By Laura Ackerman
We all know the value of pollinators for commercial crops. But a backyard veggie garden helps pollinators, while also helping to feed you.
I plant my garden using open-pollinated seed. That seed grows true to original form, so it gets saved every year. Some plants - like squash - have flowers and then fruit, and you save the seeds from the fruit inside. Some plants - like greens - have flowers first and then seed. Since I save seed every year, I have to let some of my greens go to seed and not eat them. Most of the seeds that I save over and over are from heirloom veggies and flowers.
So if you save seed, you will benefit next year by having the seed and not having to buy it. Seed saved over and over gets more accustomed in the form of plants to your gardening microclimates and soil, and it really benefits the pollinators by letting it flower. I always appreciate a flower, no matter how small.
1. Onion flowers. 2. Various greens in flower. 3. Heirloom lettuces; Red Deer Tongue and Merveille de Quatre Saisons. 4. Ocean Spray, Holodiscus discolor
I let some of my onions stay in the ground and bloom the next year. In the photos above, you can also see the tip of a red swallowwort, Asclepias incarnata. It’s an old-fashioned flower and butterflies and other pollinators love it. It goes to seed every year in my various gardens and I leave it where it grows. I often just let plants bloom where they plant themselves. They do better and a mix of plants in all types of gardens is something I really love; in part because I am a bit of a lazy gardener.
Part of all my greens I let go to seed. If you have chickens, like I do, they love to eat greens as well so you can plant a little section for the birds if you want to.
The Ocean Spray is a wonderful and showy native plant that the pollinators love. It needs a bit of water on this side of the Cascades.
I have been out in the field monitoring train sidings to see what the short line railroads are storing. My findings will be part of a larger report.