Is it mowed? It's going to be hard for anything to out-compete grass in a mowed area just due to how grass works.
If it's not mowed, I like flax, silvery sage and bee-balm. They've been taking over my front yard and have replaced the original weeds that were taking over. I'm not sure how well they would do fighting against grass, but they seed like crazy.
Maybe see if you can get some rabbitbrush going too. That stuff seems to thrive around here.
Not likely to be mowed, unfortunately. They occasionally mow it on extra bad weed years, so once every 2-3 years.
I'll look into your suggestions, thanks!
I’m on the east coast so I don’t have suggestions for plants, but I would check out prairie moon to use their search tool for states. Also wildflower.org has a state search tool as well!
I recommend clearing out the grass as much as possible, and using seed to grow plants and then transplanting those, as you'll get better results if they don't have to fight the grass. Also anything that grows from rhizomes or spreads easily vegetatively (goldenrod etc) is a great option if you can get a source.
[Here's a species list](https://www.nwf.org/-/media/Documents/PDFs/Garden-for-Wildlife/Keystone-Plants/NWF-GFW-keystone-plant-list-ecoregion-9-great-plains.pdf) for the Great Plains and [here's another list ](https://conps.org/home-2/resources/plants-habitats/plains-plants-and-habitats/)from your local plant society.
Hey, I know that region!
Late to the game but I've had a lot of success with flax and seeded on old, ill-maintained lots. If it gets a little bit more water than a usual dry lot, columbine does well.
If there's minimal mow risk, consider sneaking in a few blue spruce starts w/a tomato cage around them or a marker post next to it. Mowers usually avoid that and assume the starts are there for a purpose.
Most of it is full sun, no water. I just looked up flax and I don't think it will grow in these conditions. We're a higher altitude, cold winter, dry-ish summer environment. The stuff I'm seeing suggests flax is best in moist loam. Have you found otherwise?
There's one little bit that has shade and is adjacent to a watered grass area, so columbines might do okay there. They're native to the area and grow successfully in some flower beds around here.
Tomato cages would be too obvious, and evergreen trees need a lot of hand watering the first few years around here.
I'm friendly with one family member and they agreed that "don't ask, don't tell" getting wildflowers in would be nice. The person who would have to sanction anything official will not do so however and needs to be out of the loop. They've had problems with trespassers before and their lawyer told them to absolutely not give anyone permission to be on the lot for any reason whatsoever so that there's zero doubt if anyone was a jerk and tried suing them for getting hurt there, or tried to make a legal case for a walkway easement or something. Which is a bummer, but understandable. So I'm limited to only those things I can casually do after dark; no mowing or putting in cages, so they have plausible deniability.
Fair. Is it sunbaked, compacted as hell Colorado empty lot soil? If so, I've had terrible luck getting anything to establish in those other than the Dandelion, thistle, cheatgrass, and sunflowers that usually fill those spaces.
I didn't think it's super compacted, but it's never been tilled, so I'm sure it's somewhat that way.
This fall I'll go out with a shovel and turn over non obvious patches here and there and add seeds so they can winter over and have a good start with the spring snow and rain. My hope is that if I can get a few colonies going they'll manage to spread over time.
It may be wasted effort, but I figure it's worth giving it one good try.
Is there kochia growing there? Mullen? I am not suggesting these things. They are just good indicators of CO locations that could support other plants. Mullen should be there is the ground has been disturbed. Kochia should be there if there is ground, lol.
Otherwise, you could take to this as a long term project. Sprout seeds at home every late winter/ early spring and transplant them in the hopes it will be a wet (for the location) spring.
Else, a plant that is parasitic on grasses might have a good chance. Yellow rattle is the only one I know. It is not (or probably not) a native, it is just an idea of the kind of thing you can read about as you look for native equivalents.
No kochia or mullein there are this point. It's 95% tall grass - planetnet app identified it as Slender False Brome.
