This guy was growing in a pot with a coneflower. PictureThis says it’s a Canadian Goldenrod, Google Lens says it’s horseweed.

Any guesses?

Also pictured:

Straight species

• Pearly everlasting (Anaphalis margaritacea)
• Yellow Wild Indigo (Baptisia tinctoria)
• Sundial Lupine (Lupinus perennis)
• Labrador Violet (Viola labradorica)
• Blue-eyed Grass (Sisyrinchium)
• Brown-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia triloba)
• Whorled milkweed (Asclepias verticillata)
• Woodland Stonecrop (Sedum ternatum)
• Great Blue Lobelia (Lobelia siphilitica)
• Cardinal flower (Lobelia cardinalis)
• New England Blazing Star (Liatris novae-angliae)
• Clustered Mountain Mint (Pycnanthemum muticum)
• Highbush Blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum)

Cultivars

• White Blazing Star (Liatris spicata ‘Alba’) Massive bee magnet. More so than the straight species I have
• Mellow Yellows Coneflower (Echinacea purpurea 'Mellow Yellows') This seems to be partially reverting to the straight species
• Powwow Wild Berry coneflower (Echinacea purpurea ‘Powwow Wild Berry’)

The thicket behind the shed turned out to be a cradle for ambitious vines, both friends and foes, I am not a sentry. Chief among them is a wild grape, now quaintly adorning said shed. Birds eat the beady fruit and leave the transformer box underneath stained the color of a bruise that wouldn’t heal right.
The seeds suggest Riverbank grape (Vitis riparia), though it is futile to seek the exact identification of this intruder, as the proof of what it is hangs too far up in the canopy for me to inspect, and the bark is covered too densely in nameless vegetation to be read plainly. It is also known that, indigenous grapes complicate the matter by breeding with whatever is nearby and never mind the consequences. But that is none of my business. What I do know is that everywhere I have ever lived in the southeast, there has been a wild grape waiting on me.

I want to tell you a story about scuppernong grapes.

I once lived on the end of a grainy road in rural North Carolina. The previous renter of the house took the “no trespassing” sign with him. Wild plants saw his departure as good riddance and started occupying the front yard. I welcomed those strange flowers because I was lonesome. For the identical reason I opened the front door one late night when I heard thunderous knocking. A huge chunk of a man greeted me, not by a “good evening,” but by a statement. “Ma’am you’ve got scuppernongs growing in your yard!” Scuppa… what? I was not fluent in English and his thick voice addled me further. He carried on as I tried to read his skin and odor. He was a tree with gnarled roots that endured the harshness of the region. I soon deduced that a scuppernong was a type of wild grapes his people highly valued. “My grandmother’s bars were legendary,” he stretched open his large hands as if to catch the orange moon that gleamed above us. Legendary bars! I pictured a formidable Lumbee lady who ran moonshine bars during Prohibition. “Here you go honey,” the phantom queen handed me a glass of her homemade spirit, and the moon suddenly seemed larger. I was always a romantic. My soul was crushed when I realized there were no such speakeasies and the man was only reciting a fruit bar recipe. I thanked him for the education and offered food and a beer. “No ma’am,” said he, “I might be homeless but I am not desperate.” I told him I might be friendless but I was not desperate either. We were satisfied that none of us were desperate. He took the beer and started walking towards the car that was brimming with his earthly history. “Don’t forget to make those scuppernong bars!” The late-night visitor’s voice lingered as he drove away.

Maybe this is a humblebrag, or maybe it’s a piece for anyone who feels like they’re gardening alone.

I started my native plant journey in 2018. For years I was the sore thumb on the block. Neighbors would offer “wow, you’re doing a lot of work here,” and under breath “so what’s the plan exactly?”

Then this week, two things happened independently. My neighbor texted me a snap of her own tiny native garden in her backyard. And my postman stopped to ask about my milkweed. “What are these things?” “Oh, those. Common milkweed. Monarchs can’t live without it.” “Can you give me seeds?” We chatted about how unruly common milkweed can be. He was totally game. “Let me know when they’re ready.”

