() - Today we visit with our friends at Shape Your Future to discuss the many ways gardening can fit into any lifestyle.

Our lavender is showing off.

() Then we learn more about the Oklahoma Native Plant Network and visit the Native Plant Nursery to learn about some of their favorites for the Oklahoma Garden.

Underwriting assistance for our program is provided by the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry.

Helping to keep Oklahoma green and growing.

Oklahoma Gardening is also a proud partner with Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

Shape Your Future provides resources for Oklahomans to make the healthy choice the easy choice.

I love sharing with you guys the cool things that plants can do.

We're back here at the Student Farm.

I wanna share with you a tropical plant that you might find in some Oklahoma landscapes.

It's important to know which plants we are dealing with so that we can continue to maintain them successfully for years to come.

Today we're here in the vegetable garden and joining me is Kelsey Nation with Shape Your Future.

Kelsey, thank you so much for being here and I love what Shape Your Future is doing because you guys are promoting how gardening can create a healthy lifestyle, right?

So let's talk a little bit about that and what Shape Your Future's doing.

- Absolutely, well Shape Your Future is a program of TSET, the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

And we really make available resources and information to help Oklahomans make healthy choices and stay active and eat healthy and be tobacco free.

And just right now it's about getting in the garden.

And getting excited about gardening.

- You're speaking my language here.

So let's talk a little bit about the benefits of gardening for all ages, really, right?

- Right, right.

I mean, from kids to adults to people later in their lifetime.

It's really great to get out in the garden.

There is physical activity that you get by being out in the garden.

Being outside is great for mental health and just having that time in the garden to just be with yourself, be with nature, and grow something that you can be proud of and eat.

Be healthy with the things that you're eating too.

- It's sort of my relaxing period.

At the end of the day, I just wanna go out to the garden and kind of decompress a little bit and not have things kind of distracting me.

It's a nice little getaway, isn't it?

Getting on the garden.

- Absolutely.

Right.

- So let's also talk about, you know, how gardening can change with your lifestyle.

I know when I was, you know, single, had kids and that sort of stuff, but it's okay to get your kids involved in that.

- Absolutely.

You know, you can go from apartment gardening to, you know, gardening with your family outside.

Kids love to be in the garden.

It's a great thing to get them involved because they can learn about being active outside.

They can learn about nutrition.

- [Casey] Yeah.

- [Kelsey] And that they can grow their own food and they love having a part in it.

And just that responsibility of, "Hey I did this.

I helped."

- [Casey] Right.

- [Kelsey] To see how things grow.

- And I know my kids have a lot more energy than I do sometimes.

So having open spaces is so important for them to get some of that energy out, right?

- Absolutely.

- Let's talk a little bit about when we get older too, right?

So we're gonna get older.

Our knees might not bend as well.

Our back might not be as well, but there's ways to incorporate gardening also when you get older.

- [Kelsey] Yeah, absolutely.

You know, there's raised beds that people can garden with and the mental health benefits too of when you're older and you're gardening.

Older adults can participate and still have the same benefits of getting outside, spending time.

You know, being with, even if you garden with your friends in a community and get that community aspect too.

And still eating delicious foods that you've grown yourself.

- [Casey] Right.

- You know, it can be a little cheaper as well.

You know, you're not going down and spending all the money on the produce here when you have it right in your backyard.

You can go and pick fresh vegetables and fresh fruit.

- [Casey] And you know how they've been treated.

And so it's kind of like, you know, I think we're all guilty of picking a little bit out in the garden and nibbling on it right there.

It tends to taste better, right?

- [Kelsey] Yes.

- So let's also talk about, you know, getting out into the garden and some of the mental health, but also just the science and the learning that can happen for kids out in the garden as well.

- Yeah.

So kids, you know, they are really great about learning with doing and so getting them outside, getting them into the garden, actually digging and planting and they can see how things are growing and they can learn about the process and where food comes from.

- [Casey] Right.

- [Kelsey] You know, versus just, "Oh well I picked this up at the store."

which is great, but when they see it happening and they've taken part in that, they learn, "Okay, this is where my food comes from."

They can learn about the nutrition facts of it.

They can get recipes and start cooking with the ingredients and just learning about that.

They can take that with them throughout their lives.

- [Casey] I find that they're a little bit more likely to try things if they've grown.

- [Kelsey] Right, yes.

- So I know Shape Your Future has a lot of different resources available.

