INTEREST AND AWARENESS round native crops has been trending in recent times, and it makes them really feel virtually new. However after all natives are the unique crops of an space, and even in sure specialty corners of the nursery business, they’ve been round far longer than they’ve been making headlines.

Simply ask right now’s visitor, Neil Diboll, who has operated Prairie Nursery in Wisconsin for 42 years, since lengthy earlier than phrases like “pollinator backyard” had been modern. He’ll share a few of his favourite species it’s possible you’ll not know, and likewise some recommendation on what to anticipate over time managing meadow- and prairie-style plantings, in case you’re amongst these gardeners contemplating transitioning a part of your garden, for example.

Neil has been president and consulting ecologist for Prairie Nursery in Westfield, Wisc., since 1982. Final 12 months, in collaboration with backyard designer and horticulturist Hilary Cox, he revealed “The Gardener’s Information to Prairie Crops” (affiliate hyperlink), a complete information to utilizing prairie crops in gardens and bigger restorations. (Above, Culver’s root, Veronicastrum virginicum.)

Plus: Remark within the field close to the underside of the web page to enter to win a duplicate of the guide.

Learn alongside as you hearken to the June 3, 2024 version of my public-radio present and podcast utilizing the participant under. You possibly can subscribe to all future editions on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) or Spotify (and browse my archive of podcasts right here).

speaking prairie crops, with neil diboll

Margaret Roach: I like the guide, Neil; it’s so severe, but additionally accessible. I don’t know should you might be each issues on the identical time, however one way or the other it’s. So congratulations on that.

Neil Diboll: Thanks.

Margaret: So we did a latest “New York Instances” backyard column collectively, however that wasn’t the primary time I met you. I met you 30-something years in the past once I was engaged on a guide referred to as “The Pure Habitat Backyard” with Ken Druse, and we came visiting you and find out about all issues prairie from you. And again then, natives, you jogged my memory once we labored on the latest Instances piece, had been extra prone to be thought of weeds than modern [laughter]. Sure?

Neil: Oh, sure, sure. Let’s simply say we had been somewhat forward of the curve on this. So there was some fairly onerous years making an attempt to persuade individuals to make use of natives after they weren’t accustomed to figuring out something about them.

Margaret: Yeah, we’ve come a great distance, but it surely feels one way or the other to me—I assume as a result of I get lots of reader and listener questions—it feels to me like within the mainstream horticulture market, the analysis and growth and advertising efforts have been actually to invent flashy new types of natives and promote, promote, promote them perhaps greater than to teach the purchasers. And I do know you assume schooling is without doubt one of the most vital components, and I completely agree, listening to what individuals are confounded by.

Neil: Yeah, schooling is super-important, particularly when 40 years in the past we had a product that no one knew about, and so we needed to educate. And to ensure that individuals to make use of your product correctly, to make use of these crops correctly, it’s essential to ensure they perceive them and the way they work together with one another.

So gardening with native prairie crops, individuals can create mini-ecosystems or plant communities, and that’s actually a radical idea as a result of now you’re not simply plunking in a plant like this or a plant like that, however you’re really utilizing a local ecosystem as your mannequin for a backyard. And so fairly than recreating nature in our personal picture, if you’ll, we’re utilizing nature’s rules to create a mannequin of nature. So fairly than a homocentric backyard, it’s a extra of a nature-centric mannequin. And that actually helps to tell gardeners so far as how one can use these crops and how one can use them to create low-maintenance, high-quality habitat.

Margaret: And simply to that time that you simply’re making, I imply, once we long-time gardeners, even skilled, professional gardeners, we’d purchase our hostas and our astilbe and our this and that. I simply talked about some shade crops, however I might point out solar crops, too. We put them down and 30 years later, they’re primarily in the identical place that they was once [laughter]. You recognize what I imply? We knew how one can handle them, we knew what they wanted. We knew when to chop them again. We type of knew the routine. They had been the acquainted palette. And these will not be essentially.

And as you’re mentioning, we’re not simply plunking issues down, “Ooh, look, that’ll look fairly over right here, and this may look fairly over there,” we’re creating communities. And that’s a complete totally different mindset. So I get lots of questions from people who find themselves thrown off by, properly, how do I make this all work? It’s somewhat complicated.

