Tucker House (photo courtesy David Creech)

Of course it doesn’t hurt that it’s being held in the beautiful Pineywoods of East Texas on the Stephen F. Austin State University Campus in Nacogdoches. The conference begins with registration on June 2 and ends with dinner and a Forensic Botany lecture by botanist Barney Lipscomb on June 5. Packed between the two are a wide variety of tours, lectures, and workshops.

The 12 tours available include everything from bird watching and deer breeding to sensitive sites home to pyramid magnolias and pitcher plants. The workshops offered are Graminoid Identification, Propagation, Digital Photography, Floral Arranging with Natives, and Medicinal Plants. The dozen lectures cover a range of topics like Green Roofs, Landscape Design, Gulf Coast Bogs, New Varieties of Native Plants, and Invasive Species, by a number of well known speakers including Scott Odgen, Heidi Sheesley, Paul Cox, and Dave Creech.

The beautiful SFA campus is home to the Mast Arboretum, the Ruby Mize Azalea Garden, as well as the 40-acre Pineywoods Native Plant Center.

Mark your calendar and go to http://arboretum.sfasu.edu for the registration and the conference agenda. For more information contact Dawn Stover at 936-468-4404 or dparish@sfasu.edu

Boerne Chapter’s Operation NICE! is recommending Texas redbud (Cercis canadensis var. texensis) for the February native plant of the month.

Texas redbud in full flower before leaves sprouted.
(photo by Bill Ward)

Texas redbud is a multi-trunked small tree or large shrub that grows on the thin limestone soils of the Hill Country. It is popular as a landscape plant because of its profuse clusters of tiny rose-pink blooms.

In an ideal year when spring comes on slowly, every limb of the redbud is covered with the bright flowers before the leaves sprout. That is when the tree is most attractive and when it may linger in bloom for two or three weeks or more. Warmer spring weather seems to rush the bloom period and encourage leaf growth, which somewhat diminishes the effect of the blooms. Even then, they are pretty trees.

Some years, an unusually late and frigid cold snap will nip the buds of the early bloomers among our redbuds. However, from what I have noticed in this part of the Hill Country, most years the Texas redbud is not as likely as the Texas mountain laurel to have its flowers destroyed by late freezes.

Blooms aside, Texas redbud is a handsome landscape tree. From spring into fall its many branches are abundantly covered by glossy deep-green heart-shaped leaves a few inches across. In the fall, the leaves turn yellow for a few weeks before they are shed. After the leaves fall, the bloom buds are already big enough that one can predict many weeks ahead of time how a tree will blossom in the spring.

Branches of redbud blooms, closer up.
(photo by Bill Ward)

Texas red buds are easy to grow in alkaline soil and can thrive in part shade to full sun. Along the road we drive to Boerne, redbuds thrive and bloom profusely as small understory trees in dappled shade. Once established, Texas redbuds survive with little extra watering. We water redbuds in our yard only during periods of severe drought. This species of redbud probably will not do so well in poorly drained areas.

The Texas redbud has a couple of cousins, one from East Texas and one from the Trans Pecos, which also are grown in this area. The eastern redbud (C. canadensis var. canadensis) is widespread over the eastern half of the US. It tends to have a single main trunk and fairly rapidly can grow to be a large tree, even in our alkaline soils. Still, I think the smaller Texas redbud has deeper-colored blossoms and nicer foliage than the eastern variety, and it demands less water.

The drought-tolerant Mexican redbud (C. canadensis var. mexicana) is a multi-trunked tree with glossy leaves a little smaller than those of the Texas redbud. There is a great deal of overlap in the ranges of the three redbud varieties. Natural hybrids may confuse recognition of redbuds in the wild. Apparently a number of cultivars are available in the nursery trade, further confusing identification.

In our neighborhood, redbuds of any variety, especially the young ones, need to be protected from deer. Perhaps I keep protective fences around my small trees longer than I need to, because I’ve noticed that some neighbors were able to remove protection when their redbuds reached 8 or 10 feet high and foliage was trimmed too high for the deer to reach. Texas redbud, however, commonly grows with low branches, and the trunks are just the right diameter for bucks to rub. I think I’ll keep my fences in place for the time being.

