By Casey Schmidt Ahl
With these tips, gardening with native plants can make a big impact even in small spaces.
Native plants play a unique role in supporting wildlife by providing food, shelter, and other resources throughout their life cycle. Many species of local pollinators rely solely on native plants for parts of their lives, whether it be early season nectar, winter food, or host plants where they can lay their eggs.
Wildlife populations have been dropping over the last 50 years. The number one driver of species decline around the world, from elephants to butterflies, is habitat loss. This is largely due to land-use change: large swaths of habitat are being converted into agriculture, mined for resources, or developed into housing. In addition to removing physical space that these species can occupy, humans also remove native plants, the basis of these ecosystems. The ripple effects of these changes impact species around the world.
The good news is that we can have a big impact on local wildlife just by considering the plants we choose to plant in our own yard. By focusing on creating a safe, complex habitat for animals, you can transform a small space into a patch of viable habitat for hundreds of native species. This blog focuses on making the best impact you can with native plants in a smaller space, like the spaces that most of us garden in the Philadelphia suburbs. Stop by Colonial Gardens any time to find over 100 species of native plants and advice on how to add them to your yard.
Consider Growing Conditions:
One common touted virtue of native plants is that they are low-maintenance. That certainly can be true, but only if they are planted in the right conditions! For example, winterberry holly are an excellent native shrub for feeding birds in the winter. However, if they are grown in too dry of conditions, they won’t produce a good crop of berries.
Do a survey of your yard and ask the following questions.
- What sort of sunlight do you have?
- What sort of soil? Does it sit heavy with water after rain or is it very dry?
- What sort of space do you have?
Knowing these conditions will help you select plants that will do well in your particular situation. It will also help you save money as you pick plants that are more likely to thrive in your yard.
Consider Habitat Complexity:
Before I worked at Colonial Gardens full-time, I worked as an educator in zoos. When designing zoo habitats, complexity is as important, if not more important, than the sheer size of the enclosure. A flat football field of grass is less useful to most species than a smaller space with different shelters to hide in, things to climb on, and objects to interact with. The same principle applies to wildlife in natural settings: a large golf course that is mostly manicured lawn will support less species than a smaller space that is dedicated to providing different types of plants for wildlife.
In our yards, we want to incorporate the complexity naturally found in meadow and forest habitats. Forest habitats have multiple layers from the canopy, to the understory, to the shrub plants, to the ground level. Each of these layers serve an important function. While canopy trees like oaks and maples may not be a feasible addition to your small yard, don’t underestimate the importance of smaller understory trees and shrubs. These plants provide shelter for birds, good biomass to support caterpillars, microclimates of cool shade in the summer, and windbreaks for resting butterflies. Adding these species will both provide important benefits to wildlife, but also will reduce your maintenance as compared to perennials.
Consider Host and Nectar Plants:
When feeding pollinators, we most often think of flowers. Flowers provide nectar and pollen: essential food for bees and adult butterflies. Pollinators are not very picky when it comes to the origin of their nectar plants. So long as the plant is accessible to the insects’ mouth and body shape, and they can recognize it as food, it will feed these animals. So don’t feel guilty for interspersing some non-natives like catmint and lavender in your garden for the bees.
However, there is a place where native plants are uniquely better for these pollinators: as host plants. Host plants are plants where butterflies will lay their eggs and will successfully feed their larvae. Butterflies are picky about their host plants. These are plants that they evolved alongside. They may provide camouflage or even toxic compounds that give their larvae a level of protection. Without proper host plants, butterflies cannot complete their life cycle and their populations will plummet.
To provide proper habitat for sustainable butterfly populations, you will need both nectar and host plants. Popular host plants include milkweed, turtlehead, spicebush, native sunflowers, asters, and redbuds.
Consider Keystone Species:
Not all native plants play an equal role in the ecosystem. Oaks, for example, are the host plant for over 500 species of caterpillars and moths making them essential on a broad scale to feed both pollinators and birds. Smaller plants also vary in their impact. If you are working with a smaller space, focus on species that have an outsized impact for their size. For example, in our ecoregion, black-eyed susans, sundrops, swamp sunflowers, asters, and goldenrods are considered keystone species for small spaces, according to Homegrown National Park. Alternatively, keep in mind particularly species you might be trying to attract. For butterflies, look at loading up on their host plants. For birds, consider using the native plant finder on the Audubon Society website to find specific plants that support particular bird species.