Neil: And it helps to know your crops, and lots of gardeners know their crops phenomenally properly, however they’re simply totally different crops. And so what we’re seeing now could be that severe gardeners are attending to know native crops and making use of ecological rules in how they design with them, how they handle them, and so forth.

Particularly past simply the usage of the crops as one thing aesthetic for human beings, however fairly as a habitat backyard, and what I name a three way partnership with nature, the place we meet nature midway. So we invite nature into our gardens. And fairly than spraying every part to maintain the bugs off, we really invite the bugs. As a result of in my backyard or my meadows, if I don’t have holes within the leaves of my crops, I’m an utter failure as a gardener as a result of I’m not supporting pollinators, I’m not supporting birds. The bugs that type the inspiration of the meals chain that feed every part up, they’re going to eat my crops, and that’s why half the rationale why these crops are there, not only for me, however for all of us.

Margaret: Proper. Perfectionism will not be the objective [laughter]. And a static image, as I mentioned, I’ve hostas they usually’re nonetheless in the identical place the place I put them, as I mentioned, and I might have put them there 30 years in the past. And primarily, they’re larger, however they’re nonetheless there. However with let’s say… and perhaps we should always inform the distinction between what’s a meadow versus a prairie planting as a result of that’s type of sizzling now, is to make a meadow or transition some garden to meadow or to prairie. What’s the distinction out of your ecologist’s viewpoint?

Neil: Between meadow and prairie?

Margaret: Yeah.

Neil: Yeah. Typically within the lexicon, a meadow is considered as a extra cool-season grass, with grasses that come up early in spring, with numerous wildflowers which can be extra predominant within the Jap a part of the US, normally a decrease profile. And a prairie is de facto the outline of the Midwestern tall-grass prairie, which was encountered by early French explorers within the seventeenth, 18th centuries. They usually discovered these large meadows with these tall grasses, and the phrase they used to explain them was prairie, which after all is the French phrase for meadow. However once you take a look at the best way the phrases, the phrases are used now, meadow normally refers to a lower-growing profile, wildflower, meadow. And you’ll have a brief prairie, however a brief prairie continues to be 1 to five ft tall relying upon the constituents. So it’s nonetheless typically a taller plant neighborhood and typical of the Midwest fairly than the East.

Margaret: So I hear from individuals who transitioned an space to a meadow or a prairie, normally, once more, I’m within the East, so I hear from particularly lots of Easterners they usually say, meadow, “I’ve a brand new meadow backyard or no matter.” “I’m managing my meadow.” And within the third 12 months, I don’t see my black-eyed Susans. There’s no extra black-eyed Susans. And I liked my black-eyed Susans,” Rudbeckia hirta [above]. Some members of that neighborhood that they thought was going to remain static, keep like a postcard picture perpetually, and it’s evolving, proper? So uh-oh, succession [laughter].

Neil: Precisely, yeah. And let’s take a look at the 2 other ways you need to use these crops. You possibly can create a prairie backyard with transplants, the place you possibly can choose long-lived crops in order for you it to be extra static. And that’s why in our guide, we listed vegetation expectations. We don’t have any annuals in there, however we now have a number of biennials, after all, with a life expectancy of two years. After which short-lived perennials three to 5 years, after which mid-successional perennials 5 to 10 years, after which later successional perennials 10 to twenty, after which lastly the Methuselah crops that dwell 20, 30, 40, 50 years and longer.

Margaret: I liked that Neil, I liked it. I imply, I’ve by no means seen the life expectancy listed in any guide about crops. And once you did that, and it was like “Baptisia, 20-plus years,” and I used to be like, proper, that factor is anchored within the floor. You recognize what I imply? That’s a keeper that’s staying round. It settles down, and it’s there.

Neil: Nicely, I believe that is actually vital for gardeners, so that they know what they’re getting. As you level out, what occurred to my Rudbeckia hirta? Nicely, it’s a biennial, and naturally you’re referring to a seed combine the place being a biennial, it’s simply fairly dominant in a second 12 months, and it would dangle on for one more couple of years, however by the fifth or sixth 12 months, it’s just about gone due to, as you identified, ecological succession.

And that is actually vital for individuals to know ecological succession, whereby once you seed onto open floor, normally the primary 12 months it’s all weeds, which you didn’t plant. They’re simply dormant seeds within the soil, and also you management them by preserving every part mowed again, normally to about 6 inches within the first rising season.