Both species of nolina (foreground) and piñon pine (behind). (photo by Bill Ward)

Among our still-green shrubs and small trees are Texas mountain laurel (Sophora secundiflora), evergreen sumac (Rhus virens), Texas madrone (Arbutus xalapensis), cenizo (Leucophyllum sp), mountain cedar (Juniperus ashei), autumn sage (Salvia greggii), silktassel (Garrya ovata subsp. lindheimeri), agarita (Berberis trifolata), barberry (Berberis swaseyi), Texas pistache (Pistacia texana), wax myrtle (Myrica cerifera), condalia (Condalia hookeri), damianita (Chrysactina mexicana), piñon pine (Pinus cembroides), and palmetto (Sabal minor).

The mountain laurel, evergreen sumac, and silktassel show that in this part of the Hill Country it’s possible to have an evergreen hedge or privacy screen without planting the exotic ligustrum or red-tipped photinia.

Our little Vasey oaks (Quercus pungens var. vaseyana) proved to be as “evergreen” as the live oak trees (Quercus fusiformis).

Neither beargrass (Nolina texana) nor devil’s shoestring (Nolina lindheimeriana) was fazed by the frigid weather. The sotol (Dasylirion texanum) and our various agaves, yuccas, and cactuses are still green, too.

Madrone trees. (photo by Bill Ward)

Even some of our maidenhair fern (Adiantum capillus-veneris) received only minor damage during the deep freeze. The fern already had withstood December lows in the mid-twenties without turning brown at all. Perhaps that is because it grows under protecting branches of a large live oak, but even under the oak it was unusually cold last weekend.

Among our native vines that still have green leaves are crossvine (Bigonia capreolata), old man’s beard (Clematis drummondii), Carolina jessamine (Gelsemium sempervirens), and much to my surprise, snapdragon vine (Maurandya antirrhiniflora).

A seemingly cold-hardy native plant I’m trying to get started in my yard is cut-leaf germander (Teucrium laciniatum). This perennial wildflower still had a couple of blooms late last month, and the recent cold spell seems to have done little harm to the leaves. It looks as if this is going to be a good garden plant.

Other forbs that did not freeze back to the ground are violets (Viola missouriensis), blue-curls (Phacelia congesta), columbine (Aquilegia canadensis and A. hinckleyana), and slender-stem bitterweed (Perityle lindheimeri). And all our bluebonnet rosettes survived. It’s going to be a good bluebonnet year!

With so many native plants that hold on to their leaves in sub-freezing weather, we can keep a lot of green in our Hill Country landscapes, even during the colder winters.

Benny Simpson, developer of “Storm” series of desert willow (Chilopsis linearis) and “Green Cloud” cenizo (Leucophyllum frutescens), ran his trials for Texas native plants that would adapt to blackland prairies in these plots.

I never had the honor of meeting Benny Simpson. I only knew him by his reputation as one of the founders of the Native Plant Society of Texas and as a developer of native plants that would be acceptable to homeowners in their landscapes. So here I was, looking at the neglected plots of the man himself and thinking, “Oh, my goodness, what a mess.” I, among others, had answered the call to volunteer time to clean up the plots.

Some of the cleanup crew at the extension service
site take a break to pose for the camera
(photo by Dawn Hancock)

To begin, our hardy band with loppers in hand included Gailon Hardin and John Snowden and me from North Central Chapter. From Cross Timbers Chapter came Jan Daniels. Then there were these three tiny slips of girls from TWU, partially coerced by Cynthia McGuire from Trinity Forks Chapter, to fulfill Community Service hours.

The hopes of making a dent in our task looked bleak, but we began yanking, cutting and hacking. Grapevine and dead limbs came out and a tree, relieved of its burden, began to emerge.

Soon other folks began to arrive. More TWU students including an actual male came, each looking somewhat nonplussed. (I think some of these had been “left inside” as children.) North Central Chapter’s Sandra Johnson strode in with her chain saw and began to make short work of dead limbs and grapevine. Rick Rosen and Carol Feldman from the Dallas Chapter came, along with Betsy Farris from Plano Chapter. Now we had a living and breathing and sweating crew.