Can you tell us a little bit about some of those?

- Yeah, we have- - A lot of different resources, you know, for planting vegetables, fruits, things in your garden.

There's information about apartment gardening.

There's information about if you have a home backyard gardening, you know, information about how it doesn't have to be perfect.

(laughs) You know, I mean who has the perfect garden?

- It's an experiment.

- Right.

- Have fun with it.

- Right.

And you know, it could be something small.

It could just be, you know, tomato plant.

- Right.

- You could start with that.

And there's resources about getting recipes from the things that you grow.

- Okay.

- So if you wanna have, you know, fresh vegetables or fruits or things to eat, you can use those in the recipes that we have on our new website feature at shapeyourfutureok.com.

And you can build recipes out, you can build menu plans for the week and it's really great and you can incorporate the things that you've grown in your garden.

- Excellent.

So you're gonna get us all organized for the week and the busy moms at home and things like that.

- Yes.

- So also, I believe there's some activities as well because I know I've put in some coloring sheets and stuff, so.

- Yeah.

There's lots of great activities for kids in the garden too.

There's a scavenger hunt that they can take part in just so that they can come and explore and learn.

- Right.

- And again, it doesn't have to be perfect for them either.

They can just come out here and learn and just to be in the garden and be outside.

And there's coloring sheets like you said, that they can start to learn about the different things that they can grow and they can have a part in and take that ownership and really know what's going on their plates.

And get excited about that too.

- Absolutely.

I love taking my kids out 'cause they actually are looking at it from a different, literally a different perspective, right?

And so they're seeing things that I wouldn't notice.

They're bringing it to my attention.

Sometimes they slow me down and in a good way.

You know, to take advantage and really sink in and absorb everything that they're seeing.

So absolutely.

Let's get the kids, let's get families out.

More people should be gardening.

And I appreciate Shape Your Future and what you guys are doing.

- Thank you so much.

- Thank you.

- [Announcer] For more information about Shape Your Future visit their website.

(energetic music) I just had to show you guys this garden that we built a couple of years ago and if you remember, we put this concrete a block to help kind of build up the soil around our greenhouse and it had a lot of aggregate in it and so we wanted to put something that was drought tolerant and what we ended up doing was taking some cuttings from a province lavender that we had in another bed and we took several cuttings and then planted it a year ago last spring.

So they had one year to grow out.

This is the second year to grow on these lavenders and look how great they look.

They just look absolutely stunning and are doing that job of not only softening the edge of our greenhouse, but of course inviting in a lot of pollinators as well.

Now something about this that we sort of did too to kind of help transition it through that season was earlier in the season we actually had some different alliums planted in here, sputnik and then also universe, some of the larger ornamental allium bulbs.

And then you can see we still have some residual chives that were blooming earlier.

And then we also had chamomile.

So having those ornamental alliums planted and then also the chives and the chamomile made quite a display early on in the season before the lavender really took off.

Now we also have another allium still planted that you can see down in there that is the millennium allium and it's still just now starting to come on.

So it's got buds on there and so it will pick up that display a little bit later.

But what I like about it is all of that foliage got tucked away and kind of hidden in with this lavender.

So you know, one of those things about like what do you do with that foliage after the flowers blooming?

How do you disguise it?

And I think we did a fantastic job with this.

So I just wanted to share with you how this is looking after two years of being planted, it's doing a great job not only highlighting our greenhouse here, but also the pollinators and bees love it as well.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) Today we are joined by Galt Ormiston who is the co-president for the Oklahoma Native Plant Network.

And this is a new organization, but thank you for joining us to talk about it a little bit.

- Absolutely.

Glad to be here and have the opportunity for sure.

- So let's talk about this organization and who it's comprised of.

- Yes.

So really industry professionals that are geared towards native plants and either designing or, or using them in landscape areas, garden spaces, green spaces.

So we're really foundationally trying to promote the use of, of native plants and have several educational resources that we try to do that with.

- And, and native plants have always had, you know, the one table at your traditional nursery, but y'all are really trying to make it more mainstream, right?

- We are, we are, we feel like this is a great opportunity.

There's a lot more excitement around native plants more so than, than before.

We've always kind of been here, you know, but now it's, it's time to, I guess get a little more vocal and start to work on some of the branding towards native plants in the Oklahoma area in particular.

- Okay, so you're comprised of a lot of growers and some nurseries and then also some homeowners.

