Natives Now

The prairie is full of native flowers blooming in early June.  Just a walk around the perimeter of my mowed area allowed me to capture all these.  ProfessorRoush is going to keep the gab to a minimum today, although I'll still identify each for you.  And while I do, be thinking....what characteristic do all these plants have in common?  There will be a quiz at the end.

This photo is of the low-growing Catclaw Sensitive Briar (Mimosa quadrivalvis), a member of the Fabaceae (or Bean family), so named because of the prickly pods that catch exposed ankles as you walk by, and for the delicate leaflets that fold when touched.  It has a long bloom period and can be seen blooming over most of May and June.

Of similar color, the Illinois Tickclover (Desmodium illinoense) is another Fabaceae, taller and more sparsely represented on my spot of prairie.  Late in the summer, the mature seedpods of this plant cling to my pants and hitchhike wherever I walk, often causing me to sit and pick at my pant-legs for a long time before they get washed. 

As I think about it, these native Black-Sampson Echinacea (Echinacea angustifolia) also display a similar muted pink-purple hue during their bloom.   The blooms quickly become bedraggled by wind and local insects.

These Echinacea are abundant in my area, and are favorites of local butterflies, bees, and finches.

I've posted a photo before of the Fringe-Leaf Ruellia (Ruellia humilis), but didn't write much about it.  It grows freely, low to the ground, in both the mowed areas of the yard and in the taller native prairie.  I have it stuck in my head that Ruellia is a violet of some type and I have to correct myself each time I see and identify it.

There are many forms of Asteraceae, composite flowers of the Sunflower family, that bloom and attract native insects and birds on the prairie. Daisy Fleabane (Erigeron strigosus) is one of those, 2-3 feet tall and easily visible among the grasses. It does not, contrary to myth, repel fleas from man nor from beast.

Another Asteraceae member presently blooming are the Black-Eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta).  This gray-green, hairy-leafed plant doesn't compete well with prairie grasses, but it sprouts willingly on disturbed ground.   If I showed you a picture of my vegetable garden right now, you'd think I was growing it preferentially there (which I do, since I don't weed it out unless it is adjacent to a tomato, zucchini, or other intentional planting.  

I could, and should, show you photos a few dozen clumps of Butterfly Weed (Asclepias tuberosa).  This unmatched bright-orange color uniquely stands out in the grasses and I encourage it to grow and seed wherever it chooses on the prairie or even in my garden beds.

One thing about Asclepias, it draws butterflies and bees from everywhere.  I really should start learning to identify bees and wasps so that I can recognize and encourage either of these visitors to my prairie.

Click on this picture to expand it and you'll see both a butterfly and a bee on the upper left of this single spray.  I'm not sure, but the butterfly here is perhaps a Pearl Crescent (Phyciodes tharos), common in my area.

The prairie is awash right now with clumps of Wild Alfalfa (Pediomelum tenuiflorum), providing some blue tones to contrast with the yellows and whites.  If you view the flowers up close, you can see why this plant is placed in the Bean family.

Last, but not least for a gardener who is always looking for roses, I'll show you a closeup of Rosa arkansana, the Prairie Wild Rose.  R. arkansana is a low-growing, once blooming, winter-hardy rose that has been used in the breeding programs of Ag Canada.  It is everywhere on the prairie, food for insects and animals alike.

And now, what characteristic do all these have in common?  Along with also-currently-blooming but unpictured Lead Plant (Amorpha canescens), Waxy-Leaf Thistle (Cirsium undulatum), White Prairie Clover (Dalea candida) and Purple Prairie Clover (Dalea purpurea) and Woolly Verbena (Verbena stricta)?   All of these are drought resistant natives, stoic in the face of the fickle prairie rains.   They hold a hidden message of hope for the gardener; "for best results, choose drought-resistant perennials and shrubs!!!!"

Quivera Roadtrip

ProfessorRoush took a vacation from work and gardening Friday and, with his beloved Mrs. ProfessorRoush, made a 2.5 hour daytrip west and south to explore the Quivera National Wildlife Refuge near Stafford, Kansas (population 925).  Quivera NWR is a 22135 acre sand prairie and inland salt marsh smack dab on the central migratory flyway, and it supports the vast migration of hundreds of thousands of Sandhill Cranes and the much more rare Whooping Crane, as well as 340 other species of migratory birds and the Monarch Butterfly. Established in 1955, it is a virtual oasis for these migrations and sits among ancient sand dunes covered by grasslands, rare geography, geology and ecology for any area, but especially for Kansas. 