We laughed, we cried, we screamed as we rousted rats from their homes and mistook each other’s arms for snakes. NPSOT members took the lead in identifying what to remove and students hauled tons of debris. Four hours later the plots were not so shabby, and I, as a NPSOT member, was not quite so ashamed of them.

Soon NPSOT chapters will again be called on to finish what we started. I hope you will be one of the volunteers both for Benny’s sake and for the fun of it.

The winners -  January, mountain laurel; February, redbud; March, coral honeysuckle; April, American beautyberry; May, esperanza; June, Turk’s cap; July/August, Lindheimer muhly; September, blue mist flower; October, salvias; and November/December, possumhaw.

All of these 10 for 2010 bear repeating for at least two reasons. First these plants have proven to be hardy water-conserving landscape plants that do well in this area and generally are readily available at local nurseries.

Another reason it is time to reintroduce a few of the NICE! favorites is that during the nearly eight years of our NICE! program, many new people have moved to the Boerne area, and a lot of them need landscaping tips. And, I am happy to say, an increasing number of longtime residents have become interested in planting landscape vegetation that requires less water, fertilizer, and pesticides.

Although these plants have been chosen particularly with Boerne in mind, most of them are appropriate in other parts of the state as well, especially in the central part.   If you have questions about using a plant where you live contact your local NPSOT chapter before purchasing the plant.

Early spring blooms of Texas mountain laurel. (photo by Bill Ward)

The January NICE! plant, Texas mountain laurel (Sophora secundiflora), was our very first Plant of the Month in April 2002. This flowering evergreen shrub or small tree has been a favorite plant for home and commercial landscaping in this region for a long time.

Texas mountain laurel is the native plant I most associate with my childhood. When I grew up in San Antonio, the most ubiquitous yard shrubs, as I remember it anyway, were ligustrum, abelia, vitex, Japanese plum (temporarily changed to “Chinese plum” during WWII), and mountain laurel. In those days, I certainly wouldn’t have understood how unfortunate that four out of those five were exotics.

Even then, however, I did have a sense that it was highly desirable to have a mountain laurel in your yard. For one thing, in early spring it puts out fragrant blooms that look like hanging clusters of purple grapes. People with more sensitive noses than mine said the blooms smelled like Grapette and grape Kool-Aid.

In elementary school I had at least one teacher who would get a little perturbed when a student brought her a gift of mountain laurel flowers. She immediately would put them on an open-window sill or even out in the hall when it was too cold for open windows. Because of that teacher, for many years I thought people would pass out if closed up in a room with mountain laurel flowers.

Handful of mescal beans. (photo by Bill Ward)

When we ambled home from elementary school, it was always fun to search the ground under a mountain laurel for the hard red “laurel beans.” We never got tired for rubbing a bean on the sidewalk until the friction made it hot, then sneaking up to touch it to the bare skin of a friend and yelling, “Red hot!”

Of course, at that time I had no idea these mountain laurel seeds also are called mescal beans and once were ground into powder by Native Americans to use in hallucinogenic ceremonial potions. Reportedly, when it was discovered the toxic mescal beans were killing people, they switched to peyote.

Homeowners in my childhood neighborhood undoubtedly sought out Texas mountain laurel to plant in their yards because it has bright-green evergreen foliage, pretty purple flowers, and grows well in calcareous soils. The perfect shrub for much of San Antonio and the eastern Hill Country. Today we also pay special attention to the fact it is so drought tolerant and is rarely browsed by deer.

Except for very small seedlings, I find mountain laurels difficult to transplant. However, they are widely available at nurseries in a range of sizes. Once established, Texas mountain laurel never needs irrigation.

As a boy in San Antonio and much later as a homeowner in the Boerne area, I always regarded Texas mountain laurel as one of the most desirable Texas natives, a really special little tree. I haven’t changed my mind, but in the last few years I have been surprised to learn that Texas mountain laurel can be seen in a very different light. Not far west of here in limestone hills of Real and Uvalde Counties there are dense thickets of mountain laurel that have the same effect as the thickest Ashe juniper (cedar) brakes. Practically no grasses and forbs can grow in those areas because of low light and dry soil. For ranchers in those areas, mountain laurel is more of a dreaded nuisance than cedar.

