Bison are back in our Illinois Prairie!!!
“WHAT A THOUSAND ACRES OF SILPHIUMS LOOKED LIKE WHEN THEY TICKLED THE BELLIES OF BUFFALO IS A QUESTION NEVER AGAIN TO BE ANSWERED, AND PERHAPS NOT EVEN ASKED.” – ALDO LEOPOLD When I first read the above sentence from Aldo Leopold’s book Sand County...Answers to some of your native plant questions
FAQs; What is an Ephemeral? Are natives invasive? Can I forage or collect in the wild?
Rethinking Garden Maintenance
There are a few minor differences between maintaining native plants and non-native plants. In a non-native (traditional) garden, we are growing plants that naturally don’t grow together, aren’t part of natural processes or adapted over thousands of years to the local environment. Here are some nature inspired maintenance tips for native plants.
Plant profile: Purple Flowering Raspberry, a summer beauty
Purple flowering Raspberry (Rubus odoratus) is one of my favorite summer flowering shrubs (click photo below for an enlargement). It is native to Du Page County, but rare in surrounding counties. It is also thornless.
Bird house, bath, feeder fall maintenance
Fall is a good time, as well as periodically throughout the year, to do maintenance on your birdhouses, birdfeeders and bird baths. Maintenance will help protect birds from some pests and diseases, and from unwanted visitors.