- Howdy, I'm John Hart Asher.

This week on Central Texas Gardener, see how new Braunfels gardeners, Kathleen and Denny Scott created a native plant garden that came with deer and HOA rules.

Andrea DeLong-Amaya from the Wildflower Center shows how to layer plants for wildlife and garden beauty in all seasons.

Daphne Richards answers your questions, plus see how to extend your fall vegetable garden season with Scott Blackburn, so let's get growing right here, right now.

- [Narrator] Central Texas Gardener is made possible by the generous support from Lisa and Desi Rhoden, thank you.

(bright music) - Kathleen and Denny Scott's new house in New Braunfels came with deer and HOA rules for a percentage of lawn.

Now to plant habitat for pollinators and birds, they ring the yard with native trees and plants that provide successional blooming.

In the unfenced front yard, they went for deer resistant perennials and grasses.

- I think planting habitat is so important because in today's world, there isn't as much habitat and if we want butterflies and bees and hummingbirds and birds, we have to give them a place to breed and a place to eat and a place to shelter.

Hi, I'm Kathleen Scott and my husband and I started this garden from scratch.

There was nothing but Bermuda grass.

I needed to live by the HOA requirements, which are very stringent for lawns where I live, 75% front yard, 50% backyard.

Therefore, what I did was I ringed my house with beds and I ringed the outside of the yard in a horseshoe from the front with the beds and the first thing we did was take up the Bermuda grass.

This sod was new enough that we could rip it up in sections, and so we ripped it all up and then we sprayed some nutrients on it, put compost on it, covered it with cardboard everywhere and then we put mulch over that.

In October of 2021, we could begin to plant and we were planting a lot of four inch plants because it's except pickax to dig in this soil.

The native soil here was limestone and then because there had been a cedar forest, there was actual real clay soil, but it was soil over it.

Unfortunately, all of that was scraped away and red clay was brought in from someplace else and there were streaks of builders caliche, which was laid down so that they could drive their machines on it.

All of that hard summer was really hard on new plants because they're putting their feet into clay and caliche.

But native plants, oh man, you plant them right and they will grow by themselves pretty much.

Plant it where it wants to go.

That's 99% of success.

So what kind of sun?

What kind of water?

What kind of soil?

And where I live, do deer eat it?

I'm primarily working to provide habitat for hummingbirds, birds, butterflies, and new to me in this garden for bees.

For butterflies, I need host plants.

Those are the plants where the butterflies lay their eggs and the caterpillars eat and then you need to have nectar plants.

For instance, we have a ground cover called frog fruit.

It goes the entire length of one side of the house.

And frog fruit is a host plant to three little bitty butterflies and a nectar plant for many months to a whole range of little tiny bitty bees.

I made a point of planting plants that would bloom from early spring through late fall.

I mean, my real goal is year round, but I only have one year round bloomer, and that's four nerve daisy.

I have never had anyone say, oh, I don't want hummingbirds in my yard.

What people really wanna know is how do I get hummingbirds in my yard?

So the first thing is the hummingbirds migrate here in March.

The first ones to arrive are the black chin hummingbirds.

All in all in this garden, there are between 20 and 30 hummingbird plants.

On the back fence, I started with vines.

I have crossvine, which is very vigorous and it will cover the whole of the back fence eventually, but I also have some other things to grow up.

Kidney wood, which is a great native tree, I have in front of those ground covers, primarily snake herb and winecup.

There's a small possumhaw holly, and there are a whole lot of tropical sages and by the way, those were volunteers and they reseeded themselves all over the yard.

So some people might look at that and say, well, by the time you get that many, it's a weed, but the hummingbirds didn't think so and when the goldfinches came for the seeds, they didn't think so either.

In the middle of the garden in the back, there are layers.

In the front of it is a seed bed with biannual standing cypress, which is a great hummingbird plant.

Then behind it there are red yuccas, which put up bloom stalks for the hummingbirds.

Behind that is a flowering senna, which will come up and be taller and make a little accent there so there'll be some balance.

Next to that, I planted an experiment.