In our part of the Hill Country, thank goodness, Texas mountain laurel is better behaved. It is one of our top yard plants. Quite a NICE! shrub.

Mature bigtooth maple at Frost Bank, preview of future scenes along Boerne streets. (photo by Suzanne Young)

Bigtooth Maples for Boerne grew out of a dream of Jan Wrede. After the Boerne Chapter of NPSOT planted maples on the Old No. 9 Greenway Trail in 2004 and 2005, Jan envisioned all the streets of Boerne bright with yellow, orange, and red foliage every fall.

Maple-lined streets still would be just a dream if the Lende Foundation had not committed to finance a maple-planting program for ten consecutive years. The extended duration of this generous financial support distinguishes this project from other NPSOT community-service planting programs around the state. This sort of backing can make the dream come true!

This program also would not have been possible if volunteers from the Boerne NPSOT chapter did not provide the planning and labor to get the maples distributed through the city. The person most instrumental in making Bigtooth Maples for Boerne an annual success is Suzanne Young. I call her Maple Momma.

All year, Suzanne receives and evaluates the official request forms. As the fall giveaway approaches, she buys the maples, wire fencing, and bags of mulch. After the application deadline, she chooses the lucky recipients and schedules times to pick up the saplings. Then Suzanne recruits the volunteers to cut wire enclosures, unload the maples and the mulch when they arrive at the give-away site, and later help the recipients load the trees into their vehicles. With each tree goes a wire enclosure, a bag of mulch, and detailed planting and care instructions written by Maple Momma herself.

After all that, Suzanne itemizes the expenditures and balances the Bigtooth Maples for Boerne account. Then she starts planning for next year. Boerne homeowners, businesses, and community organizations can apply for free maples by submitting the application form ( www.npsot.org/Boerne/maplesforboerne/) any time before October 1 each year.

2009 bigtooth maple giveaway. Volunteer helpers (l-r) C.R. Jones, Bill Ward, Wilt Shaw, Jan Couch, and leader Suzanne Young. (photo by Jack Morgan)

A third major element in the success of a long-term planting program such as this is a supplier who can provide the number of trees required every year. Luckily, we have the dedicated cooperation of Baxter Adams of Medina. Many people know Baxter as the man who introduced apples to the Texas Hill Country, but he also has been the major source of bigtooth maples for many years. He grows them by the thousands from seedlings he collects in the wild, mostly from land he once owned in the Love Creek valley between Media and Vanderpool. The seedlings he leaves uncollected eventually are eaten by deer. Baxter’s enterprise is helping to preserve the bigtooth maple population of the Hill Country.

The fourth factor that makes Bigtooth Maples for Boerne a viable project is the cooperation of the Boerne property owners who are willing to participate in this vision by caring for a maple or two. The trees generally can fend for themselves a couple of years after planting, but at first a little TLC is required.

Some landscape architects are choosing maples as the trees to plant on new construction sites in Boerne. Also, some business owners are adding bigtooth maples to their established landscapes.

Last week a group of us planted several more maples near the Esser Road trail head of the Old No. 9 Greenway Trail. During the last few years Jack Morgan has taken it upon himself to care for trees planted along this hike-and-bike trail that runs along the old railroad track through Boerne. The nice foliage color at the Blanco Street crossing this fall may be at least partly attributed to Jack’s having nursed the bigtooth maples through that severe heat last summer.

The 2009-10 kindergarten class at Cibolo Creek Elementary will plant a “Papa Bigtooth”, “Mama Bigtooth” and “Baby Bigtooth” and then take a group picture by the trees. When this class graduates from the 6th grade in 2016, they will once again take pictures with the Bigtooth family to see how much everyone has grown.

In one block of Hickman Street, the residents have gotten together to plant maples in every front yard. Those residents who can’t easily plant and care for the trees are helped by those who can. With this kind of community cooperation, Boerne indeed will be The Bigtooth Maple Town of Texas.

Ernesto and his long-time friend Ysmael Espinosa own and operate this garden-nursery.  It’s on Highway 16, just at the southeastern entrance to the little town of Medina and right across the road from Baxter Adams’ tree nursery, the supplier for the annual Bigtooth Maples for Boerne giveaway.

