Purple Poppy Pain?

The little devilish side of ProfessorRoush sometimes enjoys asking the uncomfortable questions, just to watch the answer-maker squirm a little, to make them question themselves.   I'm not at all above playing devil's advocate either, espousing opinions with which I don't agree, just, once more, to draw out that philosophical moment of realization.

So I ask today, how many of you would give up the beauty of a nice stand of Purple Poppy Mallow (Callirhoe involucrata) in order to attain that perfect thick sheen of uninterrupted blue-grass of fescue that seems to be the suburban ideal?  Purple Poppy Mallow is a sprawling wildflower in my lawn, a smothering thug which makes it hard for the buffalograss to truly compete with it for light and water, but one which blooms in drought and in rain, reliably opening to sunshine and shutting down at night.   Yes, many, myself included, weed out the dandelions and thistles from our lawns, and some even fight a continual battle against clover, and many readers here would be horrified at the stand of Goat's Beard (Tragopogon dubius) that I'm letting grow in the "rain gardens" of taller grass in the side yards, but I believe we should and would all draw the line at purple mallow.  

One of the benefits of simply mowing the prairie grass and not starting a "lawn" when we built our house is that I've always had a long section of Purple Poppy Mallow (left) near the driveway, which is slowly expanding across the cut lawn and has jumped this year into adjacent areas.  I suppose I'm selecting for it by mowing high, and this year I'm mowing higher than ever with my new lawnmower.   Right or wrong, my old lawnmower, set at 4 inches, mowed a lot lower than the new one at 4 inches, and I'm taking advantage of the high cut to conserve moisture and to try to help the buffalograss to spread.   The mallow seems to like being mowed high as well, the sprawling or "reclining" stems surviving each mowing.

Despite the almost-complete perfection of Mrs. ProfessorRoush as a spouse, she does lack in her environmental awareness and has in the past complained about the mallow as a weed in her vision of lawn perfection.   We'll see this year if she notices as the Purple Poppy Mallow achieves June dominance in my blooming landscape.   Although she doesn't or rarely gardens, she's not above lodging complaints with the Gardener-In-Residence if she believes something doesn't measure up to her standards.

Are you squirming at the site of the mallow stand, pictured above?  Feeling a contentment that the world is still okay, or having a little discomfort or pain?   To Purple Poppy Mallow or not, that is the question!

June Native Wildflowers I

In yesterday's blog, I related that most of my yard is native prairie that I mow regularly, usually in portions on a every other week rotation.   This year, I'm trying to leave certain areas unmown, primarily so that I can enjoy the prairie forbs that pop up in those areas.  The flowers aren't as dense-packed as you might see on a calendar photograph, but there are enough of them to enjoy.    Many of my intentionally neglected areas are strips on the hillsides that will serve a dual purpose (other than for my aesthetic satisfaction)  as rain gardens to slow down and clean some of the runoff from heavy rains.  And of course, the unmown areas offer a third, selfish advantage;  they decrease my dreaded mowing time.

I decided to show you some of the June wildflowers blooming in these areas because of my initial excitement over a patch of Purple Poppy Mallow (Callirhoe involucrata) right next to the circle (okay, teardrop) driveway.  I've been mowing around it for several years while the Poppy Mallow blooms, then cutting it off again a month or so later because the blooming ceases in about a month and because a month is all I get before Mrs. ProfessorRoush starts to complain about the disheveled mess and forces me to cut it.  We are not entirely in marital agreement on our appreciation of the "natural" state of lawn.

The Purple Poppy Mallow blooms brightly and gloriously for quite some time during the summer and loves the hot dry summers of Kansas.  The blooms close each evening and don't open up till late morning, so if you take a picture or pass by a group in early morning, like the one on the left, it just looks like a patch of overgrown weeds and you might look at it and side with Mrs. ProfessorRoush.  Three hours later, this is a river of bright purple, a floriferous masterpiece, and nobody would have the heart to mow it off.  

Another forb that has been blooming in the prairie for several weeks now is the Blue Wild Indigo (Baptisia australis).   This one also comes in a light cream form (a different species, Plains Wild Indigo or Baptisia bracteata ) that usually blooms first and has already spent their beauty this year.  I enjoy the dark, black rattle-ly seedpods that form on the dried up stems of these plants, but saw my neighbor chopping off the blooming false indigo this weekend because he doesn't like the seedpods.  There's no accounting for taste, but at least he has a better appreciation for the fact that the sap of this plant turns purple when exposed to air. 

Throughout my garden beds, one native prairie plant that I recognize as a seedling and allow to self-seed wherever it wants is the Butterfly milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa).  I've been amazed how often they pop up in a perfect place for display and that's good because they are nearly impossible to transplant anyway due to deep taproots.  These orange beauties have just begun to bloom and they will brighten up their areas for 6 weeks.  I now have 10 different self-seeded butterfly magnets in my garden.  They are all tough as nails, impervious to wind and weather and insects, and as drought-tolerant as you'd ever want.

Hidden in the prairie grasses, if you look hard for it, will be light-pink-purple bristly flowers of the Catclaw Sensitive Briar (Mimosa nuttallii).  What looks like flowers are actually the overpowering pink stamens towering above the tiny flowers.  Touch the stamens and they fold up into a small ball instantly.  Catclaw is an important indicator of prairie health as it disappears in overgrazed areas.

I've got loads of wildflowers to show you, so look for posts II and III later this week;  I think we'll do the yellows, and then the whites on different days.