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It's Nebraska
Wildflower Week
June 3rd-11th
Goldstrum Rudbeckia
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It’s official! The state that
is the nationally recognized home of Arbor Day is
finally celebrating it’s true contribution to our
national horticultural traditions—prairie
wildflowers. June 3-11 has been officially
proclaimed to be Nebraska Wildflower Week, with
events and activities ongoing around the state. The
Nebraska Statewide Arboretum proposed the
celebration and is sponsoring events in concert with
a diverse group of horticulture related
organizations.
It is fitting that a state
whose landscape is dominated by prairie should honor
the plants which give the prairie its most memorable
spring and summertime scenes. Our native western
prairies come alive with wildflowers by late spring
and continue their wildflower progression in
abundance through at least late summer.
Unfortunately for wildflower aficionados most of our
native prairie is now domesticated pasture, and
expansive vistas of grazing cattle are a more common
site alongside Wyobraska roadways than are expansive
vistas of wildflowers. But if you can get an
opportunity to walk through a section of prairie
that has not been grazed for a year or two, you’ll
find the wildflowers quickly return to a place of
colorful prominence in the prairie ecosystem. I
had such an opportunity a year ago, and was
surprised by both the diversity and the density of
the wildflower population in a prairie that had not
been grazed for only two years.
That experience heightened my
appreciation of the degree to which wildflowers
contribute to the visual quality of native prairie
ecosystems. Grasses may be the dominant plant type
in the prairie ecosystems, but it is the wildflowers
that make the native prairie such a visually
memorable experience.
There is already underway in
Wyobraska a strong movement by homeowners to
incorporate the “prairie wildflower look” into
residential and business landscapes. It is a long
overdue movement. As the Statewide Arboretum’s
Wildflower Week celebration indicates, wildflowers
are a major part of Nebraska’s horticultural
heritage. Much of that heritage was lost in the
conversion of the state’s prairies to farms and
ranches, and in the preference of the European
settlers to plant their favorite eastern U.S. and
European landscape plants around their new
farmsteads and communities.
To be sure, the wildflowers that are now reclaiming
their rightful place in Nebraska’s human landscapes
are what might be called improved or representative
versions of the native wildflowers discovered
growing here by the region’s earliest European
settlers. These new and improved wildflowers are
the result of selection, breeding, and hybridizing
programs of universities, arboretums, and private
nurseries. These new and improved wildflowers bring
to the human landscapes the same colorful presence
that their ancestors contributed to the
native prairie, but with much improved flower,
foliage, and behavior.
Penstemon
Fireworks Goldenrod
Showy Goldenrod
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Following are some of my
favorite wildflowers (improved for landscape use)
Magnus Purple Coneflower
Purple coneflower One of the
most popular prairie wildflowers, the cultivars sold
as garden and landscape plants are very close
relatives of the native purple coneflowers. The
common cultivars are ‘Magnus’, ‘Red Star’, ‘Double
Decker’, and ‘Kim’s Knee High’. 2-4 feet tall,
purple-pink flowers, it is a perennial but it also
seeds. Either cut off seed heads in mid winter, or
be prepared to hoe out some volunteers. But control
is not a problem.
Indian Summer Rudbeckia
Rudbeckia The garden perennial
rudbeckias are only distant relatives of the many
prairie sunflowers, but they are so much better
behaved while contributing the same yellow flowers
to the Wyobraska garden, that I highly recommend the
distant relatives ‘Goldsturm’ and ‘Indian Summer’.
They are almost essential to every prairie garden.
Kobold Gayfeather
Liatris—Gayfeather. The
long-blooming purple spikes of this Nebraska native
are a striking visual contrast in almost any flower
planting. A very well-behaved plant, try the named
cultivar ‘Kobold’.
Elfin Pink Penstemon
Penstemons Penstemons are a wildflower genus that
is literally distributed throughout the world.
There are many native to the American prairies and
the American southwest. Many colors, many sizes,
varying bloom periods from late spring through
mid-summer. Many rebloom when deadheaded. ‘Elfin
Pink’ is one of my favorites. ‘Rhondo’, ‘Red Rocks’,
‘Scarlet Bugler’, ‘Firecracker’, are other options.
Excellent new cultivars are soon to be introduced
out of the North Platte, Nebraska breeding program
of Dr. Dale Lindgren.
Goldenrod The Nebraska state
flower is finally getting the attention it deserves
as a landscape flower. Several new cultivars have
been introduced in recent years including the
lateblooming ‘Fireworks’, which tends to form a
large clump. Distinctive yellow flowers late
August-September. Goldenrod does not cause hayfever—it
tends to bloom at the same time as ragweed—hence the
old wives’ tale about it causing hayfever.
For a complete listing of
Nebraska Wildflower Week activities and information
go to the “Nebraska
Statewide Arboretum”. web site. When you reach
their homepage, click on “Nebraska wildflower
week”. |