Registration is now open for the St. Louis Native Plant Garden Tour on Saturday, June 20 from 9 AM to 3 PM. Take a self-guided tour of 10 residential native plant gardens in central St. Louis County. Various locations in Brentwood, Clayton, Glendale, Kirkwood, Webster Groves and more. Sun, shade, butterflies,…
Years ago, Kathy Bildner taught herself how to identify monarch butterfly eggs on her milkweed plants. Each spring through fall, in order to save them from hungry birds, spiders, parasites, etc. she brings the eggs indoors to go through their life cycle. When they become butterflies, she releases them in her…
If you have some Aristolochia macrophylla in your yard, I’m hoping you might want to share some tendrils with the pipevine swallowtail caterpillars that are rapidly depleting my plants. Actually, I am rapidly depleting my pipevine plants to feed about 45 caterpillars. They were rescued as tiny orange eggs or…
By Scott Barnes At the June yard tour, Dave Tylka talked about a caterpillar that ate all the leaves on his Indigo plant last year. I had the same problem, and was surprised to learn I wasn’t alone. The caterpillar belongs to the Broom Moth. I looked them up and learned…
By Kathy Bildner This female Monarch was very busy jumping from unopened flower to flower. I thought she was looking for nectar but was not succeeding so moved on quickly. Looking closer, I saw the eggs. I have never seen them put the eggs on a flower. Usually it is…
According to a recent press release from Mayor Francis Slay’s office, the City of St. Louis, as part of a national campaign to save the threatened monarch butterfly, is spearheading an initiative to help grow the monarch population. How? Plant milkweed. Monarch butterflies only lay their eggs on milkweed, and the caterpillars…
by Betty Struckhoff 2014 is the third year of Bring Conservation Home, a program encouraging homeowners to support our local ecosystem by using more native plants in their landscapes. BCH is sponsored by St. Louis Audubon and St. Louis Wild Ones is a supporting partner of the program. For a nominal fee, two…
Nature Night at the Center for Creative Learning in Rockwood School District was a recent event for second grade students who had been studying nature and would be designing a Play Naturescape that could be put in their own back yards. Wild Ones members Ann Early and Bob Siemer set…
By Amy Redfield Scott Barnes once drove four hours – each way – to get some horsetail plants. His very first solo garden would not be complete without the plant that had fascinated him as a child in the fields near his home. That horsetail, and that fascination, have stayed with him everywhere…
President Ed Schmidt welcomed 19 members and one guest to this month’s yard tour and meeting. Three members of the Chesterfield Citizens Committee for the Environment also attended the yard tour. The Committee’s participation was a key reason for Chesterfield being chosen as the location for the 2011 Landscape Challenge….