After which you may have biennials that present up in a second 12 months, just like the black-eyed Susan and weedy biennials. And oftentimes you’ll should mow these within the second 12 months. After which the third 12 months, the extra quickly maturing perennials of the prairie flowers and grasses begin to present up. And by the fifth 12 months, it’s just about a prairie, if every part’s going in accordance with plan.

After which what’s attention-grabbing is the precise range of whole variety of prairie crops normally peaks round 12 months 12 or 15. After which it begins to drop barely because the early successional and mid-successional perennials give technique to these longer-lived crops that dwell 10 to 20-plus years.

So it’s type of disappointing generally once you see a few of your favourite crops perhaps going by the wayside. However with disturbance… and that is actually vital, and disturbance is available in many varieties. There’s ripping the bottom up, there’s animal exercise, however the one we normally use is managed burning.

With managed burning, you’ll be able to type of set succession again and maintain what we name gap-phase succession the place you may have open soil the place a few of these different species that will be shorter-lived, can recede and proceed to keep up as a lot range as potential. So burning is de facto an vital side of this. After all, lots of people can’t burn or don’t wish to burn. It’s really very straightforward to burn should you arrange your panorama appropriately. And it’s actually lots of enjoyable as you already know.

Margaret: There’s a complete part in your guide about it, and once I first met you, you couldn’t wait to carry me and Ken Druse to your own home the place you had been making a prairie. You had a younger prairie backyard in your entrance yard, I believe, and also you wished to point out us a managed burn. And so once more, you instruct how one can do it within the guide.

Nicely, I like that you simply mentioned that we might use a few of these crops as type of specimens. Let’s imagine, “I’m going to make a mattress of those prairie crops, not a neighborhood.” So we might try this and management it extra, however when it’s extra like a meadow or a prairie, the succession goes to take maintain and so forth.

Neil: And once you use seeds, it’s going to be an evolutionary course of. However after all, we wish to have these early-successional, mid-successional species. So we now have curiosity in 12 months 3, 5, 7, 10, 15, 20, and on, but it surely type of reaches extra of a stasis after about 15 years or so. But it surely’s not unhealthy. You continue to have a lot of flowers and delightful grasses, so there’s just a few species that will fall by the wayside over an prolonged time frame.

Margaret: And also you simply mentioned grasses. And that’s an vital element as a result of simply selecting a complete lot of flowers, lots of forbs, will not be going to do it, will not be going to carry all of it collectively and create that neighborhood, as a result of these had been crops which can be accustomed to having partnerships with grasses.

Neil: Sure. And prairies are grasslands, meadows are grasslands, and so you actually can’t have one with out the grass, and people who have tried to plant simply wildflowers. And it may be performed, but it surely’s somewhat trickier for a variety of causes. Primary, it’s the fibrous roots of the grasses that assist to discourage weeds, as a result of they don’t enable any open soil on the floor of the bottom. And in order that’s the place most weeds get established. There are at all times going to be weeds that may blow in and trigger issues, however you’ll drastically cut back that hazard by having ample amount of grass in your meadow or backyard. So that they’re actually type of your weeders. Like I say, make the crops do the give you the results you want. I don’t wish to go on the market and weed. I’m going to design this backyard or design this prairie seed combine so it’s going to have ample grass in it to maintain weeds out as finest as potential.

And likewise, should you’re going to burn a prairie, flower sticks, outdated flower sticks don’t burn. You want what we name high-quality gas—grass—with a view to carry a hearth. So should you don’t have grass in your prairie, it principally gained’t burn. And you then lose that nice administration choice for preserving it very recent and new and looking out good and preserving out weeds and timber and shrubs, as a result of fireplace is de facto the easiest way to maintain out invaders, most invaders. And individuals are scared of fireplace. Nicely, really on our web site, I’ve an article below sources and guides, it’s referred to as “How you can Burn Your Prairie Safely,” and there’s so many tips about how to do that.

So I imply, it’s virtually not possible to lose it should you do it proper. And one actually easy trick is simply earlier than you burn it, simply lower every part down and all of the gas is on the bottom. As a substitute of getting massive flames, it’s simply creeping alongside the bottom. And so it’s so easy. It’s very easy.

