What kind of area are you naturalizing? There are lots of robust native plants, surely you can find some suited to your soil, sun and moisture conditions. Tell us what effect you are after and we can suggest some.

I agree with Judy -- the best place to look for 'robust plants suitable for naturalizing' is in the local native flora. These plants have proven their adaptiveness by maintaining their populations under local soil, climate, and moisture regimes, and they have occupied a niche within the local plant community. Although non-native plants like the one you mention may indeed do well under your local conditions, the problem often is, they may do TOO well!

It grows well on Manitoulin. It needs dry sun, and spreads by forming mats of plants. It may not grow where you are because of local conditions, but, as it grows in Ontario, I don't see why it wouldn't grow in NY, if you have a prairie or alvar sort of area. However, I think there may be other plants you might find work well. What kind of conditions do you have?

By nature the soil in this part of central NY tends to be a stony acidic clay. Bedrock (slate, bluestone) is usually close to the surface. Spring is usually rainy, summers we sometimes have mild droughts. Winters the temp only rarely gets into negative numbers. Today it's -15F. at the site.

The area in question is a gentle south facing slope. It is in between three buildings and a parking lot. The parking lot is to the south so the area gets good light. Because of the buildings I assume that all of the area has been driven on and compacted and may be partly leftover material from construction. There are a few small private sidewalks running across the area.

Around 5-6 years ago the entire area was planted with store bought sod. I am told that the sod was watered in and established properly. Jump forward to today and the sod can only be detected as a thin line of topsoil at the surface. It didn't last. Dandelions, plantain, and things I only recognize as "weeds" now dominate the area. In some spots even the weeds grow thinly, with open dirt between them.

There is a line of weed maples along the north edge that I tolerate, even though I know they will steal my nutrients. I have put in some hybrid lilacs along the north edge. My goal there is that there will be a band of purple running in front of the trees in spring.

This is not a good location for a real hard core prairie. The climax vegetation around here is normally trees, not grasses. The field is small, less than an acre, and I have been going at it in sections.

There is to much social pressure for me to allow anything that looks ragged or untended. I figure I'll have bold patches of color for people driving along in the parking lot and various small plants right in the lawn for people on the sidewalks.

I think what I am aiming at is somewhere in between "lawn" and "Meadow". From a distance I want it to look neat and green, up close I'm going for as much variety and flowers as I can. I'm willing to fuss with it to get it up and running, but don't want to be a slave to my project forever. I think if I do it well it should be able to continue on without me for some time.

Last year I used shade to kill off a section, rototilled it, pulled out the largest rocks and construction debris, and made something resembling a large lasagna bed or sheet composting project. Anything that fell into my hands got composted there. Towards fall I tilled it all together and put in some daylily beds, sowed grass and white clover everywhere else.

I already have some lawn grass and white clover started here. I brought in thyme but am not sure it took. I had Scilla Sibericia but don't know if it will have survived being tilled. If not I'll bring them in again. I tilled to get things going and don't plan to make it a routine operation. Violets should do well over towards the maples so I will transplant some of them in next year. There are some daffodills along the north edge which I will encourage.

I also think the distinction between native and invader plants is probably academic in my situation. The whole area is hopelessly disturbed. 10,000 years ago glaciers stripped the biosphere clean out of here. Right now american society is busy stirring things up with global warming, acid rain, construction, various obscure chemicals, and a whole raft of new plants bugs and animals. I figure they are now a permanent part of the landscape, the "new natives" if you will. Even the old natives have only been here for 10,000 generations or so, not that long as ecosystems go.

Nature will somehow deal with it all with or without me. I'm hoping to step in and shape my one little plot to be more pleasing to human sensibilities. I don't want it to require chemicals or water or pampering. I don't even want it to require me. I expect it will reliably get mown because it is in town, unless mowing goes out of fashion. Orange Hawkweed is one of the plants I am looking at for the site.

Anyhow, that's where I am. I have a modest budget, a free hand so long as I don't upset the neighbors, time and energy to do things well.

Comments anyone?

How are you going to manage the lawn grasses and flowering plants together? Is someone mowing the lawn and are the flowers in beds?

Lawn grasses look unkempt if not mowed and will invade flower beds. Native short grasses do not grow taller than 2 to 3 feet, grow in clumps not as sod, have attractive leaves, flowerheads and seed heads and good fall/winter colour. I would think that a short grass prairie mix would serve your low maintainence, look good demands. See Prairie Moon catalogue for their inexpensive Short Grass Mix. It includes short grasses and a dozen or so flowering plants for all summer colour and attractive winter seeds.

Here is a link that might be useful: Prairie Moon Nursery.