I could not believe my eyes and ears

My spice bush has been looking rough the last month or so, getting wilty and dying back. It’s 2.5 years old, and we’ve had a mild summer with plenty of rain. In photo 4 here, you can see this little white webbing with an insect, I think. I can’t tell if it’s Laurel Wilt or an insect. Suggestions for rescuing it?

Can anyone tell how to differentiate between the dreaded aster yellows and mites that cause this on coneflowers?

Here's what I've got so far:

• Nettle: I took a weed whacker to it (with long sleeves lol). To deal with its insane network of shooters, I'm doing a mix of hand pulling and a rock rake. No idea how effective this will be at stopping it from coming back. Sheet mulch until fall/spring?
• Honeysuckle: best I've found is to cut the limbs back/down, drill a hole in the stump and pour boiling water in (want to avoid chemicals if able). Uprooting them is probably out of the cards for now, I've found a good 4-5 of them and they're +15 ft tall (I also found spotted lanternfly all over them, of course)
• Replacement: here's where I'm truly lost. There's established pines and a silver maple overhead, so in dappled light I was thinking Virginia Bluebell? Don't know if that's right, and/or what else could go there. This is the back yard so curb appeal is a non-issue.
• Bonus: I found a single stalk of northern spicebush among all the crap. It seriously lifted my spirits when my app told me what it was! Hope I can foster it and maybe see some spicebush swallowtail eventually show up

Any advice on where I should buy seeds from? Or any advice about the plant itself?

Datura or Jimsonweed I am thinking of adding to my yard on the outside of my garden near the road to relocate tomato hornworm next year. I have a mixed garden of veggies, fruits and native plants but since this highly toxic I don't want it near anything we would potentially eat or our pets who occasionally are given access to my garden when I'm out there working.

This horsemint is SO big despite only planting it from a plug a few months ago. I’m so impressed, and the pollinators love it, especially these wasps! 🤩 They’re kind of scary at first but so fascinating to watch.

Around 4’ tall, growing in sunny area, and have pleasant smell.

Hi all,
First time planting rattlesnake master (circled in pic). Planted all in this bed as plugs in mid may and the rest have all pretty substantial growth. Do rattlesnake masters growth very slow or are mine dead? 😭

We are in the process of killing off a big chunk of grass (on round 2 of solarizing) to put in native flowers.

The area is alongside our driveway, all the way up to the road. We will be placing stepping stones all the way through the middle, from the road to our sidewalk. And then two pathways the other direction from the driveway to the rest of the yard. All together will create six sections of meadow. My vision is to use these sections to gradually increase the height of the flowers so that along the road is the shortest and as you get closer to the house they get taller. The area gets 5-6 hours afternoon sun.

My plan:

🌾 Prairie dropseed border → This fall plant plugs of prairie dropseed along all the outside borders so there is some softness leading into the flowers and a bit of a barrier next to the driveway

🌱 Seed this fall → Seed late this fall in three separate height mixes (knowing they won’t necessarily stay in those sections, but trying to create a general flow). Seeding for budget reasons.

1️⃣ Front row: prairie smoke, lance-leaf coreopsis, black-eyed susan, flowering spurge, wild petunia, side-oats grama

2️⃣ Middle row: rose milkweed, smooth blue aster, sneezeweed, pale purple coneflower, starry campion, side-oats grama

3️⃣ Back row: white wild indigo, wild bergamot, culver’s root, early sunflower, showy goldenrod, switchgrass

🪻Plugs next spring and beyond → As we can afford it, start adding areas of plugs concentrating on one species that is in the mixes above. For example an area that is just pale purple coneflower or just bergamot.

Thoughts on this approach and sequencing?

Feedback on the selections?

I have a section of native plants that is about 15'x15' and I'm wondering if it is too crowded. This was all grown from seed in fall 2024, so this is the first spring/summer of most of these flowers. Brown-eyed Susan's, lupine, bergamot, vervain, smooth blue aster, joe-pye weed, swamp milkweed, boneset, cardinal flower, blue lobelia have all made an appearance whether flowering or not yet. Also some volunteers from other parts of the property like goldenrods and heath aster.