I've never had maximilian sunflower before.

The books say it gets six to eight feet tall.

I did not know that if you put it on drip, it actually gets to 15 feet tall and will overgrow anything next to it, which is a tall golden rod.

I will tell you that when they bloom in October, it is glorious and there are bees and butterflies and gold finches, and you will have the habitat plant of your dreams if you have a lot of space.

So the birds will then come from the preserve and spend more time in my garden.

I have senna Lindheimeri, which the common name is Lindheimer senna.

I have Lindheimer's Morning Glory, which has blue flowers and a fragrance, and they're beautiful, it's a lovely vine.

And then I have woolly ironweed, which is vernonia lindheimeri, and it's a bee plant, which is very drought tolerant, also recedes readily and has lovely fuzzy purple blooms for a long period in the summer.

And in that bed then, that's where the green milkweed is for the monarchs and other butterfly plants.

Moving up through the bed, there's Mexican mint marigold, which I like to cook with.

I have an herb garden in pots, so this is kind of an extension for that, but the butterflies like it and the bees like it when it blooms.

And next to that is the Greg's blue mist flower.

And then there is rock rose, which is a native hibiscus.

Then I have the four nerve daisies and some small grasses.

I have eyebrow grasses.

I'm not sure which kind of grama grass that is, but I also have side oaks grama and both of those are host plants to several kinds of butterflies.

I have a few non-native plants because they mean something to me.

I have some hardy hibiscus.

I spent two decades in Florida.

We had tropical hibiscus and I loved them and it was a big part of my life.

So I have hardy hibiscus.

They come back every year.

And then I have my grandmother's day lilies.

These are direct descendants from her day lilies from San Marcos that the purists call them ditch lilies.

One of my favorite things is we had raised beds built onto the house to look like the house tall so they would cover up the foundation and I put in those a plant that I hoped would be evergreen and attract the bees and it's turned into my favorite plant of the year.

It's white mistflower because it attracts bees like nothing I've ever seen, not just bees, I have 50 queen butterflies on it the other day and monarchs and skippers and buckeyes and I don't even know all the kinds of bees and moths.

If you plant a pollinator garden for yourself, you will have joy.

You will have flowers nine months a year because you're planting from spring to fall.

You will have beauty, you will have a life you didn't have otherwise.

- Well, Kathleen and Diddy did a great job of time sharing plants.

To learn more about plant partnerships, let's welcome Andrea DeLong-Amaya, Director of Horticulture at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.

Andrea, great to see you again.

- Hi, great to see you, John Hart.

- So tell us about this concept of time sharing plants.

You're not selling me a condo in Orlando, right?

- Well, maybe, but in terms of horticulture, it's a really useful tool.

So at the Wildflower Center, we're just using native plants so we don't have that luxury of switching out and doing pansies for the winter, for example.

So we're using native plants at different seasons.

So we'll have a cool season species that does its thing in the winter and spring, and when then it goes down, we will have some warm season species so that we have something going on all the time.

- Okay, so in ecology, that's succession.

So that's plant communities changing over time, but this is really more about a seasonal approach.

- It's a seasonal succession.

- So seasonal succession.

So what are the benefits or why do we want to consider time sharing plants?

- Yeah, I think it's really important so that you don't just have bare dirt.

It makes it prettier green, more green, but also in terms of habitat, you can really maximize the amount of flowers that you can have available for pollinators, for example, or other insects that might be using the plants for other purposes.

- So when you're doing this, you're really thinking more in terms of plant communities, not just a singular sort of like you're saying with pansies or something where it's mainly like a feature.

You're thinking about something that's changing over time.

So does time sharing really require some plant knowledge?

I mean, it seems like you probably want to know a little bit about your plant identification.

- That's a good point.

It's good to know what seasons the plants are actively growing in.

So for example, a classic combination that we use would be wine cups that have evergreen foliage in the wintertime.

They bloom gorgeous in the spring and then they kind of go dormant in the summer and they don't look that great.

So then what we do is we can throw over on top of that, throw some seed down for the annual partridge pea, which is a summer bloomer.

