by Katherine Darrow \u2022 April 2024 marks the 20th year that Washington State has continued a resolution
\nrecognizing the many values and benefits of native plants. What started as a week in 2004, has
\nexpanded to a month since 2021, when our Governor first signed a resolution declaring April as
\nNative Plant Appreciation Month (NPAM).<\/p>\n
This year\u2019s NPAM theme is Prairie Preservation, promoting conservation and education about the remaining fragments of wild prairie. Across North America, prairies are some of the most endangered ecosystems. In Washington, less than 10% of prairie lands that existed prior to European colonization remain.<\/p>\n
There are two broad categories of prairie in Washington: the Palouse prairie and Westside
\nprairies. The Palouse are those found on the east side of the Cascade Mountains in the Columbia
\nBasin. These prairies have largely been replaced by wheat fields and other commercial crops.
\nWestside prairies are found south and west of the Cascade Mountains, mostly in South Puget
\nSound. All of these areas are classified as \u201ccritically imperiled\u201d due to continuing encroachment
\nof urban and agricultural development. Conserving our prairie lands requires that we limit human
\nactivities within and around them to prevent continued fragmentation and loss of these
\nenvironmentally sensitive ecosystems.<\/p>\n
In east Jefferson County, we are extremely fortunate to have two remaining prairie
\nfragments on public lands. One is located at Marrowstone Point in Fort Flagler State Park. This
\nis a coastal wetland prairie, and is frequently flooded by high tides and winter storms. In early
\nspring, showy patches of bright pink sea blush are the first to bloom, followed by fritillaries,
\npurple larkspur, and two kinds of biscuitroot, all in a matrix of grasses and sedges.
\nThe other is our beloved Kah Tai Prairie Preserve, a less than 2-acre patch of upland
\nprairie located within the Port Townsend Golf Park that is managed jointly by the City Parks &
\nRecreation Department and Washington Native Plant Society (WNPS). The Preserve features
\nblue camas, which is closely related to asparagus. The bulbs of camas are highly valued by
\nindigenous people of the area, who have tended native prairies for thousands of years for this
\nimportant food source.<\/p>\n
Because of the importance of camas and other native plants growing at Kah Tai Prairie,
\nthis grassland is recognized as an area of cultural significance. An interpretive sign explaining
\nthe cultural history of Kah Tai Prairie, as well as another at the nearby statue of \u010di\u010dm\u0259h\u00e1n
\n(pronounced cheech-ma-han), aka Chief Chetzemoka, are testimony to the importance of the golf
\npark landscape, which was part of an extensive camas prairie that stretched across the Quimper
\nPeninsula prior to the 1850\u2019s.<\/p>\n
Today, introduced plant species and development pressures continue to threaten this
\necosystem. Fortunately, new management plans by Friends of the Port Townsend Golf Park aim to restore native plant communities along the course, using sustainable maintenance practices
\nthat reduce the need for water, herbicides, and mowing.
\nWith regard to gardening, the Garden Club of America (GCA) encourages \u201cprivate and
\npublic landowners to increase the size of existing native habitats and replace lawn areas with
\nnative plant ecosystems.\u201d While it might be difficult for home gardeners to re-create a fully
\nfunctioning prairie in their yard, there are many prairie species that could be included in an
\nornamental or food garden.<\/p>\n
There are dozens of native plant species that grow in our region\u2019s natural prairies. Here
\nare a few representatives from prairies on the Olympic Peninsula that are commonly available at
\nregional garden centers. All of these species are easy to grow when planted in sunny places with
\ndry, gravelly soils similar to native prairies:\u00a0 Roemer\u2019s fescue (Festuca roemeri): Grasses are the foundation of any prairie ecosystem.\u00a0 Fescue is a bunch grass, so won\u2019t make a very good lawn, but works well as an accent in ornamental gardens.\u00a0 Common camas (Camassia quamash) & Great camas (Camassia liechtlinii): Two of Washington\u2019s native camas species are propagated for the horticultural market and can be found as seeds, bulbs, or potted plants at many garden centers. The chestnut-sized bulbs of both can be used as food, but need to be cooked first, similar to potato.
\nFritillary (Fritillaria affinis): Because of their dark maroon petals, they are sometimes also called chocolate lily, but don\u2019t taste anything like chocolate! The bulbs of these lilies come apart in small pieces resembling rice, giving them another common name, riceroot. Like camas, they are also edible after cooking. Biscuitroot (Lomatium nudicaule & L. utriculata): There are more than 40 kinds of
\nbiscuitroot native to Washington. On the Quimper Peninsula, these two species are found in our
\nprairie remnants. They are members of the parsley family and have sweet smelling edible seeds.
\nWoolly sunflower (Eriophyllum lanatum): Long after blue camas has gone to seed, bright
\nyellow blossoms of woolly sunflower bloom at Kah Tai Preserve. These are shrubby perennials
\nthat can grow to three feet in diameter, and are easily propagated with cuttings.<\/p>\n
Whatever your gardening ambitions, WNPS and GCA discourage collecting from the
\nwild, where roots and seeds of native plants are necessary to continue their role in a healthy
\nundeveloped ecosystem. However, if there is permission to salvage native plants due to
\nimpending development, this is ethically congruent with a conservation mission to preserve and
\nprotect the remaining wild places and their flora. Otherwise, it is best to purchase from garden
\nclubs and nurseries that propagate natives professionally, or trade seeds and cuttings with other
\nnative plant gardeners.<\/p>\n
There are numerous books and other resources available on-line and in local bookstores
\nabout how to propagate and grow native plants appropriate for your landscape. Learn more about
\ngardening with native plants and NPAM events in Washington at https:\/\/www.wnps.org<\/p>\n
This article first appeared in the Port Townsend Leader April 10, 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Katherine Darrow \u2022 April 2024 marks the 20th year that Washington State has continued a resolution recognizing the many values and benefits of native plants. What started as a week in 2004, has expanded to a month since 2021, when our Governor first signed a resolution declaring April as Native Plant Appreciation Month (NPAM). […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":6850,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","classic-edited"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6849"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6853,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6849\/revisions\/6853"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jcmgf.myparkpack.com\/mg2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}