Margaret: I’m sorry that the home wren, by the best way, exterior my window—though I’ve closed the window, the home wren is insistent on being on this program right now, so you possibly can hear him screaming.

Neil: Oh, yeah, that’s good. It’s good to have a accomplice on the present.

Margaret: [Laughter.] Just a little bossy creature. Yeah. So we had been speaking about making this residing mulch in a way by having the element of grasses with the wildflowers, the forbs, and that it makes it extra weed-resistant. The opposite query I get requested quite a bit is when weeds do come by means of, particularly within the early years that I don’t need, ought to I pull them out as a result of then that will open up one other house within the soil? Ought to I pull them out and attempt to do the least opening of soil potential or put one thing on it, like a bit of cardboard or no matter? Is there any weeding recommendation in any respect for these type of communities?

Neil: Yeah, as soon as once more, you’re speaking a couple of seeded meadow, seeded prairie, proper?

Margaret: Possibly, yeah.

Neil: O.Okay. Nicely, should you take a look at it, you must take a look at it strategically, and it’s essential to know your weeds. In reality, once I first began doing this again in 1977, I used to be plantings that somebody had performed on the college the place I went to highschool, and it was a really new planting so all I discovered had been weeds. So I needed to be taught my weeds first, which really was very useful.

As a result of should you take a look at weeds, you take a look at them because the species that may trigger issues in a grassland, you may have annuals, which present up largely within the first 12 months and the second 12 months as properly. Then you may have biennials. Now we’re speaking about herbaceous crops, annuals and biennials. After which you may have perennial grasses, and you’ve got perennial rhizomatous grasses and perennial non-rhizomatous grasses. Then you may have perennial broadleaf weeds, and people are additionally divided into rhizomatous and non-rhizomatous, with the rhizomatous species being the actual downside kids, these are those that creep in every single place. Issues like Canada thistle and area bindweed and horse nettle. These are actual, actual issues, and also you wish to get them out as quickly as you presumably can. Crown vetch, oh, what a horrible plant.

Margaret: We’ve got mugwort, and I do know your recommendation for mugwort.

Neil: Oh, mugwort is like, oh, good luck with that.

Margaret: Relocate. Relocate [laughter].

Neil: Yeah, relocate. Recalibrate, sure. It’s so tough upon getting a longtime inhabitants of it.

Or what you are able to do is you possibly can kill all of it off. After which right here’s somewhat trick. In case you have a long-term downside with the seed financial institution, you possibly can kill every part off with whichever technique you wish to use, whether or not it’s smothering or repeated tilling or herbicide or no matter, till there’s completely none of that perennial weed left and none across the edges the place it might probably creep in. After which you possibly can put 3 inches of recent, clear, topsoil over that which can bury the weed seed financial institution, after which you possibly can seed or plant your crops into that recent soil, assuming that it doesn’t have some other problematic weeds. So this works on a small space, it’s not going to work on a bigger space.

However when you may have an issue website with a longterm historical past of actually nasty, thuggish weeds, that is the way you overcome them, by fully eliminating the weeds after which placing 3 inches of fine, clear topsoil over that, that won’t have weed seeds. However should you take a look at this, it’s essential to know who you’re up in opposition to. So so far as pulling weeds within the first 12 months of a seeded prairie, you by no means pull weeds, as a result of once you pull the weeds, you undoubtedly, invariably carry up clumps of soil and there go your prairie seedlings with it. And also you may as properly go in there and spray it with Roundup. That’s why we maintain every part mowed to six inches, as a result of few, if any of these prairie seedlings are going to develop greater than 6 inches within the first 12 months.

Within the second 12 months, if we now have downside weeds with biennials like burdock, candy clovers, wild parsnip, lots of these guys can actually be an issue. So proper after they end blooming, we lower them right down to 12 inches, which then stops the seed formation course of.

Margaret: Proper, O.Okay.

Neil: And kills the crops excluding Queen Anne’s lace, which is an indeterminate bloomer and would require fixed slicing again of the flowers. Then within the third 12 months…

Margaret: I used to be going to say strategic relying on what plant you’re up in opposition to, you may have a technique. Yeah.

Neil: Precisely. And that data is within the guide, “The Gardener’s Information to Prairie Crops.” It’s additionally on our web site. So there’s a lot of sources right here the place individuals can get to know these crops and what to do. However once more, you must know who you’re up in opposition to and know how one can strategically management them.

