Rewilding My Lot

In this second year of my “rewilding” project, I am using annual native flowers (seeded or volunteer) to cover most of the back yard. This “green mulch” approach allows me to capture water before it runs off, prevent soil erosion, improve soil health, and host wildlife visitors while I continue to make more long-term plans for the space.

Currently, most of the annual plants in the back yard are Firewheel aka Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella), Beach Sunflower (Helianthus debilis), and Common Sunflower (Helianthus annuus). Curiously, the Firewheels in the front meadow are shorter (1-2 ft) and bloomed earlier than the ones in the back yard, which are about a foot taller and bloomed later. I bought seeds for both locations from the same source.

These flowers are growing so well that in some cases they are crowding out other things. When that happens, I cut them down and lay the stems on the ground. I don’t pull them up because I don’t want to disturb the soil and I want the roots underground to decay and provide nutrients. The softer parts of the plants (leaves and flowers) above ground will also end up feeding the soil. The harder stems will not quickly compost on their own, so for now their function is to cover the soil until I figure out how to use them in the garden later as some form of mulch.

Here’s how the ground looks after the plants have been cut down. There are at least four stem clusters in this picture.

In the back left corner of the garden I have a wood pile with Frogfruit (Phyla nodiflora), a few Red Yuccas (Hesperaloe parviflora), and three little American Century Plants (Agave americana). The one Red Yucca bloom spike is now taller than my 62 inches and literally as I am drafting this post a hummingbird is feeding from it!

I needed to clear space in that area, especially around the tiny Agaves, so chopping happened.

Here’s the area after the work. Almost everything that I cut went back on the ground, although I did pull out and discard some Frogfruit that had travelled too far. The small tree in the center of the photo below is the Mexican Olive (Cordia boissieri) that I thought I might have lost in last winter’s freeze.