Over the last five years I’ve seen ornamental grasses go from being unique to common around my town. Most of the newer homes and businesses in my area of central Wyoming have some ornamental grasses. Even though I encourage friends to use grasses, and I was a fan from the start, I have shied away…
Author: wyominglife
We’ve Cheated Old Man Winter
Well, that’s the way I feel when I am walking on November 28th and there are bugs flying in the air around me and the native plants in my garden have turned green and resprouted. What a great feeling to have a day in the mid 50’s and no wind. It really is the best…
Groundwater Test Results in Pavillion, Wyoming
The EPA has released initial findings from ground water testing in the Pavillion, WY area. Pavillion residents have complained of contaminated drinking water wells for many years, suspecting fracture drilling, or fracking, is causing contamination. The EPA results can be found here. Their interpretation of these results should be forth coming in the next few…
Climate Challenges and Vegetable Gardening
I moved to Wyoming from the Midwest over 20 years ago. I thought I understood what ‘arid’ meant, but it took two failed vegetable gardens to really get through to me. Sunset’s Western Gardens does a pretty good job of describing our climate: “…this zone sees January temperatures from 0-12 degrees F with extremes between…
Wasn’t Poison Sumac After All
“It turns out the “poison sumac” (Rhus vernix) of my childhood, which I so diligently avoided, wasn’t poison sumac after all, although R. vernix does grow in Indiana.” This is from my reply to a comment from Steve at Portraits of Wildflowers. Steve reports Rhus trilobata grows in Texas, but Rhus lanceolata is more reliable…
Unique Color with Native Plant Scarlet Globemallow
Sometimes envisioning native plants in the home garden or landscape takes some imagination. That’s the case with Sphaeralcea coccinea, also called Desert Mallow, Cowboy’s Delight, and Scarlet Globemallow. This hardy little plant grows along gravel roads, in highway rights of way, and some of the driest habitats Wyoming has to offer, and folks, that is…
Rabbitbrush Native Shrub
Chrysothamnus, or Rabbit brush, is a common native shrub of Wyoming and much of the arid western US. Some of the species that I learned as Chrysothamnus are now in the genus Ericameria. The major difference being Ericameria is covered with tomentum, or a felt like covering of tangled hairs. Wyoming has four species of…
UW Hydroponic Greenhouse
University of Wyoming Grad student, Nate Storey, has designed and developed a hydroponic tower system for this greenhouse where fish, herbs, and vegetables are grown. The water circulates from fish tanks through media filled ‘towers’ made of PVC or poly pipe. The water has not been changed for years. “The biology just works,” says Storey….
First Snow
Yesterday we awoke to the first dusting of snow on Casper Mountain. It’s right on time. We usually see our first higher elevation snow by October 15. It heralds the coming of winter, but it won’t be a slow, steady, predictable arrival. In Wyoming the changing of seasons usually happens in fits and starts. I…
Wyoming Fall Colors Include Rhus
The fall colors of Wyoming are subtle, not like the brilliantly brushed hardwood forests of the eastern US. The shades of autumn in the Rockies are more muted with the dark olive evergreens, purple-grey slates, and reddish sandstones providing the back drop for pockets of glowing aspen and roadside ribbons of burning rabbitbrush. The fall…
Sedums, A Tough Beauty
As I have stated before, native plants are my passion as a gardener and landscaper, but I don’t promote the use of natives because I think it will save the world, or because hybridized and introduced species are evil. I plant, experiment with, talk about, and promote the use of native plants because I am…
Wyoming Life 