Ysmael Espinosa (left) and Ernesto Cariño at their native-plant nursery in Medina. (Photo by Wilt Shaw)

Ernesto and Ysmael met when they both worked at HEB in Kerrville during the late 1990s. Ysmael, who was born and raised in Kerrville, still works at that HEB and does double duty on his times off as a nurseryman and landscaper. Currently he and his family live in Medina.

Ernesto came to the US from the Mexican state of Puebla during the 1960s. Eventually he moved to Medina and built the rock house. Ernesto is an accomplished oil painter, but for the present, there is no time for art in his busy nursery and landscaping career.

After work hours during the days they both were with HEB, Ysmael and Ernesto used to help out at Betty Winningham’s nursery. This was at the time Betty was starting her Natives of Texas Nursery on Highway 16 between Kerrville and Medina. From Betty, they learned a lot about propagating and marketing native plants.

Before long, Ernesto and Ysmael thought they might start a nursery and landscape business of their own on Ernesto’s land in Medina. Working with Betty Winningham, they had learned to appreciate the value of water-conserving native plants for local landscaping. Besides that, Ernesto’s previous experience with his property reinforced the idea that their business should emphasize the use of native plants.

In early years, Ernesto had landscaped his yard with whatever plants were popular at the nurseries. Then every time he left for extended visits to family in Mexico, those plants dried up and died. Ernesto soon realized he needed plants more adapted to the hot Hill Country summers.

When they decided to start their nursery specializing in native plants, a lot of practical advice and encouragement came from their Tarpley neighbor Dorothy Matissa, one of the pioneers in promoting native plants for Hill Country gardens. In addition, Chuck Janzow of Boerne taught them many tricks of the trade about propagating natives.

Several other people prominent in the native-plant movement also became aware of this Medina nursery. Sally and Andy Wasowski, on their way to visit cousins in Utopia, began to stop by from time to time to encourage Ernesto and Ysmael in their efforts to grow and sell native plants. Jill Nokes also got wind of the Medina Garden Nursery and came to lend advice and encouragement. Sue Tracy, who lives in the Medina area, became one of their staunch supporters. This nursery soon earned a good name for itself far and wide.

Butterflies nectaring on thoroughwort blooms at Medina Garden Nursery. (Photo by Wilt Shaw)

Ysmael and Ernesto have experimented with growing and propagating many different water-conserving plants found in the Hill Country, West Texas, and northern Mexico. It is always fun to see what plants they’ll try next. Their nursery offers a few species probably seldom available anywhere else.

Medina Garden Nursery is located on an alluvial terrace of the Medina River and so has better soil than is in most Hill Country yards. Realizing that they need to promote landscape plants that will tolerate the thin, dry soils more typical of the limestone hills in this part of Texas, Ernesto and Ysmael created a “caliche” garden.

They dug out many cubic yards of good soil from a large plot and replaced it with calcareous rocky material almost like road base. Then they planted an array of native shrubs and wildflowers that thrive in this seemingly hostile terrain. It’s a beautiful plot that has educated a lot of customers.

The many native plants that have been growing in the ground for years at this nursery provide a unique service for customers. They illustrate the size and appearance of the mature species in a landscape setting. Also, there are examples of shrubs and wildflowers that attract swarms of nectaring butterflies during the bloom periods. Other plants in the garden are the special host plants for the larvae of those very butterflies.

Ernesto and Ysmael have not only established a native-plant nursery, they also have created a teaching garden.

Ligustrum jungle at the new library site.
(Photo by Paul Barwick)

Currently, however, it is one of the most devastated and ugly landscapes in Boerne. This is not a woods where you’d enjoy a morning walk.

The main culprits in the decline of that tract of land are waxleaf ligustrum and a herd of axis deer that camps out in the ligustrum forest. The ligustrum trees are so thickly grown together that little sunshine reaches the ground, and what few forbs and bushes can survive in the dim light are browsed away by the deer.

Without grass and other groundcover, runoff is high. What soil has not been eroded away is thin and dry. The narrow, usually dry stream bed at the base of the slope has no sign of riparian vegetation. That rocky creek bed may as well be one of those cement canals so common in the creeks of that big city on our south. It is a conduit for sending flash floods downstream at maximum velocity.

