More and more gardeners have come to embrace adding native plants to their gardens. These plants are designed to thrive in your local environment and provide vital support to local pollinators and wildlife. These native plants require little attention, but some thoughtful care in the fall will help them to come back stronger in the spring as well as give support to your local fauna.
Let’s look at some of the more popular native plants and the maintenance you should provide in the fall.
Your Native Garden Still Has Work to Do After Summer
Unlike typical vegetable garden plants, your native plants’ value continues well after the flowering ends. Their seeds feed birds, vegetation provides shelter, and leaves protect overwintering insects. Underground, their strong root systems help to stabilize soil and prevent erosion. A careful, selective cleanup will help to preserve useful habitat while managing weeds and disease.
Let Late-Blooming Flowers Finish Feeding Pollinators
Native plants like New England and Smooth Blue asters, as well as Maximilian sunflowers bloom later in the year, and well into early fall. These plants are important nectar sources at a time when many other flowering plants have ceased to bloom. They provide support for migrating monarch butterflies, as well as other bees and butterflies. Once the flowering finishes, allow the plants to form seed heads. The seeds provide food for birds and will help your native garden to expand with new plants. While it may not look neat and manicured, allowing spent blooms to stand will enhance your native garden in the long run.
Keep Seed Heads and Healthy Flower Stems Standing
Flowering natives like coneflowers, black-eyed Susan, coreopsis, blazing star, and sunflowers produce seeds that provide for winter foraging for finches, sparrows, and other seed-eating birds. The standing stalks provide habitat for helpful insects. Common sunflower, prairie sunflower, and plains coreopsis are annual plants, but by allowing them to drop seeds, you can keep your native garden going without having to replant. If you would like to harvest seeds to plant elsewhere, be sure to leave some stems standing to feed the wildlife.
Leave Native Grasses Upright Through Winter
Native grasses like Little bluestem, Indiangrass, switchgrass, and Canada wild rye should be left standing in clumps rather than mowing them or cutting them back. These lovely grasses can provide visual interest in your garden throughout the winter. Their foliage provides vital winter cover for birds and habitat for insects. Little bluestem, for example, feeds several skipper butterfly caterpillars. Many of these grasses produce seeds that feed wildlife, and their roots help prevent erosion.
Protect the Habitat at Ground Level
Whether you are growing milkweed, wild bergamot, Joe Pye weed, blue vervain or other native varieties, the area around your native plants can be of vital importance to local wildlife. Some butterflies and moths overwinter in leaf litter, newly produced bumble bee queens shelter in protected ground level sites, and some solitary bees use stems to live in. To help these insects, leave a loose layer of whole leaves where it’s practical. Gently move excess foliage from paths without burying small plants under a dense wet mass. Preserve some open soil for ground-nesting bees and avoid tilling or covering openings with thick mulch.
Do the Cleanup That Helps: Remove Weeds and Diseased Growth
While most of our advice has been to leave native plants alone in the fall, there is still some important cleanup that you should do. As your valued natives die back, it becomes easier to see and remove invasive plants and unwanted weeds. Just be careful around young native seedlings. Remove any clearly diseased foliage and dispose of it properly (not in your compost pile). Wild bergamot is susceptible to powdery mildew, for example, so removing diseased plant matter will keep it healthy. Feel free to neaten up your plant bed edge to keep it attractive while still preserving habitat.
Give Young Plants Targeted Care Before Winter
Established native plants tend to have deep, strong root systems that allow them to withstand the stress of winter weather. Younger plants spend their first couple of years growing their root systems. This is why you may not see blooms from your young native plants in the first year or two. They also may need a little more attention in the fall before the ground is frozen. In dryer fall weather you may need to provide some extra water to young seedlings, and make sure the soil is draining well. Natives do not typically need any kind of supplemental fertilizer.
Use Fall to Sow Seeds and Plan Next Year’s Habitat
Many native flower seeds benefit from cold stratification. This means they need exposure to winter’s cold, moist conditions to help break seed dormancy. Check your seed packets for exact instructions for timing and planting depth (many native should be surface-sown). Sow seeds into prepared, weed-free soil and ensure good seed to soil contact. Optimize the beauty and benefits of your native garden by planting varieties that bloom at different times to provide color and habitat throughout the year.
Spring Is Cleanup Time
Spring is generally the time to clean up your native garden. Cut back last year’s dead foliage on native grasses leaving about 6 inches of stubble and avoid cutting any new growth. Native flower stems can be left alone as new growth will usually hide old stems. If you do feel the need to neaten things up, leave 8-24 inches of stems to keep the habitat for insects.
Growing native plants is a wonderfully easy way to garden. A quick check-in each fall is usually all it takes to get everything ready for winter. Leaving your flowers and grasses standing lets them wrap up their season naturally while giving local birds and beneficial insects essential food and shelter. Plus, letting them drop seed and build strong roots ensures your garden comes back even fuller and healthier next spring!
