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DIGGING DEEPER: Getting to the Root of Your Gardening Questions By Sarah Bouboulis, PDE Habitat Project Coordinator Q. Fall is an excellent time to plant standard garden bulbs (tulips, daffodils, etc.), but are there bulbs for native plants that I can grow? — KATE, CAMDEN, DE
A: Great question! There are native plant bulbs that are great to
plant now, but the flowers won’t necessarily come up in the spring with your tulips. Think summer instead. There are a few native lilies that grow from bulbs — Turk’s-cap lily (Lilium superbum), Canada lily (Lilium canadense), and wood lily (Lilium philadelphicum). The first two are 4-to-5-feet tall with nodding flowers. They prefer shade and wetter soils. Wood lilies are only a few feet tall and can tolerate more sun and drier soils. AlTurk’s cap lily is a native flowering bulb you though they come up in the summertime, fall is a great time to plant can plant in your garden now. the bulbs of these beautiful flowers — if you can find them for sale! Squirrels and deer love the bulbs and plants, so you will need to do your best to keep the critters away. You may want to consider spring ephemerals like Dutchman’s breeches (Dicentra cucullaria), spring beauty (Claytonia virginica), and wake-robins (Trillium sps.). Spring ephemerals emerge before trees “leaf-out” to take advantage of the spring sun. They generally bloom and seed all within a few weeks. They can put on a fantastic spring show, particularly under some of your deciduous trees. Afterward, they die back in to the ground, and you may never know they are there until next spring. Be sure to plant some summer flowers nearby to fill the space. This article relates to the Delaware Estuary Program’s Comprehensive Conservation & Management Plan If you have a gardening question GOAL Sustain Flow for Drinking Water for Sarah, contact Sarah Bouboulis 3 and Ecosystems by clicking here where you can also subscribe to our quarterly publication, STRATEGY Conduct research and monitoring on Perennial Pages. S water quality and habitat requirements
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OUTREACH & EVENTS
Delaware River Festival: A Virtual Feast for the Eyes This has been a strange year, but that hasn’t stopped us from finding innovative ways to have fun, especially in celebrating the Delaware River. PDE was a proud partner of the 2020 Delaware River Festival with organizations including the Philadelphia Water Department, Center for Aquatic Sciences, Alliance for Watershed Education of the Delaware River, Camden County, and the Independence Seaport Museum. Instead of celebrating the Delaware River for one day, the festival offered a week of 60 free online and in-person events, including birding, kayaking, hikes, yoga, kite flying, a drive-in movie, panel discussions, demonstrations, stories, educational songs for children, and a live music concert. “Although we were disappointed that we could not hold our annual face-to-face celebration along the banks of the Delaware River in Philadelphia and Camden, all of the partners involved with planning the Festival did a fantastic job,” Kathy Klein, Executive Director of PDE, said. “I encourge people to to check out the robust virtual content created for the 2020 Festival that lives on at DelawareRiverFest.org.” We can’t wait for next year’s event This article relates to the Delaware Estuary Program’s Comprehensive Conservation & Management Plan to be just as spectacular! If you missed GOAL Improve Public Awareness & the online events, you could still watch 2 Stakeholder Engagement them through the Delaware River Festival’s YouTube channel here. A STRATEGY Utilize events to increase stewardship video of festival highlights is available C2.2 and engage new people by clicking here. S PARTNERSHIP FOR THE DELAWARE ESTUARY
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FALL 2020 | VOLUME 30 | ISSUE 4
