Planting Plans for spring 2015

Every year brings another opportunity to grow my native plant collection.  This year I'm focusing on 4 areas:  Clean up and replanting around the swimming pool, clean up and expansion of the meadow, replacing the vinca along the driveway and build up a privacy hedge with the neighbor.  After learning a bit about the current conditions, what is already here and what might be expected to grow here naturally, I've put together a shopping list of natives to get this year.

This moss phlox is pretty happy growing along the pool deck,
A good portion of it is on the concrete slab.
The colors can be intense, so I use mostly one color at a time.

The area around the swimming pool is infested with common evening primrose (Oenothera biennis).  While native, there is just too much of it and it is not that attractive close up.  The soil is mostly a fast draining fill with a moderately high pH (ca. 7.5).  Since this is far from native soil I put a greater focus on what would look good growing in this setting.  Since I had already started using this area for plants native to Texas (my wife's home state) I will be adding two of my favorites, Wine Cups (Callirhoe involucrata) and Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella).   I got some seed on a recent visit to the Wildflower Center.  These will be great for the full sun areas and they tolerate alkaline soils.  The moss phlox could use some bolstering up as well.  I am attempting to remove the English ivy from the enclosure and this phlox seems to be a good candidate to fill back in.

This species of wine cups grows close to the ground, filling gaps around taller plants.
Seed requires a hot water treatment and  30  days cold stratification for germination. 

This is the annual species of Indian blanket, Gaillardia pulchella.

Small's Penstemon is long blooming in shady locations.
The contrasting lavender and white blossoms show up at a distance.

In the shadier areas I will be trying out Greek Valerain (Polemonium reptans aka Jacob's Ladder) and Small's Penstemon (Penstemon smallii).  Despite its common name the valerain is actually a native to the of the US.  This had confused me for a while.  Looks like the name Greek valerain is used for a number of species in the Polemonium genus.  One of them with particularly showy flowers, P. caeruleum, is a European native.  P. reptans grows more like a ground cover

I've ordered some more Indian Pink (Spigelia marilandica) for an area in the pool enclosure with more moisture and organic soils.

This cottonwood seedling appeared in the vegetable garden.
I'll transplant it this spring to a moist part of the new meadow.

I have an area that has been overrun with invasives that I am trying to convert to a meadow.  I cleared half of it last year and hope to finish this spring.  After removing the bad guys I am backfilling with native species.  I realize that I'm making more work for myself by trying to kill off invasivies at the same time as introducing new plantings.  By planting mostly shrubs I think I can more easily manage the area with an annual mowing/whacking of the undesirable plants.  For the right way to convert a weedy area to a meadow or prairie check out this link.

Last year I planted an American plum (Prunus americana) and several elderberries (Sambucus canadensis).  This year I will add some chokecherries (Prunus virginiana) and smooth sumac (Rhus glabra).  I also have a Cottonwood (Populus deltoides) seedling to put on the edge.

The pawpaw blooms in early May,
just before the leaves open up.  

Way in the back I have a large grove of Pawpaw (Asimina triloba) trees.  I've been watching them for 2 years and I have yet to see any fruit.  Since pawpaws produce better with cross-pollination, I will be adding a couple of new individuals to the area,  It is possible that my entire grove is really just one clone.  We'll see if this helps, in a couple of years.

These goldenstar have more than doubled in size after a year in the ground.
I'll get some more to speed up coverage.

In the shady area around the driveway I have been ripping out the vinca and replacing it with shade tolerant natives.  I started with foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia) and Heucheras and these are taking hold.  In addition to these I've seen some really good results with Goldenstar (Chrysogonum virginianum, aka Green and Gold) in open shade areas.  These are relatively easy to find in a regular nursery, sometimes marketed with the plants that you can walk on.  Another plant that I've used in dry shade is big-leaf aster (Eurybia macrophylla), It has dense foliage and spreads by rhizomes so it should do a good job competing with the vinca.

This shiny summer foliage pf aromatic sumac turns red and orange in the fall.
We'll see how it performs in a shadier location.

The boundary between our nearest neighbor is defined with a double row of white pines.  At 40+ years old they are now limbed up fairly high and not providing much screening.  We have already put in a juneberry (Amelanchier canadensis), hazelnut (Corylus americana) and Hoptree (Ptelea trilfoliata).  There was also a pawpaw already there, doing a pretty good job despite the drier conditions.  We are looking to add some additional shrubs to fill in this gap and obscure the view.  A local native plant nursery has listed maple-leaf viburnum (Viburnum acerifolium) for sale this year.  I've been told that this is a very difficult shrub to propagate.  It does well in shady woods so I'm looking forward to trying it here.  I should get two since they don't self pollinate.  I am also looking to get some aromatic sumac (Rhus aromatica).  The wild form grows 5-12 feet, just the right size for our area.  I already have some of the 'Gro-low' cultivar.  At about 3 feet it is a great ground cover shrub for many difficult locations.

Now with may list in hand, I can hardly wait until spring!

Zebra Swallowtail

Zebra Swallowtail, Eurytides marcellus, is a common visitor to our property here in west central Maryland.  The native range for this species is the south eastern US.  One reason we have so many is the abundance of  the native Pawpaw trees (Asimina triloba) which are the host plants for the Zebra Swallowtail's caterpillars.  

This Zebra Swallowtail is checking out the thermal blanket on our pool.
It's probably looking for some moisture.

This was one of the first butterflies to visit us this spring, showing up in the first part of April (didn't have my camera handy).  At that time it was feeding on nectar from the purple deadnettle, Lamium purpureum, that shares space in our lawn and woodlands.  When gathering nectar it is usually vibrating in a sort of feeding frenzy and it is hard to get a good photo.

