Conservation Corner: Some native species like to get their feet wet
The challenge faced by any plant that wants to grow around my house, and probably some of yours as well, these past few years is that they need to be able to stand having their roots growing in saturated soil. In other words, they better tolerate getting wet feet.
Outside of a few weeks here and there, we have seen no shortage of rain in central Ohio for longer than I care to remember, and it has led to complications across the botanical board including failed agricultural crops to increased mortality of plants and trees that need drier soils. So, as we continue our celebration of Native Plant Month, I felt it was pertinent to highlight our natives that have adapted to thrive in moist conditions in both natural and landscaped settings.
The problem I ran into as I started this column was how to narrow down a list that is not only lengthy, but also could lend itself to various situations. We have plants that can tolerate or need standing water, some that only tolerate saturated soil, and those that can survive equally in moist or normal soil conditions. Since most of you reading this reside in Ohio, where it might rain for four straight months then have a micro-drought for six weeks, I figured we’d hedge our bets and discuss those plants with a little more tolerance for variety in soil saturation.
My first go-to plant that fits this definition would be the swamp milkweed. Although this plant is considered an obligate wetland species which usually means they are only found in wetlands as their name might suggest, swamp milkweed can do just as well in a landscaped bed with only infrequent watering. One of the appealing side benefits to planting this, besides its pale pink flowers is that, like all milkweeds, it serves as a host plant to monarch butterfly caterpillars. While people most often associate common milkweed as the ideal monarch attractant, some studies have shown the butterflies prefer swamp milkweed over common milkweed when planted side by side.
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Another striking native flower that caught me off guard the first time I saw it growing in the wild is the swamp rose mallow. I still recall stumbling across one of these in a floodplain field and immediately thought it must have been a cultivar escaped from someone’s garden. Swamp rose mallows are related to tropical hibiscus plants and their similarities are evident. These plants can attain heights of five or six feet and the showy, five-petaled flowers may bloom in shades of pink or white and are enormous – up to six inches across!
The final two species of native plants that prefer moister soils are the closely related cardinal flower and great blue lobelia. Both plants produce irregular flowers that are uniquely tube-shaped with asymmetrically lobed petals. There are also some striking differences between the two species that you may have inferred from their names. The great blue lobelia’s flowers are a bright blue or lavender color while the cardinal flower’s blooms are a brilliant crimson red. The cardinal flower also wins the size battle with plants growing up to five feet in height while great blue lobelia tends to top out around three feet tall. Both varieties are favorites of pollinators, with bumblebees being a principal visitor to lobelias and hummingbirds attracted to the red nectar vessels of the cardinal flower.
As our current situation has many of us stuck at home or using our new-found free time to tidy up the yard or explore nature, welcoming native plants into your landscape is a way to do both and provide benefits to our native wildlife at the same time.