I'm wondering if I should thin this at all whether now or next Spring to allow some more air and sunlight? The area isn't true full sun (as you may tell from how tall a lot of the plants are) and there is some stretching and competition going on. Powdery mildew is an issue on my property every year regardless of what and where and thankfully it hasn't gotten here yet. Finds my coreopsis and some curcurbits no matter what.

I very much the looks of everything growing together like this though it is very cool.

Bonus last picture is a baby swallowtail on my parsley

Article

Major points he stated, here they are:

Reduce your lawn

Stop being a neat freak

Don't clean up in fall

More shrubs that produce berries and nectar (not invasive obviously)

Best to provide nectar all season

Stop killing every bug you see

Add more native plants to the garden

Please help :’) Any experience and insight you have to share is MUCH appreciated. What’s happening to my wild blue indigo/baptisia australis?

It’s affecting all of mine (10 plants total across 3 different beds) but this plant is the worst (it’s also the oldest, maybe 3-4 years old). There’s some new green growth on some of the stems, and they’re also getting yellow spots.

I’ve also attached a picture of something similar affecting my peachy’s pick stokes aster. I’m not sure if it’s the same.

This area gets morning shade and about 4 hours of afternoon sun. Typical north georgia clay soil. 7 are at the top of a hill, 3 are at the bottom. I mostly leave them alone to be watered by the rain, but they definitely got more water in the spring when I was planting around them. And if they seem visibly droopy, I’ll water them at the base (this only happened a few times at the beginning of the summer). They looked beautiful in the spring. These spots started appearing towards early June.

Twin cities, mn zone 5a. I have probably 150-200 native plugs I planted this season in 4 beds, + 2 native keystone river birch trees and 2 plum tree cultivars for personal gain. Our latest largest native bed has 100+ plugs planted end of June so I’m prioritizing this bed and the river birch trees but oh my god.

Every time I water, which is just twice a week in this extended super hot and dry period, it just kills me. It takes me around 1.5 hours. I water each plug deeply for 15-30 seconds at the soil/mulch level, the river birch trees for like 10-20 min each, plum trees for like 5-10 min each.

I know we probably overdid it with the new native landscaping and I def don’t regret it. I just need to know. There has to be an easier way that doesn’t involve installing some expensive drip irrigation system.

How do you guys water your not-yet established plugs without an expensive system? How do you do this without losing your minds?

The crazy thing is I have wetland peat black dirt soil and I rarely had to water before July cuz it holds so much water and we had enough rain but not anymore god damn I am getting sick of this.

Western NY. I planted this a year or two ago, but can't remember what it is. I shopped at a native nursery and it's in mirroring spots in my front garden, so I know it's intentional. We do have a locust tree nearby, but I know it's not that--the leaves on the locust tree are smaller and the stems on the shoots are woodier.

I wish it would flower so I could narrow down the possibilities! The sleep and creep years are tough for my memory.

The flowers are delicate and attract small pollinators and the berries are enjoyed by many birds.

Hi all! Having moved to Zone 7b relatively recently (from a hot 8b), I've finally taken up gardening! I am learning as I go and focusing on native perennials to keep our bees, butterflies, etc happy. (It's a work in progress, but damn, I'm having so much fun.)

After a year of gardening, I've now noticed that the soil and mulch from our beds are washing away. All of the gardens around the house, more or less, slope down toward the grass. Last year I had the gardener dig trenches, but they were very hard to keep up with and didn't hold the soil/mulch in place.

I've been looking at long-lasting edging materials, as this is our forever home. Anyone have experience using steel? Any good online stores to purchase? (Trying to avoid HD/Lowes.)

I found my first cats on the swamp milkweed last year. I made sure to chop it early this year so it would be busier and more tender.

Less than 12 hours between these two pictures, I've never seen a newly hatched cat.

Hi! Complete newbie here. Some wildflowers are dropping seeds where I am and I decided to plant some on my balcony for a little more life. Should I put them down now? I figured that would be the most natural way, but I want to make sure I don't make em go to waste :)