SPRING FLOWERS ON LAWNS

      From mid-February to the middle of May in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, many short-grass lawns have beautiful bouquets of flowers on common feral, or wild, plants, which make those lawns more interesting.  Most of these plants are from Eurasia, but a few species are native to North America.  All of them are adapted to short-grass lawns with their regular mowing, and ample sunlight.  And some kinds of these plants feed various species of adaptable wildlife.      

     Some of these plants, like Veronicas and yellow wood sorrel, are so tight to the soil that mower blades miss cutting them.  Some plants, like dandelions , grow rapidly between weekly mowings.  And other kinds of wild, lawn plants grow, flower and go to seed before mowing time.  These are all ways of living, seeding and spreading on regularly mowed lawns.

     Snowdrops with white, bell-shaped flowers, winter aconites that have yellow blossoms, scilla with their blue blooms and glories-in-the-snow that sport pale-purple flowers are originally from Eurasia, but were commonly planted as bulbs on many short-grass lawns.  These adaptable plants bloom from mid-february, into March, a time when we need nature's beauties.  All these lovely species of flowers spread across the lawns they were introduced to, and looking as though they are wild flowers poking through the short grass at random.  These plants blossom before mowing begins.

     In March and April, great and small carpets of Veronicas with tiny, pale-blue flowers, purple dead nettles that have pink blossoms, yellow wood sorrels and Indian strawberries with yellow flowers, and ground ivy that have purple blossoms, bloom and spread across many lawns, making them more beautiful and intriguing.  These wild plants are so low to the ground that mower blades don't cut them off, allowing them to go through their life cycles unimpeded.  Wood sorrels are the only natives of this grouping and Indian strawberry flowers produce a red, berry-like fruit with seeds on the outside of the fleshy fruit.  Some kinds of birds and rodents, and box turtles, eat those fruits.  Ground ivy, being a vine-like mint on the ground, broadcasts a strong mint scent when its leaves are injured.

     Alien common dandelions and native blue violets carpet many lawns in April and May with cheery, yellow and lovely, purple flowers respectively.  Dandelions quickly grow seed stems between mowings, therefore, getting many seeds into the breeze, each one carried by its own fluffy parachute away from parent plants.  Many dandelion seeds are ingested by mice and a variety of sparrows and finches.

     Cottontail rabbits and wood chucks consume the leaves and flowers of dandelions and violets on many lawns.  These creatures add more interest to many a back yard.  

     Grape hyacinths with small, purple, round flowers hanging in bunches like grapes on a vine and lily-of-the-valley plants with little, white blossoms are aliens from Eurasia.  Both these species bloom in April and May, and spread greatly from where they were introduced to soil.  I have seen whole lawns carpeted, wall to wall, with blooming grape hyacinth plants.  And lily-of-the-valley colonizes many flower gardens.

     White clover and star-of-Bethlehem with white blooms and cat's-ears that have yellow blossoms bloom on many lawns in May.  White clover is a great source of nectar for bees and other kinds of pollinating insects all summer.  When white clover blossoms are cut off by mowers, week after week, all summer, clover vegetation simply grows new flowers, week after week, all summer, providing nectar all that time.  I have seen whole lawns white with the innumerable white clover blossoms.

     All these flowering, low-to-the-ground plants beautify many lawns, and make them more intriguing.  And certain kinds of adaptable wildlife benefit from that same vegetation by ingesting parts of it.  This spring, look at your lawn more closely, with an unbiased eye, to see the beauties of those flowered, human-made habitats.   

       

     

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

SPOT-BREASTED LOOK-ALIKES

      Ovenbirds, wood thrushes and brown thrashers nest in woods and thickets in Pennsylvania, and throughout much of the eastern United States.  And while nesting there, these species of unrelated song birds feed mostly on invertebrates they catch on forest floors.        Interestingly, these three kinds of birds that share woodland nesting habitats have brown feathering on top, but white underparts, streaked with black spots.  Those plumage color patterns on both genders of each species camouflages them on woodland floors of dead-leaf carpets as they feed.         Each of these woodland species has its own niche, which allows each one to raise young in much the same environments as the others, with minimal competition for food.  Ovenbirds, which are a kind of warbler, generally nest in drier, maturing oak woods.  They place their unique, dead-leaf nursery on the dead-leaf-covered ground.  Each pa...
Read more

LATE NESTERS

     Three kinds of abundant birds in southeastern Pennsylvania, including mourning doves, American goldfinches and cedar waxwings, nest late in summer for a variety of reasons.  Most "song" birds in this area are done raising young by the middle of July, but these three adaptable species could be rearing offspring into early September as a result of being dependent on certain foods or nesting materials that are most abundant in late summer.       Each pair of handsome mourning doves raises two young per brood, but they "put-out" two young a month, on average, from March into September because they rear two broods at a time through the warmer months. Each pair of doves probably can only feed two young at a time because they regurgitate pre-digested seeds into the beaks of their offspring.  But they compensate for that by hatching chicks in spring and summer.       Each pair of doves starts a brood of young early in March....
Read more

CITY PEREGRINES

     Peregrine falcons are a stately kind of raptor that traditionally has nested in crevices high in rocky cliffs, particularly near rivers, throughout much of the world.  Unfortunately, their numbers in the United States had been depleted in the mid-twentieth century due to the use of DDT pesticides, shooting and egg collecting.  However, in recent decades, they have made a strong comeback in the United States, to the point that they seem relatively common these days.  DDT use is a thing of the past, peregrines are protected by laws and, most importantly, they have adapted to raising young on the ledges of tall buildings and under large bridges over rivers, places that must remind them of shelves on cliffs.  All those human-made nesting spots are in and near cities.        Furthermore, peregrines have also adapted to rearing offspring in nest boxes erected on cliffs, usually near rivers.  Their adjusting to hatching youn...
Read more