I love this plant. I first noticed it last summer around the Duluth, MN area by Lake Superior. There it grows by the millions in areas of full sun, thin soil and even in areas of mostly shade. The full sun, dry areas seem to suit it most. I did swipe three plants to try in my garden and despite their tiny damaged root system, they established quickly. I'll have to see what becomes of them in the next growing season. Just to be clear about this, I have never transplanted any other native plants from the wild to my own garden.

You bet they're around Duluth and heading south. We're starting to find them as far south as the north metro (Anoka County, MN]. They are not native and are fairly aggressive. You may like them but your neighbors may not and these plants respect no property boundaries. I'm finding them invading high grade remnant fens with milkwort, pale blue lobelia and ragged fringed orchis and unfrtunately I know whos going to win. I recommend you spray them out now before its too late. I just see them becoming another orange dandelion. Then again there's a bulldozer parked on every corner in my neighborhood right now. Not much wins out against them. The last of the native remnants get hit with a double whammy. Development fragments the remaining native areas and exotics move in a gobble up any tidbit left over.

Yeah, invasive is right...we are finding them in Colorado as well now for the first time this year. They are definately on the must-get-rid-of-right-away list....thanks, but no thanks!!
Even if the area is hopelessly disturbed you can do yourself a favor by not planting a invasives-they will create more disturbance than what you have now.

AchenElf you say, "Just to be clear about this, I have never transplanted any other native plants from the wild to my own garden." The point is that Orange Hawkweed is not a native...You would have been better served swiping a common native from the wild instead of a non-native, invasive plant! Your first clue to a possible problem should have been "growing by the millions".

What he meant is that it was the middle of the ice age and NY state was under a glacier.

This species of Hawkweed, likes sunny well drained locations with minimal competition. It
spreads by way of runners and seeds. If you keep the grass cut low- it will move into the grass
and do well there. They do not like heavy wet soils or hot humid conditions.

In the west they are becoming a "problem" in some locations.

Bright attractive orange daisy like flowers over low growing hairy leaves.

Think two or three times before you put in hawkweed. I am having a very difficult time eliminating it from any area that I am restoring as an oak savannah. I am not sure, but I think that it is one of those plants (it is late at night and my brain is dead so I can't remember the word) that kills surrounding plants by giving off a chemical. It becomes a really thick ground cover. Pretty, yes. But at the expensive of loosing many other plants and ending up with a monoculture. A friend of mine recently bought some property that is queen anne's lace and hawkweed and nothing else. So becareful

I brought in some young Hawkeed plants this Summer. I had to get them in Summer so I could ID them. They took despite the season. It turns out that groundhogs love the flowers. They ate every one before they went to seed. I'm hoping for vegatative reproduction (or less groundhogs) next summer.

Yep I can see that they are a problem in some locations of the west, wisconsin for instance :-O

It's a designated noxious weed in WA, ID, MT, CO, and OR.

Ken
Unfortunately mowing also encourages vegetative spread, so consider yourself lucky to have those groudhogs to help spread it aroundfor you......

Bloomingthings, I found this info on control methods
When selective herbicides are applied in the spring and followed with nitrogen fertilizer, grass competition can keep this weed suppressed.

Hieracium does too well under grazing or mowing pressure. In winter it looks like a large area of frost-heave.

Apparently, in Europe it is used on those mounds they put along highways to reduce the noise - and it does very well despite the pollution.

In areas of native vegetation - tussock and shrubs - it prevents regeneration because it covers so thickly seeds cannot reach the ground.

It tolerates low rainfall areas (10-20"), dry summer heat and sharp frosts. It is an absolute menace in drylands pastures, though it barely registers in a decent sward. If I had to choose between wilding pines and Hieracium - I'd have the pines, thanks.

Is there any room in your scheme for using glacial shingle as groundcover/mulch? (I'm thinking of material such as thin pebbles of schist.) It would take the tread and perhaps improve the habitat for the establishment of local indigenous plants/grasses.

yellow hawkweed? How about indian paintbrush. It does well on manitoulin in "acidic clay" limestone and sandy soils. Despite the limestone, acidic plants do very well on Manitoulin. and the painbrush does quite well.

Krigia biflora looks like a hawkweed and it's native. It is sometimes called False Dandelion but it doesn't behave like a weed.

Holy Smokes! Please reconsider planting Orange Hawkweed. I live in Colorado, where we are just beginning what will be a long and losing fight to keep OHW from taking over what is left of the meadows after the knapweed, spurge and thistle gets through. Hawkweed was not here either 10000 years ago, but now it is, mostly because gardeners have let it get loose into the wild environment. It grows happily in wet or dry or sunny or shady environments, and if it is not happy, it seeds out anyway and spreads to a better place. It will make beautiful (as long as it is in flower) monoculture meadows that can support only goats (and maybe woodchucks). It will grow a mat that looks like something off the set of the Green Amoeba Eats Manhattan. It will take over lawns like Dandelions. It can't be controlled well with hand pulling or mowing, so the next thing you know, your neighbors will be dumping toxins on it. You could keep it in your garden by pulling the seed heads, but all you have to do is miss a sunny week and it will go from bud to flying seeds. Growing OHW is no challenge - why not work with your natives, instead of their noxious competitors?

