What a lovely and gracious correction. I will say… the original photo is a bit of a conundrum for me, because sometimes I do see our songbirds here eating the seeds or fruits of invasive plants like Amur honeysuckle or common teasel. I believe Tallamy has written about the nutritional differences for the birds.
Loved the column. We need more of this EVERYWHERE.
Kristine Johnson is definitely correct. Monarda is in the mint family (Lamiaceae), but the flower shown here—probably a knapweed, as Kristine points out—is clearly in the the aster family (Asteraceae). There are no species of Centaurea native to North America, they are all introduced!
(I realize you’re likely sharing directly from the book, but various species of knapweed are considered noxious weeds in many parts of the United States, particularly the West.)
PlantNet also immediately identified it as knapweed. I'll be interested to find out how it ended up in a book about native gardens. Meantime, I have fudged the caption, and am adding a correction note. Thank you, Kristine and Aaron.
No worries! I have managed invasive knapweed on public land and done noxious weed and native plant education, so it’s unfortunately seared into my brain.
I love this! I'm much newer to the movement (I read Nature's Best Hope two years ago when we bought our first house) and I feel like even in my time of planting natives, I've seen so many more people take an interest. And SO many young people! Anyone my age that's gardening is planting with natives / gardening for wildlife. I believe the r/NativePlantGardening subreddit grew from something like 20k members to 200k in only a year. All very hopeful, even when things can feel dire! Most people aren't anti-pollinator and they want to help, they just need the info on how to do it!
Email comment from an educator who speaks and teaches native gardening to audiences around the state: "Just wanted to thank you for the uplifting article - it is a great start to my day today. So much is written about native gardening because of ecosystem collapse (and I’m guilty of this) but gardening for beauty and diversity and transformation is so important too. HOAs requiring part of yards be natives - who would have thunk it!
Reading that was a great start to my weekend, thank you. I don't come across the term native gardens so much in the UK as I do wildlife gardens, but similarly, wildlife gardening has become much more mainstream in the past decade (yay!). Much emphasis has been on creating habitats for wildlife, necessarily embracing messy areas, and using pollinator-friendly plants, though not exclusively native species. There are, of course, still many people/organisations who can't/won't (yet) live with the messy side of a wildlife garden, but perhaps some orderly native gardening might appeal...
What a lovely and gracious correction. I will say… the original photo is a bit of a conundrum for me, because sometimes I do see our songbirds here eating the seeds or fruits of invasive plants like Amur honeysuckle or common teasel. I believe Tallamy has written about the nutritional differences for the birds.
Loved the column. We need more of this EVERYWHERE.
In the top photo… that’s not bee balm (Monarda spp). It looks to be knapweed (Centaurea spp).
It looks like the bee balm in my yard. But I’ll ask author David Mizejewski tomorrow.
Kristine Johnson is definitely correct. Monarda is in the mint family (Lamiaceae), but the flower shown here—probably a knapweed, as Kristine points out—is clearly in the the aster family (Asteraceae). There are no species of Centaurea native to North America, they are all introduced!
(I realize you’re likely sharing directly from the book, but various species of knapweed are considered noxious weeds in many parts of the United States, particularly the West.)
PlantNet also immediately identified it as knapweed. I'll be interested to find out how it ended up in a book about native gardens. Meantime, I have fudged the caption, and am adding a correction note. Thank you, Kristine and Aaron.
No worries! I have managed invasive knapweed on public land and done noxious weed and native plant education, so it’s unfortunately seared into my brain.
I love this! I'm much newer to the movement (I read Nature's Best Hope two years ago when we bought our first house) and I feel like even in my time of planting natives, I've seen so many more people take an interest. And SO many young people! Anyone my age that's gardening is planting with natives / gardening for wildlife. I believe the r/NativePlantGardening subreddit grew from something like 20k members to 200k in only a year. All very hopeful, even when things can feel dire! Most people aren't anti-pollinator and they want to help, they just need the info on how to do it!
Email comment from an educator who speaks and teaches native gardening to audiences around the state: "Just wanted to thank you for the uplifting article - it is a great start to my day today. So much is written about native gardening because of ecosystem collapse (and I’m guilty of this) but gardening for beauty and diversity and transformation is so important too. HOAs requiring part of yards be natives - who would have thunk it!
Thank you!"
Reading that was a great start to my weekend, thank you. I don't come across the term native gardens so much in the UK as I do wildlife gardens, but similarly, wildlife gardening has become much more mainstream in the past decade (yay!). Much emphasis has been on creating habitats for wildlife, necessarily embracing messy areas, and using pollinator-friendly plants, though not exclusively native species. There are, of course, still many people/organisations who can't/won't (yet) live with the messy side of a wildlife garden, but perhaps some orderly native gardening might appeal...
I call them habitat gardens.
Also good.
Thank you, Jane. I like “wildlife gardens” better. Much more clear and without the unfortunate nativist echoes.