From Barren Lot to Pollinator Paradise

Lots of compost, native plants, and love have made this garden

My name is Barb Mrgich . I am a Master Gardener in Adams County , Pennsylvania , which is in Zone 6a .

My husband and I grease one’s palms our 3/8 - Akka lot in 1989 . The tidy sum was nearly stark of even weeds . After we build the home , I start engraft and have almost never turn back . I am a substantial believer in constituent gardening . I make a caboodle of compost , and we never bag our grass or folio . My garden is certified as a wildlife habitat by the National Wildlife Association , and as pollinator favorable by Penn State . I utilise as many native plants as I can but do not restrict myself to them .

This picture shows part of my pollinator garden . A tumid belt ofMonarda(bee balm ) dominates this area . Echinacea purpurea(purple coneflower ) , a jaundiced perennialHelianthus(sunflower ) , lily-white Shasta daisies ‘ Becky’(Leucanthemum × superbum‘Becky ’ Zones 5–9 ) , and a sort of native mountain mint(Pycnanthemum muticum , Zones 4–8 ) fill in a good morsel of existent estate . Behind the bee balm , a swampland milkweed(Asclepias incarnata , Zones 3–6 ) has just finished blossom .

Our entire property slopes toward the street . In rules of order to cease stormwater runoff , and to solve a grave mowing site , I built this retaining wall 17 years ago . get going to the left is a empurpled baptisia(Baptisia australis , Zones 4–8 ) that has just finish blossom and now search like a magnanimous shrub . It is a native plant . I buy it at a residential district center yard sale , and the helpful Boy Scouts had label it as a Purple Baptist ! The small - sizedHydrangea paniculata‘Dhruma ’ ( Zones 3–7 ) were difficult to find . They are now at their fledged height of 3 to 4 foot . The small yellow George Herbert Walker Bush areCaryopteris‘Sunshine Blue ’ ( Zones 5–9 ) and will cover themselves with blue flowers in August . The marvelous “ tree lilies ” are beautiful , but they do n’t last too long .

In early June our garden was featured on a garden tour , and we had about 150 people add up through . In summation to small ID labels on most of my plants , I used 10 of these signs to describe what was go on in the bed . This is a native milkweed(Asclepius tuberosa , Zones 3–9 ) that the monarchs love along with many other pollinator . Strutting its clobber behind the brass headboard isDeutzia‘Chardonnay Pearls ’ ( Zones 5–8 ) , which remains brilliant scandalmongering all season .

Clematis is always a popular vine . The big single create privacy on a large trellis . Here the purple ‘ Jackmanii ’ contrast nicely with the white ‘ Corinne ’ , which I prefer for its color and myopic size .

Another favorite clematis , ‘ Betty Corning ’ , flower all summertime if you keep it watered .

More of theDeutzia‘Chardonnay Pearls ’ contrasting nicely with nine bark ‘ summertime Wine’(Physocarpus opulifolius , Zones 2–9 ) .

A adorable combination : bellflowers(Campanula glomerata‘Superba ’ , Zones 3–8 ) beside old - fashioned peonies .

The beautiful and interesting peak of the eastern sweetshrub(Calycanthus floridus , Zones 4–9 ) , a shrub native to the eastern United States .

A monarch and an eastern swallowtail butterfly in the same picture . The plant life that draws them isTithonia(Mexican sunflower , yearly ) .

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