I mean, anybody can be a part of this group?

- Yes, anyone can be a member, but we do have kind of levels and tiers.

So we're trying to use this organization as a network for business to business, but ultimately the information that we produce and the events that we have are for public consumption.

- Okay.

- But say in a regular meeting, we're probably only going to have people that are in the business or in the industry, and it kind of relates to native plants.

- All right, so let's talk about some of the educational components that you're putting out there and the branding for native plants.

I hear you got some plant tags that are going out.

- We do.

We've got a special plant tag program.

So our organization has come up with what we see as the metrics of what we'll consider as a native plant, how it's produced, the size and the species.

- Okay.

- So we came up with a list our first year, which was last year of 10 plants.

And then this year we came up with five more.

And so built special tags for those 15 plants.

And if you're a member of our organization and you're kind of been approved, then you'll have access to those plant tags.

And so as consumers are out at nurseries that participate within our organization, they'll see these plant tags and know they've been specially approved.

- [Interviewer] Right, right.

And so there's no second guessing to it, you know that it's something that is native, and grown in a native friendly way, right?

- Correct, yeah, absolutely.

So no neonicotinoids, did I say that right?

In particular at the top of the list.

And you know, I think the the fundamental question everyone was what is undeniably native?

And we had a lot of plants that we looked at.

- I bet those were fun discussions.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

It took a while, you know, and it seems like 15 plants is maybe not a a whole lot, but this is our second season and as we build upon that, look down the road five, 10 years from now we'll have a much larger collection.

But again, ones that we've really thought through and feel like they're important for this area.

- And one of the big things y'all are about is trying to make native plants more accessible to the average person, right.

So I assume there's resources on your website and events that you're having as well.

- Yes, thanks.

And our website is onpn.org.

- Okay.

- That has all of our information.

There's a few key dates that we're gonna have.

July 25th, we'll have a professional workshop, and that's at the OSU Botanical Gardens.

- Okay.

- That's on a Thursday.

And then September 28th is our fall fest.

We did it last year.

We had a great rollout.

There was like a thousand guests.

Everyone was just floored.

This past spring, we had an event in Norman at the Stash.

Had over 3000 visitors.

A lot of the same audience that came to our fall show, so they came to our spring.

We're hoping that fall's gonna be even bigger, so September 28th and yeah.

- And are those educational as well as plant sales?

We can buy some plants there too?

- Yeah, and they'll have some goodies as well, so some edible kind of like foods and things like that.

But yeah, mostly plants.

And then we will have, I think, five or six speakers.

- Okay.

- You know, so they'll talk, a little bit about everything.

- Alright.

Well I know other states have programs like this and you guys were really wanting to create something for Oklahoma, right?

- Yes, yeah.

And it's a long process and there's a lot of ground to cover.

And so trying to keep it concise as I was saying earlier, is kind of our key focus.

Like what makes sense for us to put our time and resources into that can make a big difference, a big impact.

All of us are working within the industry, you know, so these aren't, retired homeowners, hobbyists, enthusiasts, although they kind of are as well, right.

- [Interviewer] Right, right.

- [Dalton] I mean, everybody loves the native plants.

And so trying to come up with pertinent material that we can put out there, we can focus our time on, is really the highest important part.

- Well, and on the industry side of things, I know sometimes that can be a gap between what designers want and the availability of plants.

So the fact that designers and nursery men are also working together to provide that for homeowners is kind of a cool thing.

- Yeah, absolutely, and that's a big part of why we wanted to put the group together is really just sourcing materials.

You know, so designers that love native plants want to be able to spec their plants on their designs, obviously.

And that's part of it.

And that's great.

But having the suppliers and the producers and the growers that are actually here, that have those plants available, it's a whole nother thing.

- Yeah.

- So, yeah, marrying those two, I guess, ideas and coming up with some good solutions are things we're trying to work with.

- That's fantastic.

Thank you so much for sharing this with us Dalton.

- Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you.

(happy music) (happy music) - Today we're here at the native plant nursery in downtown Oklahoma City.

And joining me is owner Brian Pever.

Brian, thank you so much for inviting us down here.

It's a beautiful nursery you have set up here.

- Thank you very much.

- So you've been here about two years - Right.

- And you've got some kind of display garden spaces.

Tell us a little bit about those.

- Right, right.

So as we come through the entrance, we've got what I like to call as Graminoid Trail.