Paul Barwick, Senior Planner for the City of Boerne, has detailed plans for transforming the future Boerne Library grounds into an inviting campus with native-plant gardens, natural woods with native understory, and lush riparian banks soaking up creek water and slowing erosion during floods. The first step in this ecological restoration is removing the ligustrum.

Volunteers clearing ligustrum. The brush pile soon got huge. (Photo by Paul Barwick)

What’s so bad about ligustrum? Waxleaf ligustrum or Japanese privet (Ligustrum japonicum) has a lot of qualities we like in landscape plants. It is evergreen, very drought tolerant, doesn’t require fertilizers, and grows rapidly. Those traits have made it a popular landscape shrub or small tree for a long time. It used to be one of the favorite shrubs for urban yards in Texas and the South. Some people say it still is overused.

Unfortunately ligustrum has a major flaw. It is not compatible with our native vegetation. It is prone to escaping into the wild and dramatically changing native habitats. Ligustrum invades and plunders as it goes. It replaces native vegetation, thereby changing the whole ecosystem it invades.

Most lists of undesirable invasive exotic plants of Texas include at two species of ligustrum. Although this invasive plant produces abundant fruit, the USDA ranks its food value to mammals and birds as low. Birds that do eat the berries seem to have a major role in spreading the plant. From time to time I have to pull ligustrum seedlings out of our flower beds, even though I know of no ligustrums in our subdivision.

Waxleaf ligustrum with early-fall berries, which later turn black. (Photo by Kathy Ward)

The Boerne Chapter of the Native Plant Society has pledged to lend a hand in de-forestation of the ligustrum woods at the new library site. Many of us already are practiced at removing ligustrum, because it is one of the main exotic plants invading and damaging the riparian corridor at the Cibolo Nature Center.

So far, the Boerne Chapter has participated in two work sessions at the library property. Even with three chain saws going for three hours at the last work day, much more ligustrum is left to cut. This is a huge thicket with all trees tall and skinny, reaching for the sunlight. The ligustrum is so closely intergrown that a tree won’t fall over when cut off near the base; it is held erect by limbs of adjacent trees.

No permanent damage is done to ligustrum trees by just cutting them down. They readily re-sprout. To be sure they are gone forever, stumps need to be sprayed or painted with a systemic herbicide immediately after cutting. When construction starts on the new library, the cuttings will be mulched and spread by the site contractor to further reduce erosion. The ligustrum roots are being left in place to reduce further loss of the little soil left.

Some day before long, the Boerne Public Library campus will be the pride of Boerne.

Steve Nelle thinks a more acceptable definition is “shrubs and trees which are considered undesirable to the planned use of the area”.

This defines brush relative to the objectives for a given piece of land. Where land is managed for prairies or grazing land without wildlife habitat, most shrubs and trees are indeed brush, incompatible with the objectives. For any land wholly or partly managed for wildlife, however, trees and shrubs are desirable, even essential, and are not brush.

“What may be a worthless brushy jungle to the cattleman may be an exceptional browse pasture to the goat raiser,” Steve writes. It’s a matter of perspective. “What may be a hideous brush-infested pasture to one person may be a tract of excellent wildlife habitat to another.”

Steve Nelle is with USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service in San Angelo. He usually works with landowners who want to be better stewards of their rangeland, but his experience in good management of those rural large tracts of land can be applicable to the smaller tracts and suburban lots which most of us try to manage in one way or another.

Beautyberry
(photo Bill Hopkins)

Wildlife uses trees and shrubs for two main purposes: to eat and to live in. Steve points out that “browse” (leaves and tender stems) may be an important food source for a few mammals such as deer, but is of no direct food benefit to most mammals, birds, and reptiles. By contrast, the berries, nuts, and seeds of woody plants are vital for the existence of many species of wildlife.

The most preferred Hill Country shrubs, trees, and vines with demonstrated wildlife value as fruit, seed, or flower include: bush honeysuckle, hawthorn, rusty blackhaw, Carolina buckthorn, Spanish oak, possumhaw, Texas mulberry, mistletoe, hackberry, blackjack oak, bumelia, Roemer acacia, redbud, grapevine, wild plum, Carolina snailseed, elbowbush, Virginia creeper, poison ivy, greenbriar, American beautyberry, black cherry, and elms.