Panorama of Little Salt Marsh, Quivera National Wildlife Refuge

ProfessorRoush was interested in exploring his newfound hobby of birding, adding a dozen species to his Life List, and the ever-tolerant Mrs. ProfessorRoush may have initially viewed it as an unavoidable hardship but also showed minor signs of excitement with binoculars in her hands.  It was a gorgeous, perfect weather day, but this is really the wrong season for birding and witnessing the mass migration.  However, my amateur naturalist came out and I made up for the current sparsity of  wildlife by exploring the abundant native Kansas flora you see pictured here in bloom. 

Some, like the Prickly Poppy (Argemone polyanthemos) pictured at the right, are old familiar friends.   I briefly considered that this might be the Hedge-Hog Prickly Poppy (Argemone squarrosa), but it doesn't have the more abundant stem and leaf prickles of the latter, so I believe I've got it right.  Other forbs, like the Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa) pictured at the top and above left, were recognizable, but displayed its yellow form rather than the orange flower I'm used to. 

Prairie Spiderwort (Tradescantia occidentalist) added abundant blue accents along the roadsides to the yellow native sunflowers that were just beginning to bloom.  At least I think it was Prairie Spiderwort.   It could also be Common Spiderwort or Long-Bracted Spiderwort, but unlike the former it has hair on its sepals, and it branches more than I would expect for the latter.   While I have plenty of sunflowers to view on my own prairie, Spiderwort is more rare here in the dryer climate of the Flint Hills.   

Of course, there was an abundance of other milkweed in bloom, in this case Showy Milkweed (Asclepias speciosa).

And the Showy Milkweed came complete with a Monarch butterfly (Danus plexippus)!

Leaving the park, driving along roads which were essentially just bulldozed out of the sand dunes, I was delighted to run into these roadside clumps of Buffalo Gourd (Cucurbita foetidissima) growing wild and displaying infrequent large orange squash-like flowers.  Based on my reading the mature gourds are not edible, and the crushed leaves give off a fetid odor that give the plant its species name.  

My botanical skills fail, however, in finding an identity for these clumps of pink-flowering shrubs near the water edge, however.   Anyone have any ideas?   Clump-like forms about 3 feet tall and wide, they seemed to be favored perches for the abundant Red-Winged Blackbirds of the area, but I couldn't get close enough for an other than wind-tossed-and-blurry-iPhone picture.  It does, however, with some oil-paint and blurring filters, make a nice photo suitable for framing (below)!

Time to Stop and Appreciate the Finer Things

'Hope for Humanity'

In the back of my mind, ProfessorRoush has a little nagging voice that keeps saying "you should post, it has been awhile," but I would not have thought that I wouldn't post during the entire month of August.   My, how it flew by!

I blame the unusual weather, more rain than usual, and temperatures that kept weeds growing and me mowing weekend after weekend.  I blame my unfortunate needs for cash, which keep me working long hours during the week, ticking down the clock of my life, time I can't replace no matter how valuable I think it is in the moment.  And I blame me, for not making the blog a bigger priority over eating, sleeping, target-shooting, reading, watching TV, or the hundreds of other distractions that occupy my time.   

Liatris spicata

But then a fall morning comes, like this morning, and it's cool (53ºF) and sunny, and I'm walking with Bella down the road at 7:10 a.m., and I remember that a beautiful world awaits, every single morning, if I only take time to look.

Time to look and stop to take a quick photo of 'Hope for Humanity', pictured at the top.  There has to indeed be some hope for a species that breeds and distributes a rose this beautiful.

Time to pause on the walk and relish the beauty of this clump of Liatris spicata, returning year after year to the roadside northeast of the house.  A "blazing star" of the highest magnitude (see what I did there?).

Time to appreciate that the Kansas state flower is the native Sunflower, thriving where the ground is disturbed by hoof or man, a roadside beacon to reflect the morning sunshine.

'Morden Sunrise'

Time to fawn over the delicately hued petals of this 'Morden Sunrise', a Parkland Canadian rose bred by Lynn Collicutt and Campbell Davidson in 1991.  I have one in front, 3 feet tall and now overshadowed by a "dwarf" lilac, and this second two-year-old in back.

'Comte de Chambord'

Time to stop and "smell the roses", in this case the Portland rose 'Comte de Chambord', a reliable bloomer and cane hardy to the toughest Kansas winters.  She looks fragile and virginal and perfect, but she's touch as nails. 

And time to appreciate all the beautiful and more mobile creatures who share the morning walks with Bella and I.  For the city folk reading this blog, the behavior of the left hand male bovine at the rear of the longhorn cow may look strange, but to an old farm-boy and veterinarian, it's anything but.  That cow had just hunched up and passed urine and he's checking to see (the "Flehmen response") if this particular cow is available for some morning "go-time".   Truly, there's nothing more natural on the prairie than a little lovin' at the first rays of the sun.  