Consider All Seasons:
One of the biggest factors in keeping pollinators in your yard is a constant supply of nectar and pollen, supplied by blooming plants. Because perennials have a bloom time that lasts a maximum of 6 weeks, you will need a variety of plants to cover the season from spring to fall. If you’ve never stopped by your local garden center before, we highly recommend making several trips over the course of the year. Our growers focus on different species throughout the growing season, meaning that our selection changes throughout the year. Each visit, you’ll find something new in bloom to add to your palette of plants.
Probably the weakest season for most gardeners is the fall. Most plants prefer to bloom in the summer when there are ample pollinators available. However, migrating monarch butterflies, along with other species of butterflies, and bees need late-season nectar to gear up for winter. Some favorites for the late season include asters, sneezeweed, and swamp sunflowers.
Consider Selected Cultivars:
“Cultivars” refer to cultivated varieties of plants, selected by humans for particular traits. Just like we’ve bred dogs to be different sizes, shapes, and colors, we have done the same thing to plants. We can do this for aesthetic purposes (changing colors of flowers and leaves) and for practical purposes (increasing disease resistance, reducing size). If your goal is supporting wildlife, you want to select straight-species plants when possible as these are the plants that have the most proven track record (aka, thousands of years of evolution) in feeding wildlife.
There are, however, important uses for cultivars in native plant gardening. Some plants, like garden phlox and beebalm, are very susceptible to powdery mildew which can make the plant unsightly or even kill it. Cultivars can provide resistance to this problem to make these plants better suited to your garden. Other plants, like Joe-Pye Weed, helianthus, and heliopsis are very large in their natural forms. These plants have cultivated varieties that are more compact, which means that they’ll fit into your garden more easily. When selecting cultivars for your native garden, stick with ones that maintain the same flower shape and leaf color as the natural variety to ensure that pollinators can recognize these plants as proper food.
Consider Other Green Practices:
Plant community composition is not the end-all, be-all of providing good habitat for wildlife. Just as fish and frogs need clean water to live in, birds, bees, and butterflies need clean, high-quality habitat free from dangers like poisons and predators. Some practices to consider:
- Reduce or Remove Your Use of Pesticides: Pesticides do not separate “good” bugs from “bad” bugs. Using pesticides can kill bees, caterpillars, and butterflies that you want to keep as they kill mosquitoes, aphids, and other pests. Avoid them when possible and only ever use them as directed on the bottle.
- Keep Your Cat Indoors: Cats are the number one killer of songbirds in the US. Even house cats and stray cats that are fed supplemental foods still kill birds, seemingly just to exercise their predatory instincts.
- Clean Your Bird Feeders and Baths: Bird feeders and baths can provide important resources for songbirds, but only if they are kept clean. Clean these items frequently to prevent the spread of disease. If you find a dead bird to see ill birds around these items, remove them for a few weeks to reduce the chance of disease spread.
- Turn off the Lights at Night: Ever watch moths circle around a porchlight for hours? Artificial lights confuse the moths and other insects, causing them to waste energy, preventing them from feeding or mating. Artificial lights also distract migrating birds who may mistake that light for moonlight reflecting off of water. Turning off your lights at night helps these animals save energy and focus on survival.
The last point I’ll make is to make connections with your neighbors. If you are limited to your fence line, you can spread your impact by getting other people to add native plants to their yard. Perhaps that’s showing caterpillars to kids in your neighborhood to inspire their love of nature. Maybe that’s helping an elderly or disabled neighbor take care of their garden and adding native plants. Building a community that cares about each other and cares about nature will give us all a better world to live in. Thanks for reading and doing your part. Happy Gardening!
Colonial Gardens is an independent garden center serving the Phoenixville area since 1967. We have one of the largest selections of plants in the area and a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help you pick the best plants for you. Visit us year-round for plants, our florist, landscaping services, and our seasonal events.