Margaret: Proper, perceive its life historical past and so forth. Yeah.

Neil: Yeah, precisely.

Margaret: So once we did the Instances story, we talked about how though everybody nearly coast to coast is aware of purple coneflower, Echinacea purpurea, which by the way isn’t native coast to coast, however I even see it offered in catalogs promoting in California, for goodness sake. However there’s so many in all places it appears [laughter]. However there’s so many nice prairie natives for the Jap half or two-thirds of the nation, which is I assume roughly talking, lots of them are your specialties, that folks don’t know but. And I assumed it will be enjoyable to only take a couple of minutes to name out so we don’t run out of time. Take a couple of minutes to name out some that you simply want you knew higher, as a result of it’s not simply purple coneflower and Rudbeckia, proper? [Above, hybrid coneflowers combining genetics of Echinacea purpurea and E. pallida.]

Neil: Proper. And individuals are oriented towards the showy flowers. And let’s not overlook that the English had been planting purple coneflower within the nineteenth century, once we had been plowing up the prairies. In order that plant’s been in style for a very long time, simply not right here. However let’s take a look at another crops that maybe are somewhat extra muted or are good companions for a few of the showier crops.

And I actually like lots of the white-flowered crops, and white-flowered crops additionally significantly good for bees and parasitoid wasps, which assist to regulate pests in your backyard. Considered one of my favorites is Culver’s root, Veronicastrum virginicum [top of page]. It’s a stately, elegant plant. It’s about 5 ft tall. It has stunning whorled leaves up the stem and these pure white spires of flowers, completely beautiful plant, and it’ll develop in clay. It is going to develop in moist soil. It doesn’t like dry soil. It is going to develop in full solar, and it’ll develop partly shade. So it’s a fairly versatile plant, so long as you give it a very good backyard soil or perhaps a barely damp soil.

One other nice plant is the rattlesnake grasp, Eryngium yuccifolium [below], attractive foliage, excellent flowers, which can bloom for a reasonably prolonged time frame. Only a actually attention-grabbing, odd-looking plant, but it surely has actual character, and it blooms similtaneously prairie blazingstar, Liatris pycnostachya. And you’ve got this lavender-white, fantastic pastel mixture.

That is the place the whites are so fantastic, and it’s attention-grabbing. Individuals consider prairies, oh, it’s all stuffed with yellow flowers, however really there’s a lot of totally different colours. White is the second commonest colour of prairie flowers.

Margaret: I didn’t know that.

Neil: Yeah, it’s wonderful. And so rattlesnake grasp is also pollinated virtually solely by wasps, together with parasitic wasps. And I had a shopper who had horrible issues with tomato hornworm in his vegetable backyard. He planted a 1,000-square-foot prairie from us with a quarter-pound of prairie combine. And after the rattlesnake grasp began blooming, he mentioned, “I had no extra issues with tomato hornworms.”

And there’s a parasitic wasp that assaults the tomato hornworm by laying eggs on its again, which then burrow into the caterpillar, the caterpillar stage, and principally eats it from the within out and emerges like “Alien.” So the place do you assume they bought that concept for the film? From nature. So he says, “My prairie is my pesticide.” And so lots of natural gardeners will use these crops to draw parasitic wasps to maintain, hopefully, in lots of circumstances, to maintain their pests down.

Margaret: And everyone knows… That’s one instance, and never simply with parasitic wasps, however the extra range, the extra layers of the meals chain are being supported, the extra assist there may be at each degree for any risk.

Neil: Oh, yeah. So true.

Margaret: Yeah. Meals and interventions each can be found.

Neil: So should you plant a prairie combine with 20, 25, 30 species, you promote them, get one hundred pc. Mom nature’s fairly tough. However I imply, should you get 70, 80 p.c of that and also you get a large range of flowers, you’re not simply feeding bugs, you’re additionally feeding birds as a result of they eat the bugs, and plenty of butterflies come. And naturally the bees, the wasps and all people.

And individuals are so afraid of wasps, however most wasps, they don’t hassle you. The one wasps you actually have to fret about are yellow jackets. These are the one ones that may assault you in case you are not bothering them. Hornets gained’t hassle you. Mud daubers gained’t hassle you, cicada killers gained’t hassle you except you hassle them. However the yellow jacket, they’d simply as quickly sting as take a look at you. However they typically don’t come to the prairie as a result of they eat doughnuts and hamburgers and soda cans.