I think we'll just leave this blog entry right here, in a light and educational moment, and not veer off into the weeds of biology trying to extend it.

Weed of the Week

If ProfessorRoush can endorse the prairie's choice of a "Plant of the Week," he can also surely endorse a "Weed of the Week," although this one was selected not through the collective wisdom and brutal natural selection processes of the prairie, but at the hand of the less-demanding and less-discerning Mrs. ProfessorRoush.  Isn't it just wonderful how these blog entries sometimes seem to write themselves?

You see, Mrs. ProfessorRoush texted me with a picture of this plant last Saturday afternoon while I was on the lawn-mower, busily engaged in my weekly Saturday work chores.  She had found it while taking Bella for a walk down the road and although it takes an exceptional floral display to attract her attention, this plant had "understood the instructions," as the "fly" youngsters say.  Mrs. ProfessorRoush wanted me to identify the plant for her and although her "snap" was a less focused and composed photo than the photograph above, I was happy to immediately fulfill her expectation of my omniscience in regards to plant identification and simply texted back this weblink:  https://kswildflower.org/flower_details.php?flowerID=90, thus temporarily meeting her minimal expectations of my usefulness.   As women in general, and especially Mrs. ProfessorRoush, are often left less-than-impressed by my prowess in this and many other areas, I then said a quick prayer of thanks to the benevolent floral gods before resuming mowing.

While it can put on an impressive floral display in June and July, Crownvetch or Purple Crown Vetch (classified as Coronilla varia or Securigera varia, as there is some current dispute over the taxonomy) is certainly an invasive foreign species here on the Kansas prairie and my placement of it into the "weed" category is not just a literary liberty.   This leguminous vine, a native of Africa, Asia and Europe, is planted for erosion control and roadside plantings due to its aggressive nature, deep interwoven root system and drought-resistant leaves, and it has now naturalized in most of these continental US states.  As a veterinarian, I'm also aware that while it provides a valuable protein-rich feed source for ruminants, its high nitroglycoside content makes it toxic for horses and other non-ruminants, so its invasive nature is a threat to more than just neighboring plants struggling to compete for light, space and water.

For the time-being, clumps of Crownvetch are blooming nearly everywhere on the prairie in my vicinity, pleasing less-discriminating plant connoisseurs such as Mrs. ProfessorRoush and vexing those like me whose sense of natural balance is disturbed by nonnative plant species in our landscapes.   I must concede that it provides a colorful and pleasing display, although the hue, while predominantly light pink, is just a little too purple for my unequivocal liking.   Happily, although Crownvetch loves disturbed soil, this is not a weed that requires considerable time to keep out of my garden beds, so I can stay silent and allow Mrs. ProfessorRoush her appreciation and enjoyment of it along the roadsides and cow pastures of our local prairie, all while I bask in her justified admiration of me as her personal plant encyclopedia. 

Eu-for-weed-ia?

ProfessorRoush woke up to a quandary this morning, a perplexing puzzle presented to him by the morning sunlight.  To wit, the question was whether he should pull the white-headed weed photographed to the right, or should he leave it be in its self-chosen spot, a fine display of green and white contrasts in the hot summer garden?  There is rarely enough color in a summer garden in Kansas and this single, debatably undesired plant (marked in the picture below by the arrow) is the most noticeable plant in the garden this morning, at least from my bedroom window.  Oh sure, there are a few spots of Russian sage around and a panicle hydrangea or three hanging out in the background, but nothing else so clean and white as this Euphorbia marginata, also known as Snow-On-The-Mountain, although I tend to refer to it as "Snow-In-Summer" before I think and correct myself.

What makes a plant a weed?   Some would say a weed is any plant that is in a place where we don't want it.   Others berate the character, the less-cultured characteristics of the plant or flower.  Always the gentleman, Emerson defined a weed as a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered.  Well, I've discovered the virtues of Euphorbia marginata.   It grows practically on every broken piece of ground in the area, and I've often pulled it before, especially when it was smothering or obscuring a plant that I wanted.   However, in certain places, like this spot where I have nothing else growing at present, I  practice tolerance and acceptance, as I've written before, and I will continue to do so in the future.   Snow-On-The Mountain has virtues, and virtues plenty.