A shutter speed of 1/40 is too slow to still those fluttering wings.

Yesterday while working around the pool I spotted one of these, most likely in search of moisture.  It was moving a little slower, so I could get some clearer photos.  This is the first time that I noticed it with its wings folded up and being relatively still.  

The tips of the swallowtail look like the antennae of the pseudo-butterfly.
The striped body is pretty cool, too.

What hit me here was that, when folded up, the wing shape of this swallowtail looks like another butterfly pointing in the opposite direction.  That has got to come in handy when predators are about.

Early Spring???

This winter has been schizophrenic.  Bouts of snow followed by brief warm-ups.  Last Tuesday, January 29th, it was well over 60 degrees here in Washington County, MD.  We have had Snow Drops, Galanthus nevalis, blooming since Christmas day but I had seen no signs of pollinators.  That is until the 29th when the little flowers were being swarmed by honey bees.

How many bees do you see here?  I counted 6.

Can someone ID these bees for me?

I assume these are European Honey bees from a local hive, but to be honest I don't know that much about bee ID.  I was surprised to see so many bees out this time of year.  I only hope they have someplace warm to return to as the temperatures dipped back below freezing two days later.

"Buds naked, rusty-brown-tomentose; bundle scars 5-7"

While I was out photographing the Snow Drops I decided to see if there were any other early signs of spring.  Walking through the woods I found no early blooms, but I did see some swelling leaf buds.  I noticed that the terminal buds of the PawPaw Trees, Asimina triloba, were getting pliable.  While I remembered their location from the fall, I just wanted to double check the ID using a plant manual.  I needed to do the ID based on the twigs and bark.  On Google Books I found a very nice resource for identifying trees in the Northeast US: Trees of New York State .  It has several identification keys based on leaves, flowers and fruits, as well as one that focuses on the appearance of twigs and leaf scars.  There are also detailed descriptions of each of the tree species.  The description in the key confirmed that this was one of the PawPaw trees.

This image close-up shows the 5 bundle
scars where a leaf had been attached.

Looking at things like bundle scars can be very useful in identifying trees, especially in winter when there not much else to go on.  The bundle scars are left over from where the vascular bundles of the twig and leaf meet.

Encouraged by my success with the PawPaw I found another tree with distinctive leaf and bundle scars.  On this tree the leaf scars were large and 3-lobed, almost like a stylized human skull.  The bundle scars were clustered in arcs, one cluster in each lobe.  Using the key I was able to narrow it down to a Hickory (Carya) of some sort.  I needed to go to the detailed descriptions and accompanying botanical drawings to finally settle on Mockernut Hickory, Carya alba (formerly C. tomentosa).

"Twigs very stout pale lenticellate pubescent reddish brown turning gray the second season.
Leaf scars inversely 3 lobed, the bundle scars in marginal clusters.
Terminal bud reddish brown or yellowish usually tomentose 1/3 to 3/4 of an inch long."  [from "Trees of New York"] 

There are plenty more trees to identify in the woods here, so I should put on my boots and get out there to see what I can learn before the leaves start popping out.

Welcome to Maryland

We just closed on our new property in Maryland.  It is in what I consider to be a pretty rural area near Harper's Ferry.  This is a new experience for me, since I have always been living in more or less suburban areas.  We have a mix of mowed lawn, unmown/early successional meadow and woodland edge.  Over the next couple of months I will be trying to ID the plants on the site and then deciding how to use the spaces for creating new gardens, plant production and possibly just letting go.

In this posting I'll share some of the plants and insects I've ID'ed so far.  There are a lot of Box Elder, Acer negundo, but they are all growing in thickets and don't stand out too well.  One of the easiest trees to pick out was this Tulip Tree in the mown part of the yard.  The leaves have a distinctive tulip-like shape.  I'm guessing it's about 20 years old.

There are a number of what appear to be ornamental cherries on the property but these are in need of some TLC.  What I'm pretty sure are the native Pin Cherry, Prunus pensylvanica, looks a lot healthier, despite being in a less managed area.

I think this is a Pin Cherry.  The fruits were in small clusters,
rather than on racemes as found on Choke Cherries

Further in the back or the property I noticed the distinctive leaves of a Paw Paw tree.  This small tree/shrub has large drooping leaves.  I did not notice any fruits, but I understand that they are favored by the wildlife, so I may never get a chance.  I did see some Zebra Swallowtail butterflies which use the Paw Paw as a larval host.

The upper wings of this Swallowtail were in constant motion.

Another small native tree/shrub I found appeared to be a Carolina Silverbell.  This was in a shrub border close to the house so I don't know if it was planted or naturally occurring.  I would not have noticed it if it weren't for the winged seed pods.

The previous owner planted a wonderful assortment of flowering plants near the house, including a bunch of Butterfly Bushes.  I will probably replace some of these with native alternatives, but for now we will enjoy the variety of insect pollinators they attract.

I found the website Gardens with Wings to be very helpful in IDing these butterflies.



There are also a number of invasive plants that I will need to deal with.  One of the first we noticed was a displaced mid-western native Catalpa Tree.  These huge leaves really make the seedlings stand out along the roadsides.

This tree is no more.

 Some of the more insidious invasives to deal with are Japanese Stiltgrass and Mile-a-Minute vine.  The annual stilt grass is pretty easy to pull out, the key will be to keep it from reseeding and spreading.  Mile-a-Minute vine is pretty nasty looking and will require more work, and protection, to remove.

Stiltgrass can be recognized by a silvery line
along the mid-vein on the top of the leaf.

I started to pull at this vine, but then I noticed
the barbs all over the plant.  This will have to
wait until I have my gloves on.