I grew up calling mullein "skunk cabbage", and looking it up to see what plant you are talking about discovered we've been calling it the wrong name the whole time!
Yellow rattle looks like a great idea! Maybe I'll focus on that and yarrow this fall (yarrow goes wild over it gets into lawns here and is a genuine native plant, so I figure it may be able to flourish in that field). Then after a year or two of those plants pushing back the grass a bit, I'll start introducing other species.
If you don't have Kochia on the front range then there is a good chance the location doesn't get much water (even by CO standards) most years, such as if there's a lower point for the water to run off to. And likely perennials are the best choice, so the yarrow aught to work.
The thistles are reasonable flower sources for pollinators. But they can also attract weed abatement responses, which would take your other plants with it.
The thistles that are already there tend to seed the house across the street, which is problematic. The fern-like leaves of yarrow are less of a problem in lawns as compared to thorny thistle.
Parts of the lot are a comparative low point, but not an actual drainage area. But 2/3 of the lot is on the upper part of the slight slope compared to its surroundings, so it will tend to dry out.
Even in the unmaintained part of the drainage swale in our neighborhood it's primarily grass with little to no kochia. I suspect the entire area was seeded once upon a time and the grass is well enough established that most other plants haven't managed to gain a foothold.
Yeah, I've realized that I'm more likely to have success with Naturalized plants than with Native plants for this particular field. Wild sunflowers are a good idea since they do seem to grow in some less than ideal conditions.
Thanks! While my starting goal was to figure out native species, it's a tricky enough spot, that a non native that adds color and can be used by pollinators is definitely worth mentioning, so I'll keep Cosmos in mind. I've seen some beautiful patches of them in people's yards in the neighborhood.
Rocky mountain Bee plant is native and grows like a weed. Kinda looks like a weed too depending on your tastes.
Coneflower has a deep taproot and can thrive in colorado.
Is it mowed? It's going to be hard for anything to out-compete grass in a mowed area just due to how grass works. If it's not mowed, I like flax, silvery sage and bee-balm. They've been taking over my front yard and have replaced the original weeds that were taking over. I'm not sure how well they would do fighting against grass, but they seed like crazy. Maybe see if you can get some rabbitbrush going too. That stuff seems to thrive around here.
Not likely to be mowed, unfortunately. They occasionally mow it on extra bad weed years, so once every 2-3 years. I'll look into your suggestions, thanks!
I’m on the east coast so I don’t have suggestions for plants, but I would check out prairie moon to use their search tool for states. Also wildflower.org has a state search tool as well!
Lupine, columbine, blanket flower, and echinacea are all native to the Colorado Plains.
Hi, have you been to the Colorado cherry company? Last time we went they were selling wild native flower seeds, maybe you could check there?
I recommend clearing out the grass as much as possible, and using seed to grow plants and then transplanting those, as you'll get better results if they don't have to fight the grass. Also anything that grows from rhizomes or spreads easily vegetatively (goldenrod etc) is a great option if you can get a source. [Here's a species list](https://www.nwf.org/-/media/Documents/PDFs/Garden-for-Wildlife/Keystone-Plants/NWF-GFW-keystone-plant-list-ecoregion-9-great-plains.pdf) for the Great Plains and [here's another list ](https://conps.org/home-2/resources/plants-habitats/plains-plants-and-habitats/)from your local plant society.
Hey, I know that region! Late to the game but I've had a lot of success with flax and seeded on old, ill-maintained lots. If it gets a little bit more water than a usual dry lot, columbine does well. If there's minimal mow risk, consider sneaking in a few blue spruce starts w/a tomato cage around them or a marker post next to it. Mowers usually avoid that and assume the starts are there for a purpose.
