How the Garden Gives Back to Nature

Bee enjoying a echinacea flower

It's high summer: The blue birds and cardinals have found the ripe fruit of the native pagoda dogwood. What fun! I get to watch it all happen and it’s all serendipity. George and I got the dogwoods years ago and we sold not a one. They grew crooked and stunted because we just left them in their small pots. Four years ago we put one in the ground and I saw how beautiful they were, but still no takers (maybe because the beautiful one was in our back yard that is private). Last year we put them all in the ground and I am so happy to have  bird feeders I don’t have to fill.

More signs of summer: The monarch caterpillars have found the Asclepias physocarpa (we call it monkey balls). The Asclepias are now reseeding in my display garden out front, and I just pull up the few I don’t want. I think the butterflies get hungry and feel there's an open sign that says Free Eats at the Morningside Butterfly Restaurant. Then they tell all their closest friends and relatives who also come back year after year to lay their eggs and belly up to the plant bar. And I love it. That's why I make sure those plants are in my garden every year. I love showing people their green, black, and white bodies making short work out of the leaves. One day they are fat and sassy, and the next day they are gone, having inched their way to a safe spot to prepare for the miracle of rebirth into winged messengers of future generations.

Finally, keep an eye out for the cone flowers, which are getting ready to feed the finches. Echinacea's pink, orange, white, and yellow flowers will be replaced by bright yellow wings as nature intended. Lets hear it for natives and non-natives plants that feed our inner soul and the outer world of nature. Sounds like two for one to me.