Margaret: They go to the mall [laughter].

Neil: They go to the picnic.

Margaret: They go to the mall.

Neil: That’s the place they go, they’re not coming to your prairie. So price, one other sensible choice are the mountain mints, genus Pycnanthemum. These are simply pollinator havens, and we couldn’t give these away 20 years in the past. All of a sudden, they’re tremendous in style due to the curiosity in pollinators. And so Pycnanthemum is within the mint household, and it’s wonderful at what number of totally different species it attracts.

Margaret: And there’s a number of totally different mountain mints, I believe. I don’t know what number of you carry.

Neil: There’s heaps. Pycnanthemum virginianum, Pycnanthemum tenuifolium, Pycnanthemum muticum [above]. All of those are actually good decisions for attracting pollinators, they usually’re fairly adaptable species.

Margaret: One of many issues that folks ask me about quite a bit, and I believe we talked about perhaps one or two decisions within the Instances story, individuals need issues which can be low to the bottom, like groundcover-ish issues, as a result of that was what, after all, as gardeners, we had been all hooked on groundcovers, and there’s not as many decisions perhaps, however there are some. I believe Antennaria, pussytoes is that one [below]?

Neil: That’s an amazing plant for a dry, sandy soil. In case you have a patio with sand in between the stones, it’ll develop in there. It stays actually low. It likes not less than a half a day of solar, but it surely stays very low. It has stunning silvery leaves.

And it really is dioecious: It has separate female and male crops. It’s onerous to inform the distinction except you stand up shut and private. But it surely sends up these little flower stalks about 4 inches tall and these stunning whitish-green leaves, they usually particularly have these little white hairs to replicate solar as a result of they develop in very dry environments, the place it’s straightforward to get overheated.

So it’ll develop in super-, super-difficult websites like sandy hillsides and locations like that, or alongside sidewalks, but it surely doesn’t like clay. So that you wish to have a extremely good-draining soil. However when you may have these spots which can be actual sizzling spots, like up in opposition to the south aspect of a home that get simply burned up, this can be a nice low-growing plant. And there’s another actually fantastic dry-tolerant prairie crops that attain taller heights as properly for these sorts of troublesome conditions.

Margaret: The final one I wish to ask you about is there’s a petunia, but it surely’s not a petunia. It’s a Ruellia, I believe.

Neil: Yeah.

Margaret: Yeah. Is it a prairie petunia? Is that what it’s referred to as? What’s its frequent title?

Neil: Prairie petunia, wild petunia, Ruellia humilis [above].

Margaret: Wild petunia, O.Okay.

Neil: Humilis: low-growing, humble, low-growing. This can be a actually stunning plant with only a violet flower. And it has a single faucet root, after which it simply spreads out. It sends out these branches alongside the floor of the soil. It doesn’t get greater than a pair ft tall, so it’s one other actually good groundcover-ish plant. It doesn’t creep and type a floor cowl just like the pussytoes, the place it really creeps by rhizomes or the wild strawberry [Fragaria virginiana] is one other good one, which creeps by rhizomes and can develop in very tough soils, too, very dry soils. And the Ruellia can be tolerant of sizzling, dry situations. So these are actually good decisions in order for you some low-growing crops, particularly in powerful, sizzling conditions.

Margaret: Nicely, I’ll embody some hyperlinks to a few of the academic stuff in your web site, as a result of as you mentioned firstly, schooling’s been a extremely vital a part of working with a product that folks didn’t actually, and nonetheless don’t totally, find out about, and are simply studying about. I at all times be taught quite a bit from you, Neil, even once I’m not at your home and also you’re not setting your entrance garden on fireplace to terrify me [laughter].

Neil: Nicely, it’s been some time. Margaret. Subsequent spring you must come, and we’ll do an anniversary prairie fireplace.

Margaret: O.Okay. Extra trauma [laughter]. Nicely, thanks a lot. Thanks for making time right now.

Neil: It’s my pleasure, Margaret.

Margaret: Pull some extra invasives, I’m going to go do the identical. O.Okay.

Neil: All proper. It’s been fantastic. Thanks a lot.

(All pictures from Prairie Nursery, used with permission.)

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