Oregon wildflower tour reveals secrets for home pollinator gardens

A cluster of home gardeners walked into a wild meadow on Mount Ashland in early July, following in the footsteps of native plant expert Suzie Savoie.

Their goal: Low-maintenance landscape inspiration.

Savoie, a botanist and co-author of “Native Pollinator Plants for Southern Oregon,” teaches ways to recreate the benefits and beauty of wildflowers at home.

She focuses on native plants that naturally thrive in a specific region or ecosystem and that have evolved over thousands of years with wildlife to rely on each other for survival.

Native trees and flowering plants growing in the right place in a home garden can be water wise and fire resistant. They can also provide breeding grounds, nesting sites, nutrient pollen, nectar and foliage to butterflies and other pollinators threatened by pesticides and habitat depletion.

Savoie wanted participants in the garden design workshop to experience wild landscapes up close and then see how wildcrafted seeds were intentionally planted on private property to draw in nature.

What grows wild alongside a hiking trail, from pink Oregon checker mallow to daisy-like sneezeweed flowers, could be planted to dress up a yard, she said.

Savoie stopped in front of a moist area of the meadow filled with tall stems of yarrow displaying white and yellow flowers. The plant, which smells like chrysanthemum, lures in bumble bees, gossamer-winged butterflies and other pollinators to land on its flat floret surface.

Topping out at 3 feet tall, common yarrow could overpower and spread in a well-irrigated garden, Savoie said, but it can be contained in dry conditions.

The first step: Know what’s already growing in the yard and nurture the existing native plants, which sometimes are hidden by invasive weeds.

“In order to protect wildlife and wild places, you have to learn about them,” Savoie said to the workshop group organized by the nonprofit Pollinator Project Rogue Valley.

The meadows in Mount Ashland’s watershed, denuded by livestock grazing a century ago, are now ecosystems recovering without human interference, said Savoie.

She pointed to a bounty of sedges, grass-like plants that are indicators of ecological health.

Savoie and her husband, Luke Ruediger, an expert in ecological land restoration, study nature’s method of mixing native plants by hiking in Northern California and southern Oregon.

They explore low-elevation oak woodlands and grasslands, mid-slope forests and streams, and high-elevation meadows and craggy ridgelines.

And they collect seeds of native wildflowers, grasses, shrubs and trees and sell packets through their 10-year-old company, Klamath-Siskiyou Native Seeds, based in the Applegate Valley.

Savoie said observing nature means really seeing what’s there. “Native grasses are easy to ignore, but a lot of critters need them,” she said.

Butterfly garden

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Savoie handed participants in her half-day workshop a list of plant species growing wild on the mountain and, a half mile down Mount Ashland Ski Road, in homeowner Mark Newberger’s pesticide-free butterfly garden.

Savoie has worked with Newberger for nine years, nature-scaping two acres of his property using harvested seeds from 60 specific native species.

In the mountain meadow and in Newberger’s yard, the gardening group saw yellow-flowered Oregon sunshine in dry, sunny spots serving as a host plant for painted lady butterflies.

The group also smelled aromatic horsemint, a drought-tolerant, low-maintenance and deer-resistant herb, as well as purple fleabane that provide nectar for bees and butterflies.

And they took photos of hummingbird-attracting scarlet gilia and red wavy leaf paintbrush.

“When you see red flowers, they tend to be hummingbird pollinated,” said Savoie.

The group kept circling Newberger’s garden and saw nectar plants like sulfur buckwheat that will turn yellow and orange. Nearby were reddish-orange Western columbine, blue wild flax and purple flower honeysuckle.

In both the wild and seeded spaces, monarch butterflies lay eggs on showy milkweed. Pale swallowtail, echo azure and Lorquin’s admirals land on tower rockcress’ small creamy flowers, and California marble butterflies land on caterpillar larval host plants.

Towering over mountain blue penstemon and yellow arrowleaf mule’s ears are tall cream-colored beargrass and cow parsnip.

“If you’re trying to recreate a meadow, have tall plants that grow above shorter plants,” Savoie said. “Don’t overlook low-growing owls’ clover or willow herb that might not look like much, but some tiny pollinator uses that. Low statured ecosystem can be teeming with bumblebees.”

She also asked the home gardeners to reserve patches of bare ground for native bees’ ground nests and for ants to transport trillium and other seeds. “We need to leave habitat for critters, even beetles and yellow jackets, that help keep the system going,” Savoie said.

Native garden tips

When planning a native garden, Suzie Savoie advises people to consider the site-specific conditions — soils, slope, aspect, elevation, shade or sun, moist or dry — as well as weed pressure, impacts from deer, squirrels, rabbits, gophers or voles, and long-term site maintenance.

Most important: Aim for natural fertilization and soil conditioning. There is a network of mycorrhizae and plants like lupines that take nitrogen from the air and fix it into the ground.

The publication “Native Pollinator Plants for Southern Oregon” that Savoie wrote with nursery specialist Thomas D. Landis has more factors to consider when planning a garden.

Here is an excerpt:

Perennials and annuals: Many annuals are good nectar and pollinator plants, establishing quickly and providing a burst of flowers, followed by abundant seeds that may readily self-sow and spread on their own. However, annuals can become weedy in irrigated gardens.

Perennial plants will stay in place and flower for many years, and if they self-sow, will do so at a slower pace than annuals.

Bloom times: Native plants have definite flowering periods that vary in timing and duration, influenced by elevation, irrigation and fertilization.

The objective of a functional and attractive pollinator garden is to use a palette of species that will bloom throughout the growing season.

Use at least three different species from bloom times in early, mid and late season to provide a variety of pollen and nectar sources.

The CalFlora database calflora.org and OregonFlora guide at oregonflora.org cover most native plant species and bloom time.

Natives versus cultivars: If you decide to use cultivated varieties instead of native plants for pollinators, it is important to select plants that have been the least hybridized by plant breeders.

Many times pollen and nectar have been sacrificed for a showier flower. This is especially true for “double” flowers, where a bee may spend precious energy trying to enter a flower with no pollinator value.

Garden use versus wild planting: Savoie encourages the use of native plants for pollinator conservation in a garden setting. But some native plant species only found in specific areas may not be appropriate for outplanting in a natural forest, woodland or meadow setting.

Be sure the species already occurs on or nearby a natural area before planting. Consult a local botanist associated with a chapter of the Native Plant Society or the federal Bureau of Land Management or U.S. Forest Service.

Native plant species can have multiple subspecies or varieties, so it is important to use plants originating in the local geographical area to ensure the conservation of local plant genetics and regional adaptation.

— Janet Eastman covers design and trends. Reach her at 503-294-4072, [email protected] and follow her on X @janeteastman.