It's very fast and it grows and kind of fills in the bare spots where the wine cup would've been not looking like much.

- So with time sharing, you're really also talking a bit more about the herbaceous component than woody species, correct.

- 'Cause woody plants generally have a...

They have some form, even if they're not evergreen, they still have form to look at.

You might still wanna have some ground cover underneath them also so that could apply somewhat there too, but really I'm thinking more like with the herbaceous layer where you really... On the off season, there's just nothing there.

- And then with these species, this gives you a chance to really kind of... We talked about plant ID, but to probably increase your skills as a gardener 'cause you're not thinking of it more as sort of a static flowerbed per se, but it's more of a dynamic component that's changing and providing you with some visual cues throughout the year.

- And it's a lot more entertaining to be able to see the butterflies or the bees coming at all different times and a longer period of time.

- What about the benefit to wildlife?

I mean time sharing, seems like it's really gonna help in terms of habitat potential for your landscape.

- Absolutely, so that you don't have just long periods of time where there's this mulch on the ground.

You can have something that's green and growing.

That might be food for caterpillars.

It might be if it's flowering, it might be flowering for pollinators, for example.

- So what I really like about this too though is is it doesn't necessarily mean that you have to change out all the time because some of those dormant materials can provide nesting material for birds or other critters.

I know that some of these also provide overwintering habitat like we mentioned for insects, which is really important.

But also what you see above ground really tells you about how healthy your soils are as well.

So ensuring that you have different plants in there means that you're really improving that soil.

- Sure, there's more diversity.

I think a lot of times when people are gardening, they think they've planted one plant that they're done, but just knowing that there are different things that are happening at different seasons.

Even if you don't see what's happening, if it's the roots underground even.

- So let's talk about a few examples for sun.

I know people want to talk about, okay, we've got the concept, we're into this.

What are some actual species that you would recommend that you think are great time share species?

- Well I love wine cups, so it's really helpful to have something like the partridge pea to help with the summer in the winecups.

Another one that I really like for Sun is using Lantana because they're actively growing during the warm season, but then they're dormant in the winter time.

So using something like pink evening primrose is kind of nice because it's very vigorous and tough and can kind of take its own with the Lantana.

Or if you're a little worried about the vigorous nature of the pink evening primrose, you might use something a little softer, like Texas bluebonnets or something that will be growing in the winter time and then bloom in the spring.

- And the pink evening primrose, it can be a little aggressive times, but you can eat it, right?

- That's right, if it's too much, just rip it out and throw it in your salad.

- Well, and with wine cups, I want to be clear too, there's annual and there's that perennial, you're referring to the perennial.

And then what about... We talked about full sun, shady, I've got a garden, I got big trees or whatever, got a lot of shade, can't grow anything, what are some of my options?

- One option that I really like to use is scarlet sage, the tropical sage, it's so pretty in the summertime.

Long bloom period.

Great for attracting hummingbirds, but it's either an annual to a short-lived perennial, it goes dormant in the wintertime.

So in a shady spot, I like to put down something like baby blue eyes, which is another winter annual that has beautiful evergreen rosettes in the wintertime, blooms in early spring, but it's done around the same time that the Scarlet sage would start to get going again.

And so you always have something going on.

- But the scarlet sage, what I think is really nice too is that it tends to reseed itself at least I see.

I mean, it's not something you have to...

Even though it's annual, you put it in and then it's done.

But I've really noticed that it'll start popping up kind of all over.

- And I think that's great for both of those species.

I'm sorry, the baby blue eyes and the scarlet sage will both reseed as long as you're not mulching too heavily.

Mulch is good, but it'll inhibit germination.

- We'll talk about some more robust shrubby plants for sun, like Texas Lantana might be one there and then for shade, we've got wax mallow or Turk's cap that are pretty good as well.

- So for a sunny spot, if you have Lantana in the summertime, so it blooms really lovely all summer, and then in the wintertime it goes dormant and that would be a good time to use something like the pink evening primrose or maybe some Texas blue bonnet.

