Ya takes what ya can...

[KDdid]

Standing outside my MIL's house Christmas Eve, and my wandering eyes fell upon thickets of purple coneflowers standing dead in some flower beds near her garage. My wife's sister started with four plants about a decade ago, and birds have been steadily increasing the flower's range since. I borrowed a plastic sack, and in five minutes had enough to plant in amongst some NWSG/weedy herbaceous border I have along the west side of my yard. I've always been a seed scavenger but now do it with more focus. On a related note, I plan to burn this little patch off late winter and overseed some more BBS and Indian Grass in mid March. Should I mix these in at the same time?


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[Turkey Creek]

You bet you could mix them in at that time. Native flowers and forbs tend to do better with the ground disturbance. Over time the grasses can out compete and take over the majority of the area.

 

[KDdid]

You bet you could mix them in at that time. Native flowers and forbs tend to do better with the ground disturbance. Over time the grasses can out compete and take over the majority of the area.

Ok great. The Grasses will be frost seeded onto bare soil- is that a viable way to get the coneflower seeds to sprout as well?


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[Turkey Creek]

Ok great. The Grasses will be frost seeded onto bare soil- is that a viable way to get the coneflower seeds to sprout as well?
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You will find that Big Bluestem and Indian grass dont frost seed that well especially if you dont rough up the soil a bit first. The seeds to both are very light and fluffy and dont "settle" into the soil well. The Coneflower has pretty dense seed so it should frost seed alright.

 

[Fish]

Ive had coneflowers spring up in places i never planted them. Remember, they are a perennial and the first year you probably wont see any flowers.

 

[j-bird]

Standing outside my MIL's house Christmas Eve, and my wandering eyes fell upon thickets of purple coneflowers standing dead in some flower beds near her garage. My wife's sister started with four plants about a decade ago, and birds have been steadily increasing the flower's range since. I borrowed a plastic sack, and in five minutes had enough to plant in amongst some NWSG/weedy herbaceous border I have along the west side of my yard. I've always been a seed scavenger but now do it with more focus. On a related note, I plan to burn this little patch off late winter and overseed some more BBS and Indian Grass in mid March. Should I mix these in at the same time?


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Last summer I looked closer at some flowers my folks have at there place and I was shocked to see they have some cone flower as well. During a trip in the fall once the flowers had dried I collected the heads and tossed them into my existing NWSG grass stands. I have no idea if they will take, but it was worth the few minutes of time and I plan on continuing the practice as well. It can be funny the things we walk by and don;t notice, but then when we get into this habitat stuff and all of the sudden we start seeing things we had never seen before.

 

[KDdid]

Last summer I looked closer at some flowers my folks have at there place and I was shocked to see they have some cone flower as well. During a trip in the fall once the flowers had dried I collected the heads and tossed them into my existing NWSG grass stands. I have no idea if they will take, but it was worth the few minutes of time and I plan on continuing the practice as well. It can be funny the things we walk by and don;t notice, but then when we get into this habitat stuff and all of the sudden we start seeing things we had never seen before.

No doubt. My mother had a patch of Black Eyed Susan on the corner of her house, and since it's still in the family, I'm going to check those out as well.