Community of Gardens

Description

We chose native plants because they provide ideal habitat for countless species of wildlife including birds, insects, and pollinators such as hummingbirds and monarch butterflies. Because they are perfectly adapted to local conditions, particularly compared to turf grass, native plants require far less water, less maintenance, no mowing, and less or no chemical pesticides and fertilizers that flow from our yards into the local streams and watershed, harming these same beautiful species we all love in our community. And native plants are beautiful, often with showy flowers, colorful fruits and seeds, interesting textures, and spectacular seasonal colors!  

We LOVE our native landscape and local wildlife loves it too! Between July and October, we had multiple daily visits by monarchs, eastern tiger swallowtails, great spangled fritillaries, skippers, and other butterflies; ruby-throated hummingbirds; and an immeasurable variety of insects that love to buzz around our native plants.

I started this list of species we have seen in our front yard - it’s incomplete, particularly in the bird category: Monarch, American painted lady butterfly, Eastern tiger swallowtail, pearl crescent butterfly,  Great spangled fritillary, Cabbage white, Zabulon skipper, Silver spotted skipper, Gray hairstreak, Holarctic azure/ebony jewelwing, widow skimmer, Fall webworm moth, Hanging thieves, Double-banded Scoliid Wasp, Eremnophila aureonotata, Dark paper wasp, Harvestmen, Genus Euryopis, Tribe hesperiini , American Nursery Web Spider, wren, bluebird, cardinal, and ruby-throated hummingbird.

We've included a video showing the transformation of our yard from turf grass to native plant garden

-Story contributed by Sara H.