Gracie Latrelle

Tag: flowers

  • Flowers That Will Attract Hummingbirds to Your Garden!

    These are just a few of the many flowers that will attract hummingbirds to your backyard!

    1. Zinnias

    With their beautiful bright colors and tall stems, giant zinnias are a great add to any backyard flower garden when your trying to attract hummingbirds. Also dwarf zinnias are great as well and attract the hummingbirds just as much as the giant ones do!

    2. Red Salvia

    Salvia is one of my personal favorites to add to the pollinator garden as not only does their bright red appearances make your garden pop but the red color also helps attract the hummingbirds to your garden!

    3. Geraniums

    This one I call the “stinky plant” and I’ll explain why in the minute. Just like salvia their bright appearance truly causes your garden to glow with red flowers and with this attracts hummingbirds to your garden. The reason why I call it the “stinky plant” is because when the flower is disturbed it produces an odor that smells very similar to skunk spray.

    4. Petunias

    Petunias is another great add on to any garden who is trying to attract hummingbirds. The hummingbirds love the flowers due to their tubular-shaped appearance and their nectar!

    5. Sunflowers

    Now this one sounds like a weird choice, but hummingbirds truly love sunflowers. You can either purchase seeds in a prepackaged packet or you can just sow bird seed sunflower seeds.

    6. Tomatoes

    I know that this is again a weird choice but hummingbirds love to collect the nectar from the tomato blooms on the vine.

    7. Hummingbird Vine

    Just like its name these beautiful vines that produce trumpet shaped flowers attract hummingbirds very well to your garden.

    8. Butterfly Bush

    Butterfly bushes is a bush that produces a stem with dozens of small flowers attached to the end of each stem and these small flowers produces pollen for hummingbirds to eat!

    9. Hollyhocks

    With their cup shaped flowers, these are a great addition to anyone’s hummingbird garden.

    10. Lupines

    Last but not least is the Lupine. Lupines are flowering plants that have colorful spikes on top of the stem with tubular flowers making them a favorite among hummingbirds.

    I hope this helps all of you who are trying to attract our hummingbird friends!

  • Look Out for These Beautiful Wildflowers This Spring!

    With Spring only less than 5 weeks away, the Appalachian Forest floor is fixing to be covered with the most beautiful wildflowers and blooms.

    Wildflowers will start their blooming season in mid-March to early April. The colors will range from blues to yellows all the way to pinks and purples. Nature’s colors and shapes are truly endless when it comes to wildflowers!

    Some of your most common flowers you will spot in the mountains will include Bloodroot, Dwarf Violet Iris, Bird’s Foot Violet, Confederate Violets, Sweet White Violets, Common Blue Violets, Wood Violets, Halberd-Leaved Violets, Wood Anemone, Canadian Wood Betony, Toadshade Trillium, Catesby’s Trillium, Sweet White Trillium, Yellow Trillium, Rue Anemone, Purple Phacelia, Wild Geraniums, Orange Jewelweed (Spotted Touch-Me-Not), Red Cardinal Flowers and Blue Cardinal Flowers.

    Bloodroot one of the flowers I just mentioned before is an herb native to the Appalachians. It has many amazing factors to health including helping inflammation, coughing, growth of new blood vessels, infections and for cancer treatment as well. Native Americans used Bloodroot as a dye, love charm, pain relief, fever relief, a medicine, gangrene and for wound infections.

    Each and every wildflower has a special meaning to being here but not all flowers are safe to consume or eat or to even touch! “Cow Itch” as us Southerners call it has some of the most beautiful orange wildflowers that you have ever seen but by touching this flower you will be covered in an itchy rash for one to two weeks.

    With all of this being said it’s always a good idea to have a flower identification book with you or just don’t touch the flower until you have identified it.

    However, when in Federal or State areas like State Parks and National Parks it is always a good idea to never pick any flower good or bad due to it being a federal offense that can result in a fine. Many animals like the Honeybee depend on these flowers to collect nectar to produce honey for their hive.