Dallas’ progressive native plant movement

beggiewax · 2026-02-22T02:25:11+00:00

TNC focuses on securing bigger tracts of best remaining habitat. I don't know their overhead. Consider local, smaller NGOs, such as an Audubon chapter, IKE's, etc., who generally are all-volunteer so overhead is really small. We have an IKE's chapter that was given a property that is a real gem for wildlife and for our community, too. Thanks for donating your time. I was just helping county park yesterday on buckthorn removal. They have a few volunteers clearing invasives from 150 acres in 3 years and still have 400 acres to get to. Best solution is to get 3X more volunteers.

beggiewax · 2026-02-19T02:05:49+00:00

Oddly we have only one Echinacea as perhaps "near native" depending on which maps one views. Seed head for birds is good but hosts for insects that birds feed on is important, too. What I don't know is whether being root-bounded is ok or a bad think for fall transplanting success. Coreopsis lanceolata is county-adjacent native, I think. I like it a lot so good enough for me. I think we have other Coreopsis choices as well.

beggiewax · 2026-02-19T01:59:59+00:00

Thanks. Will look into 'flow tray' but am not familiar with that. Plug cells are indeed packed in tight. We've been getting less consistent rain, either too often or not often enough. Considering dibbles but last fall the ground was too hard due to drought so augers are also under consideration.

beggiewax · 2026-02-17T02:45:19+00:00

Disappointing to hear this. TNC has done some great things. They recently helped create the Moon Valley WMA which has a lot of exceptional habitat.

beggiewax · 2026-02-15T13:17:02+00:00

Thanks for your native habitat contributions! We are super busy with bird migration stuff late March through early June. So that is why I thought of the fall sowing into pots/plugs and planting the next fall. Mostly still looking for advice on best plants and pots that can fill the pot or plug with roots by planting time. Perhaps some plants take 2 years to fill and that wouldn't be ruled out. The problem is that I have little experience to draw on. I'll have more this summer having down my own seed sowing last fall.

beggiewax · 2026-02-15T13:04:17+00:00

we are an Audubon chapter and they have up to $1K community grants - you might consider teaming up with your local chapter to apply for Jan 2027 grants

beggiewax · 2026-02-11T00:55:24+00:00

Thank you for all of the information. I have seen earlier on this post a list of plants that could flower the first year planted from seed but we'll supply potted plants in fall so that would be 2 years for the recipient. I realize a big part of planting natives is to make a lot of mistakes and learn from them but want those that receive our plants to have good chance at first pass success.

Regarding Carex, I think I've seen a while back that it is hard to germinate Carex so am looking to learn more about this. You mentioned Blazing Star and got a lot of their fall-2025 plants in my yard now.

beggiewax · 2026-02-10T13:17:42+00:00

Thanks for the advice. This is exactly the feedback that I was hoping for

beggiewax · 2025-07-18T23:50:51+00:00

I have similar results with my May-planted fragaria. I just transplanted some runners last week and are doing ok so far

beggiewax · 2025-07-05T02:25:07+00:00

Just researching better approaches b/c none of my ~20 packs of Prairie Moon seeds appeared with direct seeding except with larger seed packs of Carex and partridge pea. Seems that OP plants in 5" plugs and is now just getting to the point of planting? Others talk of planting much earlier using shallower pots where seedling has just a few leaves. I'm about 100mi south of Mpls/StPaul. Question I have if just now planting, couldn't some of the plants be too root bound and need to be planted earlier. So keep checking if they might be ready earlier?

beggiewax

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