Habitat for Wildlife

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“If we don’t have the pollinators, that means we’re going to be losing a lot of plants, then you lose a lot of organisms that are dependent on specific plants and so on and so forth. You know, my plea is that we have to maintain these habitats, not only for monarch butterflies, but for everything else, because it’s really in our best interest to do so.”

-Chip Taylor, Founder of Monarch Watch

 

Nectar and Food

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Native plants provide essential food for local wildlife. The native columbine with its long tubular red and yellow blooms looks similar to a hummingbird feeder and it blooms just as the hummers return to Indiana from migration and need food, unlike the non-native columbines found in most gardens. Prairie drop seed has an extremely nutritious seed that is devoured by song birds. Switchgrass provides excellent cover and food for ducks, upland game birds (such wild turkeys, pheasants and northern bobwhite) and songbirds.

 

Improve Water Quality

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Native plants with their deep roots in a rain garden, bioswale or at the water’s edge encourage storm water and its associated pollutants to infiltrate into the ground instead of running into our streams, rivers and lakes. Some communities offer incentives to create rain gardens. Not only will you help improve water quality, you will have a beautiful garden to enjoy. We offer many plants suitable for this use.

 

Low maintenance/Different Management

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Native plants are low maintenance. Once established, native plants need less watering.  Some native plants thrive in low-nutrient soils. DO NOT use pesticides! Pesticides kill pollinators and caterpillars as well as the insects that birds need for food. Native plants are cold hardy.  Native plants are adapted to our soil and weather conditions.

You will need to care for your native plant garden. Part of the joy of gardening is to watch the garden come into its own. You will need to care to keep a pleasing design, to remove unwanted seedlings, cut back the foliage in spring, and leave the leaf litter in fall to provide habitat.