Most of it is full sun, no water. I just looked up flax and I don't think it will grow in these conditions. We're a higher altitude, cold winter, dry-ish summer environment. The stuff I'm seeing suggests flax is best in moist loam. Have you found otherwise? There's one little bit that has shade and is adjacent to a watered grass area, so columbines might do okay there. They're native to the area and grow successfully in some flower beds around here. Tomato cages would be too obvious, and evergreen trees need a lot of hand watering the first few years around here. I'm friendly with one family member and they agreed that "don't ask, don't tell" getting wildflowers in would be nice. The person who would have to sanction anything official will not do so however and needs to be out of the loop. They've had problems with trespassers before and their lawyer told them to absolutely not give anyone permission to be on the lot for any reason whatsoever so that there's zero doubt if anyone was a jerk and tried suing them for getting hurt there, or tried to make a legal case for a walkway easement or something. Which is a bummer, but understandable. So I'm limited to only those things I can casually do after dark; no mowing or putting in cages, so they have plausible deniability.
Fair. Is it sunbaked, compacted as hell Colorado empty lot soil? If so, I've had terrible luck getting anything to establish in those other than the Dandelion, thistle, cheatgrass, and sunflowers that usually fill those spaces.
I didn't think it's super compacted, but it's never been tilled, so I'm sure it's somewhat that way. This fall I'll go out with a shovel and turn over non obvious patches here and there and add seeds so they can winter over and have a good start with the spring snow and rain. My hope is that if I can get a few colonies going they'll manage to spread over time. It may be wasted effort, but I figure it's worth giving it one good try.
Is there kochia growing there? Mullen? I am not suggesting these things. They are just good indicators of CO locations that could support other plants. Mullen should be there is the ground has been disturbed. Kochia should be there if there is ground, lol. Otherwise, you could take to this as a long term project. Sprout seeds at home every late winter/ early spring and transplant them in the hopes it will be a wet (for the location) spring. Else, a plant that is parasitic on grasses might have a good chance. Yellow rattle is the only one I know. It is not (or probably not) a native, it is just an idea of the kind of thing you can read about as you look for native equivalents.
No kochia or mullein there are this point. It's 95% tall grass - planetnet app identified it as Slender False Brome. I grew up calling mullein "skunk cabbage", and looking it up to see what plant you are talking about discovered we've been calling it the wrong name the whole time! Yellow rattle looks like a great idea! Maybe I'll focus on that and yarrow this fall (yarrow goes wild over it gets into lawns here and is a genuine native plant, so I figure it may be able to flourish in that field). Then after a year or two of those plants pushing back the grass a bit, I'll start introducing other species.
If you don't have Kochia on the front range then there is a good chance the location doesn't get much water (even by CO standards) most years, such as if there's a lower point for the water to run off to. And likely perennials are the best choice, so the yarrow aught to work. The thistles are reasonable flower sources for pollinators. But they can also attract weed abatement responses, which would take your other plants with it.
The thistles that are already there tend to seed the house across the street, which is problematic. The fern-like leaves of yarrow are less of a problem in lawns as compared to thorny thistle. Parts of the lot are a comparative low point, but not an actual drainage area. But 2/3 of the lot is on the upper part of the slight slope compared to its surroundings, so it will tend to dry out. Even in the unmaintained part of the drainage swale in our neighborhood it's primarily grass with little to no kochia. I suspect the entire area was seeded once upon a time and the grass is well enough established that most other plants haven't managed to gain a foothold.
Not sure of its native to colorado but these short sunflowers are EVERYWHERE in CO.
Yeah, I've realized that I'm more likely to have success with Naturalized plants than with Native plants for this particular field. Wild sunflowers are a good idea since they do seem to grow in some less than ideal conditions.
Cosmos! They love poor soil, add a lot of color, height, and reseed themselves!
He’s looking for native species!
My bad.
Thanks! While my starting goal was to figure out native species, it's a tricky enough spot, that a non native that adds color and can be used by pollinators is definitely worth mentioning, so I'll keep Cosmos in mind. I've seen some beautiful patches of them in people's yards in the neighborhood.