Wildflower Wednesday, January, 2017

I have been posting less and less, and spending so much time on FaceBook, that I rarely read blogs anymore.  I do not want to entirely give it up, though, so will try to at least keep up with Gail, from Clay and Limestone's Wildflower Wednesdays and the others who post for it.  I have links to the plants I posted today, that give more information about them.

I didn't remember to get a post ready until last night, when it was too dark to take photos.  It has been snowing today, so I took some photos out the front door.  We have seen birds when we go out, but they fly away so fast, I am not always sure what they are.  The one here is either a wren or a sparrow, I believe.  I like how the Rudbeckia maxima stems stay upright.  I have seen birds eat their seeds before.   We are out of their native range, but this clump has done well here.

Here, we see seed pods of wild senna.  I recently found out there is one native to our area, but this is not it.  Still, it is quite the draw for bees and butterflies here.  The smaller seedhead clusters are joe pye weed.

Most of the cup plant stems bent over the front walk that comes up to our house, so I had to break them off and set them inside the planting area more.  I wonder if there will be more seedlings than usual.  I see birds on them in the winter, too.

 I am pleased to have this Illinois bundleflower right next to our front porch.  Birds also eat these seeds.

I was able to dig out some of the joe pye plant from across the yard to plant on the west side, near the sidewalk, and it is doing fine.  I am not sure if it is a native one or a cultivar.

Grayhead coneflowers also self sow around.  I went to a native plant talk where it was said they are not good for a home garden.  The gal was surprised when I piped up saying they do fine in our yard.  They seem to stay pulled or dug out when they come up where I don't want them.

Here are some wider views of our front yard habitat.

Please forgive me, but I am going to get political.  I have never been one to pay that much attention to what my politicians do, except for some environmental issues that have come up.  Now that we have a new president, every day I am hearing things he has said and done that jar me to the core.  I am going through stages of grief over this.  When he first announced, I think he thought it was a big joke.  When different things came out about him, such as his not paying for work or goods what he had agreed to, I figured people would turn from him.  Then, when the video of him talking about liking to grope and do other things to women came out, I was kind of glad, because I figured that was it for him.  I will never see what others saw in him that would allow them to vote for him.  He sure is making a mess of things right now!  I am in the anger phase, in case you cannot tell, and even though I have friends who voted for him, I am mad at them for it.  I am a Christian, and need to forgive, but I am beyond sad for our future generations.  Please read up on pipelines, and when chances come up to fight them, I hope you do.

Happy gardening, or getting ready to!  Plant more native plants, and like Gail says, do not use pesticides!