The Gardener's Guide to Prairie Plants

I love everything about this book! It has all the information I need for growing natives in one book! Each plant is given 2 pages. On those 2 pages, there is small a map that shows the range of the plants, Brief description of Habitat and Garden uses, USDA Hardiness Zones, Light requirements, soil types, Soil moisture, Bloom time, Flower color, Height, Life expectancy, Root type, Propagation, Aggressiveness, Attracts. Deer Palatability, and Distinguishing Characteristics. The second page has pictures of what the plant looks like as a seedling, emerging mature plant, leaf, flower, mature seed, and the entire plant. At the bottom of the seconds page there is a brief discussion of look-alike plants. The plants are in alphabetical order by scientific name. Not to fear, the index is excellent and includes the plants common names. If that's not enough for you, it includes sections on Establishing a Prairie Meadow, Burning your prairie, Propagation, Prairie food web, Prairie seed mixes with 12 tables, and 30 other additional and useful tables.This book is well worth the money. Thank you Neil Diboll and Hilary Cox for a book that puts everything I need in one usable and useful book

I am trying to increase the number of native plants in my North Carolina home's yard. This is a convenient guide to many of the native plants in the midwest and adjacent areas. As you might expect, the guide discusses where each species is found as well as the appropriate cultivation information. The best thing about this guide is that it includes photographs at different stages of growth for each plant. This is invaluable when starting native plants from seed in a garden - now you can distinguish the desired plant seedlings from weeds.

As a professional fine gardener, land manager, and garden designer, my professional advice is: BUY THIS BOOK. It has earned a place on my desk as a go-to resource for good reason.I live on the east coast and hesitated at first because of the word "Prairie" in the title, but many (most?) of the plants that are included in the book are native not only to areas east of the Mississippi, but also to some areas just west of it. (Southern gardeners will find many, but a few less, plants that are native to their region than northern gardeners; west coast gardeners would find only a scattering of plants).This is not a "magazine masquerading as a book." Neil Diboll and Hilary Cox spent 22 years writing the single most useful guide to native plants I have seen. (Who spends 22 years writing a book? They did!) Each author brings dirty hands (in all good ways) to the book, with plantsman and ecologist Neil Diboll sharing decades of experience both growing native plants commercially as an owner of prairienursery.com and installing prairies and gardens, and Hillary Cox as an avid botanizer, recognized garden designer and fine gardener. They know the plants, they know the gardeners' goals, and they have lived the challenges with using them and working with them. The Gardeners' Guide to Prairie Plants is one of those rare books that is also comes across as a life's work, an opus, a book that will stand the test of time. ("Gardener's Encyclopedia" might have captured its thoroughness better.)Section 5 of the book -- a main section -- is arranged like a field guide with species-by-species identification and information pages that are useful for a multiplicity of tasks (propagating or sowing a meadow (photos of seedlings), seed saving (photos of immature and mature seedbeds), or planning a garden or something larger). Each description also includes native range maps, tips on aggressiveness, life expectancy and the type of root the plant has (tap root, rhizomes, fibrous) -- information that can be hard to come by all in one place. Probably this will be the motivating section for many who buy the book, yet there is much, much more. There is information on working with old agricultural fields, former lawns, or disturbed soil; advice on seed starting, on doing safe burns, on post-planting weed control. There is background on prairie geology and prairie ecology.To understand how thoroughly and thoughtfully the book has been written, do not overlook the 200+ pages of tables at the back of the book, with headings like "Plants Listed by Root Type" and "Common Weeds in Prairie Seedings" or "Easy to Divide Prairie Plants" "Prairie Plants for Semi Shade" "Maintenance Cost of Prairie vs. Lawn" or -- as an example of HOW detailed -- "Yellow Flowers, By Soil Moisture" (also "purple and lavender" and "red, pink and orange" by soil moisture!).I have spent hours and hours collating information from a variety of sources in order to assemble in one place all of the necessary information to design with native plants. The book for me is a great time saver, and a reliable resource. I use it increasingly often. It is well worth getting and really poring it over, because it is hard to fathom at a casual glance exactly how much utility is built into this field guide sized book.One of my standards for buying books for years has been, "Is it reference quality book with lasting value?" The Gardener's Guide to Prairie Plants I believe is destined to be recognized as a reference classic.

I was looking for good information on how to incorporate grasses into garden design and this fit the bill nicely.

Beautiful book, written by experts, and very helpful as I continue to grow my native plants garden. But as another reviewer said, I can’t find the legend for the range map colors, wondering if I got a misprint copy? I can look on USDA site but kinda defeats the purpose of having the info in one reference.

It was everything I could hope for honestly

20 years in the making, this book is the ultimate guide for native plant gardeners. This is the only book with photos of each plant, from tiny seedlings to entire mature plants. And that's just the start. 25 tables of information. History & ecology of the prairie. Easy to use. It's a must have.

Unfortunately, hard to use. Oh, for a more detailed table of contents. Apparently the plants are grouped by genus (only mentioned on the first page of each). I couldn't find an explanation of the colors on the range maps, either.