and song sparrows, to name a few. We often see eagles and hawks flying overhead. There are deer, coyotes, raccoons, and rabbits in the neighborhood. Hopefully, neighbors will start to share in Dean’s enthusiasm for native plants. The large lots in his neighborhood have so much potential! Luckily, the Portland area has no shortage of native plant nurseries.

Over the last two weekends, I have potted on eighty tiny seedlings of Geum macrophyllum (large-leaved avens) and thirty larger Eriophyllum lanatum (Oregon sunshine) seedlings. I expect they will be large enough for fall planting this year.

Here are some photos of mature Geum macophyllum in bloom and starting to form their intricate seed heads

My propagation efforts have been successful, with two dozen Douglas asters rooted and ready to give away or plant out, and dozens of Erythranthe guttata seedlings, seep monkey flowers, nearing maturity in 4″ pots. There are lupines, too, and yarrow, and there will be loads of others in the coming weeks!

There were so many seep monkey flowers that I decided to try them as bedding plants. I added a border of them to a new flower bed behind a nice public bench Leon installed next to our sidewalk.

I also planted out a few more western columbines to enlarge the existing patch in the native plant garden.

Because I had a lot of columbines and monkey flowers, I set about two dozen of them up for giveaway on the brick wall near the bench late yesterday afternoon. About ten of them have walked off to neighborhood homes. I am hopeful the rest will find new homes today.

Camas and violet flowers are among the beautiful blooms the natives are sporting this month.

My plan for today is to take some Douglas asters and poke them in around the Ingraham High School property. There are many wild areas there and much potential for natives to take hold and thrive if I can find spaces that will go unmolested.

If you plant it, they will come. Several bird pairs are nesting in our yard, including dark-eyed juncos, black-capped chickadees, and Anna’s hummingbirds. The Anna’s hummingbird baby was out of the nest this week with his mum still attending to it. It was so cute!

The other constant reminder that the birds will come is the bird song in and around our yard every day, from early morning to night. Robins, wrens, juncos, towhees, chickadees, flickers, and song sparrow melodies join the calls of crows, the cooing of band-tailed pigeons, and the quiet cheeps of bushtits. We are inside the City of Seattle limits, so a fairly urban area. I am so thrilled that so many birds are finding a way to survive here and hope to help that number increase as neighbors add native plants to their yards, too!

Spring is a season of flowers in the native plant garden. Even in my five-year-old native garden in Seattle, hundreds of blooms have opened in the last few weeks.

It can take time to create a garden full of natives if cost is a factor. I have been growing native plants from seed and divisions over the last five years and adding them to the garden to join the nursery-purchased plants. So far, the most impactful are the easiest ones to propagate! It makes sense–there are more of them.

Geum macrophyllum (large-leaved avens) is very easy to grow from seed. I love this plant. The leaves are showy in spring, and the flowers, while not overly showy, are bright and cheerful. The seed pods are extraordinary. I have not only added this plant to the native plant garden, but have mixed it into my flower borders. It makes a nice contrast to blousier flowers with simple yellow blooms at a convenient height. I also think it will be hardy enough to compete with ornamentals and hold its own in the borders.

Another plant I have found easy to propagate is Tellima grandiflora (fringecup), and I have a bunch of them now in my native plant garden and have planted a few in our woodland garden. Like large-leaved avens, fringecup has subtle beauty with generous, clean-looking leaves and showy spikes of greenish-white fringed cups. A group of them can be impressive, and my group is growing.

Possibly my favorite wildflower is Trillium ovatum (western trillium). I have yet to get seeds to germinate. Luckily, I had purchased a couple of plants five years ago, and they have done alright. They are getting a bit swamped by other natives this year. I may need to move some things around to keep them healthy. They have branched out and produced three flowers in each clump this year.

I added a bunch of Aquilegia formosa (western columbine) grown from seed, too. They are budding up now. The leaves are spectacular, too. I have found these columbines a bit slow to mature for me–they take a couple of years to bloom for me, as opposed to the garden cultivars that often bloom the same year they germinate. The wait is worth it.

Some other plants are blooming, too, including Viola adunca, Ribes sanguineum (red-flowered currant), and Amelanchier alnifolia (serviceberry).

One of the most exciting garden updates is that the Philadelphus lewisii purchased five years ago has flower buds for the first time! My love of mock oranges started early on with the fragrance of the ornamental varieties. I never dreamed that we had a native one here in Washington. I have seen these growing wild, mostly in eastern Washington. Now, there will be one at my address is about two weeks!

There were a couple of photos of native plants that I want to post for their artistic value. The salmonberry in transition from flower to berry displays such intricacy and beauty. And the unfuling leaves of Acer macrophyllum (bigleaf maple) probably show the abundance of spring better than any blossoms can.

I was able to give away some native plants the last few weeks, with six plants going to our great friends Staci and Eric for their rewilding wetland project in Kenmore, WA. And I dropped six plants off with our neighbor Stuart two doors down. He has the best native garden around this area and keeps adding to it, despite the challenge of digging up new garden space here. His amazing efforts are developing into a beautiful native oasis.