If you have a shadier area, Turks cap or wax mallow, same plant, two different names, that's another beautiful just workhorse in the garden.

It looks great in a shady spot, but it goes dormant in the wintertime, so it's good to have something underneath it.

One of my favorites is a classic combination that you see in the wild would be giant spiderwort.

And it has a nice kind of evergreen daylily-like foliage through the winter.

Bolts in the spring, bloom's really lovely.

Lots of pollinators, but then it completely melts in May and disappears and you think, oh, it's all dead, but then the wax mallow will be there to take over.

- And then with the spiderworts, those can spread as well, but the good news is is they won't be around for the whole year, like you were saying and then I found that those are really easy to transplant as well.

So if they're doing really well in some space and you want them to move over there, it's pretty easy to sort of dig those up and transplant and then I know with the Turks have, again, another edible plant, you can use the flower or even the fruit and salads.

- They don't taste like much, but they're pretty.

- Well, you gotta have a good looking salad from time to time.

- You can eat the spiderworts too.

- To plug more into this sort of habitat vein here, I mean the three big things that we need to have in our gardens are food, shelter, and water.

And this time sharing approach seems to lend itself to really helping us provide two of those main items.

- Yeah, absolutely, you'll have habitat, the structure of the plants themselves instead of just having bare space.

That gives habitat for creatures.

And then of course food in the flowers or sometimes the fruit will be eaten by different animals too.

- And for gardeners, I think, there's sources like Doug Tallamy, Nature's Best Hope.

There's really a lot of people who are pushing... Are using your yard as a means to really recapture that habitat that's sort of just really dissolving in the wild, unfortunately.

And here in Texas it's important, because over 97% of our lands are private.

So this time sharing concept really allows you to plug into that and provide some of that, again, that dynamic approach, but also providing much needed habitat for some of these species.

I know that people would say, well, where am I gonna source this stuff and you've gotta answer for us, because when is the native plant sale occurring this fall?

- So come see us at the Wildflower Center.

We have our fall plant sale starting at the end of September to the 29th, and it goes for five weekends through October 29th, the weekend of that... And the first weekend will be for members only and the sale will be open Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from nine to one and we will have a great selection of native plants for people to buy, it'll be really a lot of fun.

It also hits right in line with Native Plant week in October.

- Well, that's great.

Well, Andrea, I wanna thank you so much for coming on set.

It's been a while.

It's great to see you.

Now let's check in with Daphne Richards.

- Hi, I'm Daphne Richards and this is Augie.

We often get questions about what exactly makes a plant native and how is this different from a plant that's adapted?

Native plants are known to grow naturally in a certain region, and so they should do well when planted in landscapes in that region.

And adaptive plants are native to regions with a similar climate so they've been shown to do well in an area even though they aren't found in nature there.

It's also very easy to be confused by the terms variety, cultivar and hybrid.

Think of varieties as naturally occurring variations and cultivars as variations that come about due to human intervention such as cross-breeding and hand pollinating.

When you see the abbreviation VAR period such as Anisacanthus quadrifidus VAR.

rightii, you'll know that plant's a variety.

And the common way to indicate a cultivar is to include its specific cultivar name in single quotes such as Salvia farinacea Henry Duelberg.

The most important reason to use a plant's full scientific name correctly is to make sure that you get the exact plant you're looking for.

The term hybrid is often used to indicate that a plant is sterile due to cross-breeding between two different but closely related species, but can also be used to simply convey that this cross-breeding has occurred naturally due to an exchange of pollen in the wild.

And these plants named often include the letter X as in Salvia X. Indigo Spires.

If you're still confused, you're not alone.

I have two degrees in plant science and plant nomenclature stills scrambles my brain.

Perhaps more important than knowing whether a plant is a variety, a cultivar or a hybrid is to understand what type of soil it prefers, how much water and light it needs, how big it's going to get, and how sensitive it is to cold, heat and intense sunlight.

And just because a plant's native to a particular region or ecosystem doesn't mean it's suitable for every garden in that region.

