Waking Up with the Garden: Spring To-Dos for Native Plant Success

It's that time of year again, if you can believe it. When the bluebirds and redwing blackbirds show back up, the bulbs in our gardens start to come up, and we get the urge to get outside and work in the garden. But what is it exactly that we're supposed to do? Do we weed? Prune? Trim plants? Work the soil? And is the spring process for Native Plant Gardens any different than it is for traditional gardens? Well, as always, the answer is "it depends".

Spring Weeding:

If you know what baby weeds look like now is the time to try to get them before they get too large and unwieldy. A small seedling in infinitely easier to remove from any space than an established or even a partly established plant.

Now, what do I mean by weeds? Really, it's any plant that's growing where you don't want it to, so the idea of a weed can change from garden to garden.

In my garden I mostly mean Noxious Weeds, which are plants that have been identified by either the USDA or the CDA (Colorado Department of Agriculture) as invasive plants that pose a threat to either agriculture or ecosystems. Note, while some natives can be aggressive, they are never labeled as Noxious weeds. All Noxious Weeds are invasive plants from other parts of the world.

While I do focus on Noxious Weeds, I will also take this time to see which of my native plants have re-seeded. Asters, Artemisias, and some grasses and shrubs, can and will quickly take over a garden if left to their own devices. Every year I pull baby Rabbit Brush, Asters and a few other species from parts of the garden where I have less aggressive perennials and need to make sure that they have space to grow and thrive. Even if they're native plants, it's ok to pull them from spaces you don't want them to be.

If you don't know what the seedlings in your garden are, after all many of them look very different from their adult form, that's OK! Now is a great time to just observe them, take note of any differences you see between seedlings, and let them grow till you can identify them. The only reason I know which species are which at this tiny little stage is because I watched them grow at some point until I knew what they were. And yes, there have been many times when I hoped a little plant was a cool new native, and it turned out to be a Noxious Weed. That's how we learn. So, take the time to just be in your garden, staring intently at tiny little plants, and getting to know them at this stage. Knowing what they look like now, and learning, season after season, what the seedling stages of all kinds of plants look like, will be a huge asset for you in the future and will inevitably make your weeding chores less of a burden. Plus, it's a great excuse to just sit outside hanging out with your plants.

Spring Pruning:

For many shrubs, early spring is the best time to prune. While it's nice to think that we never need to prune natives, the truth is that in home gardens, sometimes it's just unavoidable. They can get big and grow up against the house, causing damage to paint and creating a fire hazard. Or they might be a species that has evolved with natural herbivory, deer do after all, eat plants in the wild, as well as in our gardens.

Rabbitbrush is a prime example. I will go through every spring and give my Rabbitbrush a good haircut, trimming down all the green stems. Granted, sometimes the deer get there first and do it for me. Doing this makes them grow a healthy dense flush of new stems and helps keep the growth habit from getting too uneven. They'll also produce more flowers later in the season.

Not all shrubs respond this way, so it is important to do a little research and find out what each species you have prefers.

In general, avoid hedging native shrubs (Rabbitbrush excluded) and trim branches individually. Remember not to make any cuts that are flush with the branch you're leaving, and try to cut at a 45 degree angle to avoid fungal infections. Also, in the spring, wait to trim the dead out of shrubs till later in the season, to give any nesting insects a chance to emerge. You can, of course, forgo removing dead stems at all so many generations of bees and wasps and other beneficial insects can live in them. Just make sure to only do this with shrubs that live away from any structures or fences. It's important to make sure that we provide habitat, but it's also important to make sure that we don't give wildfires any extra fuel close to our homes.

Trimming Perennials:

Well, this one gets tricky, especially with all the information and memes about it out there. So, here's my take.

I leave my stems in the fall, but I will cut them down to about 12-20inches depending on the plant. "What!?" you say? "You're supposed to leave your stems for the bees!!!!". Yes, yes you are, however... Most native bee species that nest in pithy stems don't actually have strong enough jaws to cut through the tough outer structure of those stems. In the wild they nest in stems that have been broken and work their way into them from the top (yes, I'm sure there is at least one exception). So, it's ok to cut back your plants in the fall as long as you leave a good amount of stem for those bees to nest in. Now, the other thing is, most of those bees and need those stems for longer than just the winter season. Leaving your plant stems just for the spring and then cutting them and throwing them out later doesn't really give them the time they need to do their thing, and you end up throwing out baby bees anyway. But we want our gardens to look nice. So, if you must cut your old plant stems, wait till it's nice and warm out and, most importantly, don't throw them out. Bundle them up and put them somewhere out of the way so any little bees can emerge when they're ready. Bonus! You don't have to pay for one of those manmade bee motels, your garden already made it for you.

Working the Soil:

Just don't. Really, while plant stems get most of the attention as bee habitat, the fact is that most of our native bee species are ground nesting. Moths and beetles and other pollinators also spend the winter underground, so if you go in with a cultivator or a tiller or a shovel you will end up killing some ground nesting pollinators.

The other downside to working the soils that native plants prefer, is that it really breaks up the aggregates in the soil, leading to compaction and reducing drainage and airflow which are essential for healthy plants. If you happen to have a native plant garden that requires amending with compost (really just for forest and riparian plants) just do a topdressing and let it work itself into the soil naturally. Most native plants, however, require little to no amendments. That's one of the perks of using native plants, they require fewer inputs.

There are so many nuances to Spring Gardening, so if you have any questions about your gardens unique conditions or what you should do with this plant or that, please come visit us at Wiggle Worm Gardens! We're always happy to talk with you about gardening and answer any questions you have to the best of our ability.

HAPPY SPRING!!!