April showers have brought May flowers...and May weeds...
Like most people, I think weeding is an unpleasant chore. And while planting densely will curb your weeding, you'll still have to do some form of tidying every spring. The more formal the garden, the more weeding you’ll have to do.
Here’s some good news, though: if you've just planted a new bed, you’ll do most of your weeding within the first 2 years of your garden installation. When a garden is in its infancy, there is still a lot of space between plants, which means space for weeds.
As the years go by, your bed will get fuller and there will be less opportunity for weeds to colonize.
What’s more, weeds often arise on disturbed soils. So if you are pulling and turning the ground over (as one does upon installation), new weed seeds buried under soil may emerge the following year.
If you have planted a dense perennial garden, by year 3, you will likely not have much weeding at all! I do virtually no weeding in my back bed, and I love it!
What is a weed?
As the old adage goes: A weed is simply a plant in the wrong place. By that definition, even a large tree could be considered a weed if it’s not where you want it to be. But here’s where I'd like to challenge traditional gardening: sometimes, even if you didn’t intentionally place a plant where it’s growing, you might want to keep it there. It depends on the plant.
For example, in my back bed, I never planted any white wood aster. But they emerged, and I kept them because they look so beautiful when they bloom, and the bees love em! This is a vigorously re-seeding plant, but I’m ok with that because it brings vitality to my yard.
So perhaps pause before you pull. Just because you didn't plan for a plant to be there doesn't mean you need to remove it. Especially if you want a garden that evokes whimsy, spontaneity, and surprise.
Having said that, I do not advocate you simply “let things be.” There are weeds that will destroy your design, and you should get rid of them. Below is my weed guidebook, but by no means do you need to follow it. Keep whatever you think is pretty!
Here are my non-negotiables:
- Invasive bush honeysuckle. God, I hate this stuff. It’s everywhere in NWA. My neighbors have it, so inevitably, I’ll get a bunch every year. I pull it immediately. There are several invasive plants in NWA, such as Nandina, Bradford Pear, Tree of Heaven, English Ivy, Privet, and Euonymus. Even sweet smelling asian vining honeysuckle, mimosa tree, and sweet autumn clematis are considered invasive. Getting rid of these plants in our yards is a great first step to creating a healthier landscape. I’m somewhat flexible about invasives, but not Japanese Bush Honeysuckle. It isn’t pretty to me. It doesn’t smell all that good. And it doesn’t support the ecosystem. It’s out!
- Baby trees. Even ‘good’ trees, like oaks, are a no for me. I have enough trees. I don’t need a maple or redbud nursery growing in my yard.
- In my beds, and by no means is this an exhaustive list, I get rid of the following: dock, chickweed, henbit, dead nettle, veronica, dandelion, plantain, pigweed, grassy volunteers, ….they just contribute to messiness in my beds (which admittedly, are chaotic enough), and they re-seed like crazy. I pull them before they go to seed. Note: if these weeds are in my lawn, I don’t worry about them. For me, lawn is for lying on, playing on, running on, walking on…not looking at.
This site has some good pics, but when in doubt, take a pic and put on the iNaturalist app for identification.
Weeds that I don’t mind, but don’t encourage:
- Vetch: the purple flowers are cute, and the plant fixes nitrogen into the soil. It gets a bit overly sprawling after awhile…but I’m not rigid about pulling this one.
- Dayflower: the blue flowers are cute, but they only last a day….so meh.
- Wild garlic and wild onion: the bees like the flowers, and they look good blooming in a mass.
- Fleabane: the flowers smell like honey and look great coupled with other wild flowers.
- Buttercups: who doesn’t love cheery yellow fields of these lovely blooms? I just pull if they have taken over and look messy.
Weeds that I not only leave, but actively encourage:
1. Virginia creeper: I love this stuff as a ground cover and as a climber on brick and stucco. Plus it's a host plant to a variety of moths.
2. Wild violets: awesome groundcover for the shade, and the leaves are larval food for fritterlary butterflies.
3. Clovers: they fix nitrogen into the soil, serving as a natural fertilizer for plants. Plus, bees love the flowers. And they are cute!
4. Sorrels: they look similar to clovers, but daintier.
5. Bluets and claytonia: these early blooming cuties are native, and look great.
6. Jewelweed: my favorite ‘weed.’ I’m lucky enough to have a natural colony of jewelweed in my Bella Vista lake property. The orange blossoms re-seed every year on my moist, shady hillside, much to the hummingbirds’ content.
7. Passionvine, grapevine, and smilax (I love these for both fresh and dried arrangements).
While it can feel serendipitous when an ecologically beneficial and/or beautiful plant spontaneously emerges in our gardens, unfortunately, it doesn’t always work that smoothly, and sometimes nature needs a helping hand, with both removing and adding. Even if you want an orderly garden, there are several plants you can choose that have special wildlife benefits, which will bring life to your garden.
If you want birds:
You’ll want to think of all the stages of a bird’s life: baby birds to grown birds. According to Doug Tallamy, the best plant you can have for birds is an Oak tree, because it hosts over 900 types of caterpillars- essential food for baby birds. Following oaks, willows, cherries, and maples also host a large and diverse selection of caterpillars.
To feed adult birds, start with goldenrods, black and brown eyed susans, asters, and pale and purple coneflowers (see pic below with the mexican hats- great bird food too). Try to stick to the ‘straight’ species, as many cultivars have been bred for novelty and lack the nutrition that makes these plants valuable in the first place.
If you want butterflies:
Again, you need to start with the caterpillars. For monarchs, you need milkweed (see pic below), and there are many gorgeous types depending on your site conditions. If you want black swallowtails, be sure to plant golden alexanders. For spicebush swallowtails, get spicebush or Sassafras trees. For zebra swallowtail, get at least 2 paw paw trees, and for tiger swallowtail, get chokecherry or serviceberry. If you want painted ladies, pussytoes are both a host plant and a gorgeous groundcover. If you want crescents, try sky blue asters; if you want hairstreaks, get purple poppy mallow. Wild petunia (not the annual found in big box garden centers) hosts the buckeye butterfly, and the larvae of azures prefer new jersey tea and boneset.
You’ll also need flowers that provide good nectar for the butterflies once they emerge. Blazing stars, joe pye weed, ironweed, phlox, and zinnias are all-stars when it comes to nectar for butterflies.
If you want bees:
There are a lot of native bees in our region, including various bumblebees and sweat bees that feed on nectar and pollen. In addition to the plants named above for butterflies and birds, consider adding beebalms and mountain mints to supplement your garden.
Keep in mind, the planting season in NWA is quick, and nurseries run out of stock every season, so order immediately and plant immediately. Remember, get several plants of the same variety so you form a clump, water deeply and daily upon installation, easing up each week, and most importantly, take time to witness the awesome beauty of nature: if you plant it, they will come!
Weeding in Spring is an unpleasant chore, but it will become less of an issue as your garden matures. Take time to get to know what’s showing up in your garden…it might be a plant you never intended to have but looks beautiful anyway.
For more garden info, check out the 2 events below:
- Wild Ones will be hosting a garden tour at my own home! Come see my “test kitchen” Sat May 17 at 10am.
- If you would like to get this info and more as a class, come to the Botanical Gardens of the Ozarks in Fayetteville on Sunday June 1 from 2-3. The class is $15, and the money goes towards BGO.
By: Claudia Vilato