Be sure to check out what's tagged as invasive in your state at the USDA's National Invasive Species Information Center website.

We'd love to hear from you.

Click on centraltexasgardeners.org to send us your stories, pictures, and videos.

- Now let's head over to Scott Blackburn for fall vegetable tips.

- Hey, I'm Scott Blackburn, and today I'm gonna show you how to extend the growing season for your fall vegetable garden.

Let's start off with talking about some of the things we can plant.

There's a lot of leafy greens that we can start right now, some herbs and some flowers.

One of the things that I like to do is start my seeds outside.

We can do that this time of year as conditions aren't necessarily too warm or too cold.

And if you don't have a seed starting set up, I find this to be highly accessible because you don't need the grow lights, the fans, the timers and things of that nature, but you will need a few items such as a multi-cell seed tray like this, and you wanna make sure it has a bottom, a saucer that can hold water, but you can also use some small containers like these six cell seed starting cells and you could just as easily use something that you've already got in your garden, reuse that you got from the nursery.

You're gonna need a high quality seed starting mix that's gonna be important for supplying enough nutrition as you get your seed started.

If you're gonna do this outside, it's important to choose an area with full sun, ideally with morning light and some afternoon shade, but six to eight hours of full sun is ideal.

You don't wanna have some leggy seedling stretching for light.

Once you've got your seeds planted in your containers, then you'll need to keep them moist until they germinate.

You can use a pressurized sprayer like this, or you can use a simple spray bottle that you might have on hand and to help you keep that seed tray moist until they germinate, you can use a plastic dome or something similar like this.

You'll just set it on top and that's gonna help to hold in moisture while you're away at work.

As soon as your seeds germinate, you want to remove that and then you're gonna begin bottom watering your seed trays to keep them going.

That's why this trays is so important.

I use a watering can like this, and I usually remove the rosette here.

You don't need that.

And I'll check all my seedlings about twice a day, fill it up maybe halfway, usually adding water in the morning and then in the evening, draining off the excess moisture.

So there are a lot of things that we can grow in the garden right now, and many of them we can plant from seed, but I wanna point out brassicas such as broccoli, collard greens and Brussels sprouts, if you're that bold, are gonna be best planted from transplants.

Those have already been started from seed long ago, and that translates to when we can expect a harvest for those vegetables.

So don't plant those from seed right now, get you some start at a local nursery and you can get a fall harvest.

One of my favorite products to use in the garden is liquid seaweed.

This is great as a preconditioning technique, and it really can help your plants to endure elements such as heat and stress, and it encourages really well developed roots.

I find it to be essential for helping to establish new plantings in the fall, as well as for getting some seed starting.

It can translate to increased germination and overall more vigorous plants.

If we're really gonna keep cruising through this growing season, we need to be ready to ride the rollercoaster known as central Texas weather and that's why I like to employ low tunnel hoop structures to protect my plants during periods of heat and cold.

We can use some different materials for this.

The one we usually go to is some row cover or frost cloth like this.

It does come in different grades.

Most of the ones that you'll find prepackaged offer six to eight degrees of insulation, but you can get a more heavy duty row cover out there and that can protect your crops by 10 degrees.

Row cover works by trapping ground heat that accumulates throughout the day.

There are some boundaries to this overnight.

Some of that heat is gonna escape, and depending on the length and duration of the cold weather, the windshields, it will vary in terms of how successful you are.

But that's a really great method for growing a lot of food well into the season.

The other material that we can utilize to extend the growing season is shade cloth.

I recommend a 40% grade.

This allows enough lights for plants to grow while shielding them from periods of warm spells.

We do get that going into the fall, and that's gonna be really important for crops like lettuce or spinach because they can be triggered to bolt if the soil temperature gets too warm.

For Backyard Basics, I'm Scott Blackburn.

You can grow your own food, keep it organic.

- Find out more, and watch online at centraltexasgardener.org.

Until next time, remember to adopt the pace of nature.

Her secret is patience.

(bright music) - [Narrator] Central Texas Gardener is made possible by the generous support from Lisa and Desi Rhoden, thank you.