Please note that an index with links to all of our Old-Timey Plant articles appears at the bottom of this page.

 
Native Perennials for Your Garden
Eleanor Dietrich - Plant Sale Committee

By the end of February, we gardeners are itching to get back to digging in the dirt. Here in South Georgia and North Florida, we are fortunate to have a beautiful spring that greets us much earlier than it does our friends north of us. We are also fortunate to have a large selection of beautiful native flowers that bloom in early spring.

Galangal Most wildflowers are perennial, so they will be ready to bloom in your garden without you having to plant and wait for them every year. It just so happens (nature has worked things out over millions of years) that some particular native perennials open just in time to greet the returning hummingbirds, ready for sustenance after their long flight across the gulf and finding our area early on their trek. You can put some of these plants in your garden and double your pleasure - flowers and hummingbirds at the same time!

Galangal Columbine is one of the elite spring native perennials. It forms mounds of lovely lacy leaves and when the winter is mild, it can begin blooming as early as late January, continuing on through April. It reseeds easily, ensuring plants in your garden year after year. The bright red and yellow blossoms are easily found by hummingbirds, and their shape is just right for them to get the nectar easily.

Galangal Indian Pink blooms a little later than Columbine, ensuring continuing blooms for the hummingbirds. It has very striking red and yellow tubular flowers as well. In addition to Columbine and Indian Pink, there are many other early bloomers you will enjoy having in your garden.

Woodland Phlox (top) can also bloom very early in a mild winter and it will continue to courteously spread so that you can have a whole carpet of their lovely lavender flower.

Galangal Bloodroot will also slowly spread so that its very white blooms will light up your garden. Rue anemone is a very sweet and delicate little plant with pretty white flowers and it will bloom for a couple of months.

So visit the Birdsong plant sale on March 16, 2019, and stock up with these special plants that will grace your garden for years to come.

Pictured above: Woodland Phlox, Columbine, Indian Pink, Blood Root.

Birdsong's Old-Timey Plant Sale is March 21, 2020.
~ ~ ~

Listed below are all of the "Old Timey Plant" articles. We will be adding to the list so please check back here again!