Native Plants

Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?

A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.

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Wednesday - August 18, 2010

From: Wausau, WI
Region: Midwest
Topic: Wildlife Gardens
Title: Want to create a native wildlife habitat for our home in Wasau, WI.
Answered by: Jimmy Mills

QUESTION:

I am trying to create a native wildlife habitat for our home. We live in Marathon County, Wisconsin (north central Wisconsin). We live near woods, meadow, wetlands. Could you send me a list of native perennials, shrubs, grasses, trees, annuals, biennials, etc. to plant that would attract the following:Birds, butterflies, moths, beneficial insects, that would benefit all wildlife native to this region? Thank you!

ANSWER:

Mr. Smarty Plants will do even better than that. He will aquaint you with the numerous resources available on this web site, and show you how to use the NPIN Database which will allow you to generate such a list for yourself.

Lets first get some background information. Go to the How To Articles page which contains a wealth of information about the type of project you have in mind. The list below has some articles that I selected which seem pertinent to what you want to do. As you read through this material, you will come to realize that your endeavor is going to take a lot of time, effort, and patience. (Ggardening is not for the faint of heart!)

A Guide to Native Plant Gardening

For the plants, lets go to the Native Plant Database. There are two ways of doing this; the first is to use the Recommended Species list. Start by clicking on the View Recommended Species page button. When this page comes up, click on Wisconsin on the map and you will get a list of 178 commercially available native plant species suitable for planned landscapes in Wisconsin. Visit our Suppliers Directory to locate businesses that sell native plants or seeds or provide professional landscape or consulting services in Wisconsin. Clicking on the name of each plant will bring up its NPIN page which has information about the characteristics of the plant, its growing conditions and requirements, and images. Scroll down to the Narrow Your Search box, and you can specify the types plants you want by choosing among the parameters of Habit, Life Span, Light Requirements, and Soil Moisture (ignore the Bloom characteristics in your early searches, and add them in later as your refine your list). By intergrating the information on these pages with what you have learned from the reading material how to come up with a plant list.

Another approach to using the Native Plant Database is to use the Combination Search box. This is similar to the Narrow Your Search option previously mentioned. Use this if you already have some idea of the plants you want. it will usually generate a larger list than the Recommended Species list.