Nearly all types of wildlife in Texas depend on woody plants for cover, shelter, and protection from predators and harsh weather. Steve points out that, “When considering cover for wildlife, more is not necessarily better. For just about any wildlife species, there can be too much or too little cover.” For example, a sparse canopy of low shrubby cover is used by deer, quail, and many grassland birds, but a dense canopy of smaller trees with open understory is required by many woodland birds, and a sparse canopy of taller trees is used by savanna birds.

Another benefit of shrubs and trees is that they enrich the soil with leaf litter. Some, such as mesquite and other woody legumes, also fix nitrogen into the soil. In addition, spiny shrubs serve as nursery areas to protect desirable plants from browsing animals.

From Steve Nelle’s perspective, land managed for wildlife is lucky to have native shrubs and trees and especially lucky if there is a wide diversity of shrubs and trees. From my perspective, Steve’s ideas work even on a suburban lot. I am convinced that our yard attracts such a variety of birds because of the large diversity of native shrubs and trees we cultivate. Our “brush” is not brush!

Bob Burleson leading a field trip on his prairie near Temple. (Photo by Bill Ward)

On that particular visit, the proprietors of the prairie were as fascinating as the vegetation. Bob and Mickey Burleson told how they had resurrected this tall-grass prairie from old cotton fields. For many years they studied the small remnants of native prairies in surrounding counties, and they brought seeds from those prairies to plant on their own land. Little by little they created the now-famous Burleson Prairie, a living example of what must have covered much of the Blackland Prairie before most it was turned into the bread basket of Texas.

Bob Burleson died last April after a life of major contributions to conservation efforts in Texas. Among many, many other accomplishments, he was involved in the creation of Guadalupe Mountains National Park, helped found the Native Prairie Association of Texas, served as a member of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission, and was a leader in establishing TPWD’s Natural Resources Division. He and his wife coauthored a guide to tallgrass restoration, “The New Southern Reconstruction: Home Grown Prairies.”

Sand palafoxia on the Burleson Prairie.
(Photo by Bill Ward)

We saw their prairie in the fall, at the height of the grass blooms, but also when many wildflowers were flowering. The Burlesons had not only restored the grasses, but also had planted seed from the forbs they found growing on the various prairie remnants. Among the flowering plants were sand palafoxia, a large white gaura, rosinweed, ruellia, purple horsemint, lanceleaf gaillardia, and many others. Burleson Prairie wildflowers must be even more spectacular during the spring.

Last June we got to visit a prairie at a time many forbs were in late-spring bloom. This was on a field trip to Attwater Prairie in Colorado County, led by Jason Singhurst of TPWD. That coastal-plain prairie also has an impressive diversity of grasses and forbs.

Winkler's gaillardia on the Attwater Prairie.
(Photo by Bill Ward)

Just a few of the forbs blooming were phlox, pink gaura, blazing star, ruellia, Winkler’s gaillardia, black-eyed Susan, milkweed, coneflower, white horsemint, and purple pleat-leaf. Changes in wildflower color patterns across the prairie reflect subtle changes in soil and topography, both related to underlying geology.

Last month, during the Native Plant Society of Texas annual symposium, we saw that the shorter-grass prairies of the Rolling Plains south of Wichita Falls are just as diverse as the Blackland Prairie and Gulf coastal plain grasslands.

A good place to see a tallgrass prairie remnant in the Hill Country is at Cibolo Nature Center. All of the “big four” of tallgrass prairies, Switchgrass, little bluestem, yellow Indiangrass, and big bluestem grow at CNC.

My favorites in the CNC prairie are eastern gamagrass and the Central Texas endemic Lindheimer muhly. Another favorite of just about everyone is bushy bluestem, which grows on the damper margins of the prairie.

As in all healthy native prairies, the large species diversity on the CNC prairie includes many different forbs. This prairie has a variety of colorful wildflowers, both in the spring and the fall. No plants have been introduced into the prairie at CNC; all grow there naturally.

Of course, this wide diversity of native plants on prairies supports a big variety of insects, birds, mammals, reptiles, and other animals. Prairies are teeming with life!