Obviously adapted to my climate and thriving in the hottest and driest portions of summer, welcoming E. marginata into my garden is the very definition of minimal gardening.   It's large enough to make a vivid garden display even in a large garden (the books say 12"-40" tall but most here reach 4 feet and sometimes 5 feet).   It's compact, doesn't spread by sucker, well-mannered for its neighbors, flowers for months and it is beautiful in appearance.  Drought-tolerant, insect-free, disease-free and able to stand up to Kansas winds; exactly what else could I ask of it?   Snow-On-The-Mountain is also easy to pull where it's not wanted, the entire root coming up from any ground that isn't so dry as to actually form concrete.

Okay, I will admit that its milky latex-like sap can cause skin irritation in people with less thick hide than mine, but the only irritation I get is the agitation I experience trying to wipe it off my hands onto my jeans.  Cattle won't graze it because of its bitter taste, and it can be poisonous to them when dried as hay, but I have few cattle wandering my garden and, most importantly, deer won't eat this bitter plant either so it's one less plant I have to worry about when the furry rats raid my garden.   It's not edible, its sap may be carcinogenic, and its medicinal uses are few.   Historically it was crushed and made into a liniment and used as an astringent, and to treat leucorrhoea, which involves putting the liniment somewhere that would seem more likely to cause discomfort than healing wouldn't it?  

I'm not personally expecting a bout of leucorrhoea, but since I should always be prepared (even if I wasn't a Boy Scout), and the plant's presence and it's sap doesn't bother me and the deer won't bother it, I'm resolved to leave this clump right where it started, an affirmation of the value of native plants and a positive sign of my evolution as a gardener.   I'll still pull it from my strawberry patch, however!  

Longhorns Ho!

Yesterday was an outside day in ProfessorRoush-land, work to be done, and some exploration in areas that I don't frequently explore.  I mowed and piddled in the garden to my heart's content, the second mowing of the year starting at 9:30 a.m. and then doing other chores until I looked up at last to see it near 5:00 p.m., the afternoon vanished seemingly in seconds.   Most of the work was prompted by the arrival this week of the Longhorn cattle that a friend (actually the son-in-law of a neighbor), summer pastures on our land and the neighbors pasture.  Aren't they beautiful?  ProfessorRoush likes having cows around, even skinny cows with big menacing horns, and they make a conversation piece for neighbors far and wide, creating a little traffic on the road from the townies coming to "Aw" and stare.  

The Longhorn appearance, however, prompts me annually to walk the far fence, the one that I DIDN'T rebuild when we purchased the land, my border line with the golf course.  It's an original, easily over 50 years old, maybe more like 80 years old, with Osage Orange posts that occasionally get caught in the burns, and I often need to hike up the back hill with a new T-post to shore it up.  The picture below is a view of my back garden and the house and grounds from the far hillside.  Yesterday, all was well with the fence and I opened the gate to let the cattle into my pond area.

White-Eyed Grass

Walking that fence line means I walk down through the prairie and cross the woods in the draw and come as close as I get in this area to shady woodland.   This time of year, that means looking at the flora of the prairie more closely.  The prairie is coming alive with its flowers, native Babtisia starting to bloom, and this White-Eyed Grass (Sisyrinchium campestre) blooming everywhere.   White-Eyed Grass is, of course, not a grass but a member of the lily family, a bulb, used by Native Americans to treat stomachache and hay fever.

Garlic Mustard

I also ran across this unusual plant, an invader of course.  Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata) is a biennial weed that came from the Old World and escaped cultivation.  It isn't very prevalent on my prairie, requiring a bit of shade and moisture to thrive, but it seems to have found a spot here in the woods for it's temporary liking.

And speaking of invaders, while on my travels through the pasture, I also came across this unusual plant, seemingly beginning to spread in this area.   This is Purple-Leafed Honeysuckle, an escapee from my landscaping, which I made sure to come back and spray with herbicide yesterday.   I believe this clump was actually transplanted by the bulldozer that cleared it out from a bank where I placed the barn and pushed it into this area, but I surely don't want to see it begin to spread on it's own in the pasture

Poison Ivy

The woodland plant pictured here is, of course, not so desired in a woodland, but it's everywhere, hiding among others and waiting to cause pain and misery in some.  As shown here, among several similar plants, it effectively camouflages itself in early spring and then stands out in early Fall with bright red leaves to match the bright red blisters of the afflicted. Luckily, I'm immune to the toxic effects of  the urushiol in poison ivy (Toxicodendron radicans), but I know it causes misery in others.  "Leaves of three, let it be," say some, but I say "Leaves of three, I don't care."  It probably has some place in the ecosystem, a native to North America, so I leave it alone.

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Spiritual Prairie Union

 "The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament sheweth his handywork." Psalm 19:1.  