And it's a space that highlights grass and grass-like plants that are shade tolerant, mostly because we're underneath the canopy of Eastern red buds.

The concept of shade-with tolerant grasses.

- [Interviewer] I've heard of, I thought.

- I know.

So I'm fascinated with this concept.

- [Landscaper] So I thought it'd be cool to build a display garden.

So that's where the nursery sets up, as one would make entry, go to the left, go meander through graminoid trail, and work your way into the wood stems, around in the pergola area behind us, and then everything on the other side of the nursery would be flowering, herbaceous perennials.

- Okay, and that just goes to show the wide range of native plants and how they can be used in the landscape, right?

- Right, right.

- So let's get into some of the native plants, and I've asked you for your favorites, so.

- Okay.

- Let's, you pulled a few.

(Host laughing) - Right, yes, I know, yeah, it's hard to do because, you know, I would select just about five of everything that we have.

So, what we have here is, if you think of landscaping, say your front yard, or any foundation bed that's like a rectangular space, it's super common, we would work in layers, I like to think of it as in layers, and I keep it pretty much as simple as possible, small, medium, large.

- Uh-huh.

- So, small plants, ground cover, and I love working with warm season grasses, such as Bouteloua gracilis, it's Blue Grama.

- [Host] Yeah.

- [Landscaper] This is basically full grown, so this is at maturity, so it makes a really, really nice, long alternative.

- [Host] Okay.

- [Landscaper] And it's very, very drought tolerant.

I like to plant very dense, so I say often that the biggest difference between traditional landscaping and working with natives is the density.

- Okay.

- It's density that we're after, which essentially, your plants are doing the work of a living mulch.

- Okay.

- So the inputs for mulch, the inputs for fertilization, and even watering and minimal maintenance, we can reduce all of that by planting densely.

- And you're reducing that space where seeds could pop up.

- That's right.

- They could germinate.

- Yeah.

- You know, different- - Right.

- Non-appropriate seeds, right?

- Right, where there's exposed earth- - Yes.

- Yeah, is where you're gonna find that a seed will germinate.

- Right, right.

- So, I love working with grasses that are about this size, so this is the perfect grass in a warm season growth pattern.

So, full sun, it's gotta have, it does not tolerate wet soil.

- Mhm.

- [Landscaper] Or wet feet.

It's gotta be well drained, and it actually prefers pore soil.

- [Host] Okay.

- So I will put, you know, you could work with Blue Grama in about a one foot spacing.

- [Host] Okay.

- And in between those one foot gaps, Frog Fruit would be a perfect candidate to use as a creeping ground cover.

- Uh-huh.

- It's flowering, it trellises around, it kinda just meanders, so, it's a host plant to three species of butterfly.

- Oh, wow.

- [Landscaper] So, it's Oklahoma native, it checks all the boxes.

It's very, very adaptable- - [Host] It's got a little fruit on it later on, right?

- [Landscaper] Yes, this is, they're just beautiful.

So- - Yeah.

- All of these plants also work well in planters.

- Okay.

- So elevated planters, all of them will do just, they'll thrive.

- And I love that, around the nursery you do have some planters on display, because I think, and even some raised beds.

- Yeah.

- [Host] Because I think we tend to think native being in the soil.

- [Landscaper] Right.

- [Host] But you can really do it in your traditional.

- [Landscaper] You truly can, and I would encourage it too, because, you know, not everybody has a plot of land, or you don't need a plot of land, for sure.

- Mhm.

- [Landscaper] To make a difference, in terms of landscaping for wildlife, making a difference ecologically.

Ecologically-producing plants are really what we're doing.

- Right.

- [Landscaper] We're landscaping for wildlife.

- [Host] Right.

- So, if you're in an apartment, say, you have a balcony, planters, just a terracotta planter, you know, 10 inch, you could put three or four species of plants in there, and the wildlife will absolutely thank you.

- If you build it, they will come.

- Right, that's so true.

- And I recognize this one, this is the Wine Cups- - Yeah.

- Which is a showstopper right now.

- It is showing off in the display bed behind us, and this is another candidate that I would, I often do, I use it all the time, in between a grass, or even this next plant, which is, it's a grass-like plant, it's Carex.

- Okay.

- It's a Sedge, this one happens to be one of my favorites, it's super adaptable, I've used it in full sun, full shade, wet sites, mesic soils, dry soils, rich soil, it doesn't really, it's super adaptable.