Go with Prairie Moon if you haven't taken the advice already! I too thought about planting something that would have been a false example of beauty, a horrific monoculture of orange flowers that had no place in the ecosystem. real beauty comes from being able to listen to the land, look around at once was and what could be.

Thanks to Prairie Moon Nursery (Alan Wade)I got started on the right track. I was starting off just like you so I had to write in reply. I hope you have recosidered the European weed for a more democratic and natural beauty.

Good luck!

Just came across your request for orange hawkweed.

Wonder if you ever found a source for it? I had a plant in Connecticut and loved it. It was not invasive at all and very striking. However, when I moved I forgot to bring it with me and now am unable to find it again. Would love to have it.

pmfoster, I can get you some seeds or plants this summer. Send me an addy. After reading how other posters felt about it I have treated the plants with great caution, since in some places they are noxious. I have found is that it is already present and established in my area. I would speculate that I am in a climate that it finds marginal, because it does not dominate any of the spots where I have found it.

OMG... there are soo many comments here that I'd like to comment on but can't .. All I can say is, Don't Do It.
Alaska, being 'behind' in the development of as complex an ecosystem as most places in the lower 48, is just now beginning to see the introduction of noxious weeds from the lower 48. They are coming by foot, by pet, by motorhome and imported you name it! There really is no stopping of the tide but, if you have the choice...? I've seen what this weed can do in the harshest of environments. It takes over entire pastures if allowed. It's very difficult to eradicate once established because of its dandelion-like seed in the fall as well as it's rizome spreading habit. It's a survivor and dominates everything. Nothing up here likes to eat it (should we import some groundhogs? ;))
Don't be fooled by her good looks, she's a wicked witch.

I always lol when people want to kill plants and "eradicate them" I have them this year for the first time in my yard, 4 round spots about 3ft diameter. When I cut my grass I will cut around them, because there are a few things that I don't do, one is to put chemicals on my property and two is to kill anything that grows by itself. If those want to take over the yard, go for it...Nature has decided that those flowers grow, and so be it...although looking at my yard and at others I see many of those 2-3 feet rings this year... I wonder if someone was seed bombing the neighborhood... not big deal if they did, after all have done it many a times my self with wild flower seed bombs.

Evilynealaska, and who are you trying to mess with mother nature and its attempt to spread a species? Just because you don't like it and people are considering it a noxious weed doesn't mean it doesn't have a right to exist.

You, John Cunliffe, harbor a very dangerous attitude.

Apparently you knowledge of ecology is not only lacking, it's completely non-existent. I suggest you look up the meaning of terms like "monoculture" and "trophic cascades" and you very much need to look into how seriously detrimental invasive weeds are entire ecosystems, resulting in a loss of insect and animal habitat and causing decline of species in these areas. Plants like orange hawkweed destroying native plant communities is not in any way, shape, or form mother natures attempt to spread a species. Introduction of exotic plants is completely a side effect of human activity, either by accident or on purpose.

"I wonder if someone was seed bombing the neighborhood... not big deal if they did, after all have done it many a times my self with wild flower seed bombs."

If your are knowingly and purposefully spreading invasive species into wild areas, you deserve to be at least cited, if not prosecuted.

Funny thing about this old thread-when we lived in the western U.P. of Michigan back in 78/79, there was orange hawkweed everywhere. I liked it at first, mainly because I didn't have much awareness about the issues raised by exotic invasive plant species. So, if anyone would like to feast their eyes on masses of orange hawkweed, I suggest a tour of the area around Watersmeet/Paulding, MI. That latter "town" BTW is two houses, a bar and a general store/post office/gas pump, so don't blink!

+om

Well shoot Tom, they got a bar, what else do you want?

Hey, Agoseris aurantiaca looks really similar to orange hawkweed, though with the common name of "mountain dandelion" not sure if anyone wants to plant that in their yard lol.

Spent one very strange night in that bar, shooting pool with two old loggers, my wife and I. It rained that night....and rained....and rained some more, the entire area becoming flooded by morning. That next day was my final day of work for the summer up there, and me and one of the fulltime guys drove around as best we could, looking at folks fishing in the ditches, etc, the entire area having become one waterway. Strange days....and very long-ago days too, I might add!

+oM

I've experienced smoking dried leaves quite an experience at first the feeling is quite nice upward feeling then after about an hour the feeling changes into a down slide which isn't bad but kind of feels like a whitey experience when you've had your first joint lol.

This plant can be Devilish believe me.

Use only very small bits of the leaf I mean small just to see what you think W.

Good Luck

Stay Safe

C.D.