If a gardener knows any scripture at all, it should be this phrase.  ProfessorRoush has been witness to the wisdom of this Psalm every morning this past two weeks as I drive past a gorgeous heavenly display of two common prairie forbs sharing the same space, purple Western Ironweed (Vernonia baldwinii) and white and green Snow-On-The-Mountain (Euphorbia marginata).   There are few times when I see such showy native plants so wild, yet so perfectly sited to contrast and enhance each other that I can only stand and marvel, jealous of the Gardener who arranged them in combination.

Western Ironweed

I took the picture above in the worst possible conditions for photography; sun setting behind the subject, light rain on the horizon, dusk settling into the valleys.   And yet the beauty of the prairie shines forth from this chance clumping, this union of the blooms of August each drawing in their late pollinators, offering last seasonal meals in exchange for stirred chromosomes, the dance of wildflower and insect continued in another year.

Snow-On-The-Mountain

Neither of the colorful perennials above are rare on the prairie.   Western Ironweed, so drought tolerant and tall in the heat of summer, is a common pasture weed on the Flint Hills and difficult to eliminate from my garden beds.  This member of the Asteraceae is shunned by cattle for its bitter taste, who thus help it to spread in overgrazed pastures, eliminating its competitors while letting it grow.  Snow-On-The Mountain, a poinsettia relative, is also found here in nearly every disturbed spot of ground, popping up randomly in my garden beds next to grasses and roses, and anywhere else it can find a bit of moisture and sunshine.  In contrast to the ironweed, this euphorbia pulls easily from the ground with bare hands, and although it's bitter, milky sap is said to be as irritating as poison ivy, I seem to be impervious to its toxic nature.

The ubiquity of these wildflowers might suggest that their serendipitous adjacency has occurred by mere statistical chance, but I refuse to tempt disaster by agreeing.  ProfessorRoush, not normally disposed to quote scripture, nonetheless feels here a higher design, a greater Hand in this natural combination.  Maybe you have to be here, at this spot, with the waning sunlight and smell of rain in the air to appreciate this moment.  Better yet the sight is simply spectacular every morning with fresh sunlight and cool breeze and living prairie all around as I drive to work.  All I know for sure is that these two plants, every day, brighten my morning, the gift of living made manifest as my day begins.  And I am thankful for it and for my life shared with the prairie.

Hitchhikers and Heartthrobs

Most gardeners, ProfessorRoush included, labor under the delusion that we choose our plants, the plants we value enough to care for, but, truth be told, it is often the plants that choose us.  My list of the plants that co-inhabit our garden with me contains three main subcategories; the very, very, very long list of plants that I purchased that have subsequently perished from the prairie, the surprisingly short list plants I purchased that still survive in the garden, and the unintentionally long list of plants that chose my garden as adequate shelter for their own purposes.  I've spoken before of the native plants, like Asclepias tuberosa, or the Salvia azurea that I allow to grow as they desire in any bed of the garden.  I've also written about some plants that insist on growing everywhere here, such as Ambrosia artemisiifolia, despite my constant efforts to eliminate them.

There is a fourth category, however of gardening troubles that we purchase, sometimes intentionally and sometimes by accident, and come to regret.  Such an accidental hitchhiker in my garden is illustrated by what I think is a type of hops vine pictured above, photo taken just today.  This vine has been a constant nuisance in this one spot in my garden for the twenty years we've lived here.  About every two weeks, I have to search out and destroy the many sprouts of this fast-growing vine, lest it overwhelm every other plant in the area.  I've never grown it intentionally, but I can trace its arrival to a load of "good" soil that we had brought in to provide a decent border around the stamped concrete patio in the back when we built the house.  Interestingly there were 3 actual truck loads delivered to form this border, but the only area that grows the presumed hops vine was from a single truckload.  If asked, I can attest that the seeds of these vines survive and germinate at least 20 years after being deposited.  The only remaining question is whether the hops seeds will ever cease to germinate or whether I leave this Earth first and am beyond caring about it.

Aralia cordata, K-State Gardens

I suppose, when pressed, I'd have to admit to a fifth category of garden plants; those plants that we covet and have never grown.  I've been admiring this Japanese Spikenard, Aralia cordata, for several years.  Pictured as it grows in the K-State Gardens (beneath the shade of the American Elm), it glows like a lighthouse beacon.  I keep waiting, secretly hoping, to find the flaw in this plant, the insect damaged foliage that it has never displayed, the fungal disease which it doesn't seem to get, but it just thrives there, short and pretty, as I leer and drool over its perfect form.  I know that I want it, deep in my gardening soul.  I also know that it would die almost instantly here in my shadeless garden, blasted by the Kansas July sun into dry tinder.  Just another heartthrob plant that I can never grow.