- So if you're thinking you can't grow one, try this.

- Yes, absolutely.

And it's kind of this, it will grow and you'll have your inflorescent seed head in the spring, that looks almost like a burr.

- Okay.

- But, it's beneficial for wildlife, basically songbirds will pluck the seeds.

- Okay.

- It's really cool to see.

- So, again, I will plant this one on about a foot, foot and a half center.

- Mhm.

- And then hit the gaps with your ground covers.

- Okay.

- And, I think diversity, the more species that you can put together is gonna be beneficial.

- All right.

- Absolutely.

- And we've got some bigger ones behind us, then- - Bigger ones, right.

- So we've got your ground covers, you got some mid levels- - Right.

- And then some.

- So, yeah, then, you know, back to the layers, when you can think of your landscape as in a layer.

- Uh-huh.

- [Landscaper] We create a base layer, or a matrix.

- Okay.

- [Landscaper] With our ground covers, which would be dense, and then eventually all the earth, the bare earth in between plants, will be occupied.

- Mhm.

- [Landscaper] Which will limit your.

- [Host] It reduces the space for the competition.

- The weed pressure.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

- Absolutely.

I really enjoy working with mid range, three to four foot size.

- [Brian] Warm season grasses, like switchgrass, and I use these as a substitute for the concept of a foundation shrub, like a boxwood.

- [Casey] Oh, yeah.

- I will put these on about a three-foot center, linear if you're only working within a limited space, but if you're wanting to divide your bed, if you had the rectangular space, you could line these switchgrass on a three-foot center, say, and just do a little S-curve right along the middle.

And therefore, once you do that, you're then introducing new pockets of areas where you can do lower plants.

- So that sort of gives you your structure a little bit into that.

- Absolutely, for sure.

- So I know some designers kind of design with different percentages in mind, whether it's evergreens versus, you know, just herbaceous.

Do you have a percentage of plants that you use?

- Yeah, so a as it turns out, after I've looked at, you know, case study of case study of all of the gardens that I've installed, 75 to even 80% of the design is grass or grass-like plants, which sounds like a lot, and it kind of is, but if you're thinking of it in terms of mulch replacement, you need it to be dense.

So 75 to 80% of an entire design of a meadow, that if I'm gonna do a meadow design, it will be a grass or grass-like.

Carex, I love working with carex.

And then the others will have a small percentage of, would be, say, like a wood-stemmed shrub, like this leadplant.

And probably 5% of the garden would comprise of wood stems, and the rest would be herbaceous, flowering type perennials.

- Okay, and a lot of those flowers are gonna change, right?

- Right.

- You start out with one, and you end with another by the fall.

- That's so true.

We've got rattlesnake master - Rattlesnake, yeah.

- and a few others that are rally gonna be showing off this summer.

- Well, Brian, I know you've got a lot more plants and I know it's hard to pick just your favorites.

- Yeah.

- But thank you so much for sharing this with us today.

- You're welcome.

Thank you.

(lively music) - [Announcer] There are a lot of great horticulture activities this time of year.

Be sure and consider some of these events in the weeks ahead.

(lively music) (lively music continues) Join us next week on "Oklahoma Gardening" as we continue looking at native plants in the home landscape.

(lively music) Ambient rain noise in the background.

(lively music) Millennial allium that's planted, millennium.

Shoot.

- [Kids] We love gardening.

(lively music) - [Announcer] To find out more information about show topics as well as recipes, videos, articles, fact sheets, and other resources, including a directory of Local Extension Offices, be sure to visit our website at oklahomagardening.okstate.edu.

(lively music) Join in on Facebook and Instagram.

(lively music) You can find this entire show and other recent shows, as well as individual segments on our "Oklahoma Gardening" YouTube channel.

Tune in to our OKGardeningClassics YouTube channel to watch segments from previous hosts.

(lively music) "Oklahoma Gardening" is produced by the Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service as part of the Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources at Oklahoma State University.

The Botanic Garden at OSU is home to our studio gardens, and we encourage you to come visit this beautiful Stillwater gem.

We would like to thank our generous underwriters, the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry, and Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

Additional support is also provided by Greenleaf Nursery and the Garden Debut Plants, the Oklahoma Horticulture Society, the Tulsa Garden Club, and the Tulsa Garden Center.

(lively music) (lively music fades)