Rewilding My Lot

In front of the house, the area that would otherwise be a front lawn is instead a seasonal wildflower meadow. It is mown during the winter, but allowed to grow taller from about March to November.

During the first few weeks of the meadow emerging in spring, almost all of the blooms were Texas Bluebonnets (Lupinus texensis).

Now that we are in mid-April, many of those bluebonnets have completed their blooming cycle and are now starting to make seeds. (If I want bluebonnets next year, I must allow those plants to blacken and drop their seeds before clearing them away, so they will look “ugly” for a while.)

In addition to the bluebonnets, I can now start to see other wildflowers emerging in the meadow. Some have been introduced by me and some are volunteers. Here’s what I’ve identified so far…

These plants were introduced (by transplant or seed):

• Blue Curls (Phacelia congesta)
• Drummond’s Phlox (Phlox drummondii)
• Firewheel aka Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella)
• Lemon Beebalm aka Purple Horsemint (Monarda citriodora)
• Mexican Hat (Ratibida columnifera)
• Pink Evening Primrose (Oenothera speciosa)
• Common Coreopsis ‘Early Sunrise’ (Coreopsis grandiflora ‘Early Sunrise’)
• Purple Prairie Clover (Dalea purpurea)
• Winecup, annual (Callirhoe leiocarpa)

And these have volunteered:

• Bracted Fanpetals (Sida ciliaris)
• Golden Tickseed (Coreopsis basalis)
• Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja indivisa)
• Lazy Daisy (Aphanostephus skirrhobasis)
• Roadside Gaura (Oenothera suffulta)
• Smallflower Desert-Chicory aka Texas Dandelion (Pyrrhopappus pauciflorus)
• Yellow Sweetclover (Melilotus officinalis) — not native, but it does have soil-healing properties

This time is a nice transition phase between the mass of bluebonnets and the diversity of what follows. As the year progresses, other plants will become apparent as well.

Here are a few photographs, all taken on April 15, 2026. They are not always the prettiest specimens in the meadow, but I try not to walk through that area any more than I have to and these are more likely to be near the edge.

Golden Tickseed…

Lemon Beebalm…

Yellow Sweetclover…

Purple Prairie Clover…

Winecup…

Common Coreopsis…

Firewheel…

Lazy Daisy…

And this is an Indian Paintbrush, which has volunteered near the meadow but on the wrong side of the driveway. They don’t transplant well, so later I’ll try to capture mature seeds to drop in the meadow area.