Spring Wildflowers - Naturalizing

Emerging Trillum Wildflowers - April 2011

Springtime wildflowers are plentiful near my yard.  There are a few Trillium recurvatum  and  White Trout Lily  Erythronium albidum.  and Solomon's Seal (although I don't know if it's a real one or a false one. :)  )  The problem was that these wildflowers shared the same space as and overgrowth of Buckthorn, scrub trees and who knows what.  So it needed to be fixed.

So we reclaimed it - taking out all the small trees and buckthorn, and the poison ivy and kudzu.  We took great care to preserve all the wildflowers as we took out all the garbage.   It took us nearly a month.   We then layered in dirt and had sod put down.  Also put in a stone border.

West shade Garden - White Trout Lily

Here you can see some of the native Illinois spring wildflowers in full bloom.  There are 1000's of the Trout Lily - it's a wonderful blanker of white.  This close up picture shows the neat varigation on the leaves.  They come and go pretty quickly.  They are doing awesome!  The other beauty is the Trillium.  It has three petals, three sepals and three leaves.  I have both red and white flowers. 

You'll see that we also put down sod lawn. It's very shady so I keep putting down seed every spring as well  - although I think there is not enough light for even the best shade seed. Hence, over time this area might take on a more woodsy feel, which is just fine with me!

I spent the whole day today in the garden. It was awesome!

Happy Gardening!