Author: Renee Hughes

What better way to celebrate the sporadic temperature shifts and “what’s next weather” of St. Louis, than enjoying the tiny but lovely first flowers of the season at the National Museum of Transportation’s Pollinator Junction. These beauties are on our Ozark Witch Hazel (Hamamelis vernalis).

The petite strappy flower petals can be a range of colors from shades of yellow to dark purple-red. The coiled ribbons of color remain rolled tight on cold cloudy days and gently unfurl on sunny days as temperatures peak. Each extended petal “bee”comes a tiny royal carpet welcoming our earliest pollinators. There is some question as to who all that might be but it obvious that these flowers are naturally intended for some tiny hungry creature as they are sweetly fragrant! No doubt some warm sunny day flower flies are hungry-and maybe honey bees (Apis mellifera).

Witch hazel is a sweet prequel to the season. Blooming from as early as January into March and sometimes is still carrying on ’til April. This unseemly long flowering period is a natural bloom period for our Missouri native Ozark witch hazel shrub. This is hardly a trick but rather a great treat to jump start the spring season.

Selecting between a cultivar (a selection that has been discovered and propagated to retain consistency of attributes) or the straight species (found and collected) was the only “which” part. There is some awareness of this shrub’s natural durability and deer resistance so growers and nurseries are helping her find her way to the home landscape.

For our purposes, ensuring the plant is attractive to pollinators is the top priority. Variation in color, elevated bloom count on an individual shrub and significant fragrance are all desirable traits that may attract and feed more pollinators. These traits vary sometimes significantly between individuals plants and yet are still within a normal range of variation. Who wants a shrub that barely blooms? We made sure to locate her in the landscape where her sweet fragrance can be appreciated!

My decision for which witch was also based on cost and to some extent maturity (size) because the larger the shrub the more branches hence more possibility for flowers and leaves. This is also a larva host plant for our small blue butterfly the Spring Azure, a very early pollinator. Her babies are tiny caterpillars that have the munchies for the foliage. We have a pollinator food producing mission!

Witch hazels live naturally in sun to part shade creating a lovely screen and are good at erosion control. I have seen great ones along the crest of stream banks where drainage is adequate. I have only seen a few poor looking ones where the ground stays wet and swampy.

WITCH HAZEL CARE

While most varieties reach 10-20 feet high and wide at maturity, witch hazels can be kept smaller with pruning once they are finished blooming. Prune in April or early May so that the following year’s buds can develop. Suckering twigs that form around the base should be removed.

She’s a beauty! Her full name is Cephalanthus occidentalis, and yes I know, it’s a mouthful.

My friend just calls her “Button” when we see her in the woods along the creek.  But, If that’s too casual, you can call her Buttonbush (but write down her full two-word botanical name because someday,  you might need it).

She’s a local gal, a true Missouri native through and through. She likes it hot or, cold, and humid and every combination of them but she’s not real fond of extended dry period. (It’s hard on her appearance and it’s tough on her roots as well and believe me, we all need our roots.)

If you let her show her pretty leggy bark you get more than year round interest from the people lookers, you may also get oversize creamy white  flowers just in time for wedding pictures, graduation parties and all that is fun in June!

Those sweet soft round globes are enjoyed by many major pollinators including big and little butterflies, nectar moths and “too busy to care about you” Bumble bees. Even a passing hummingbird will take a power shot of nectar juice while on wing.

After her prime she still manages to look good in Autumn. Sometimes she even shows a little fall color. Come winter, songbirds flock to her for her seeds are quite tasty treat.

Buttonbush, also known as honeyball, is pretty common throughout Missouri and fairly recognizable even in winter as she develops a lovely rounded silhouette with maturity.

The flowers are sweetly scented. Blooming sometimes for as long as four weeks in early summer, she offers both food and drink for many pollinators from Missouri’s nine primary categories of pollinators. Her seeds are also a food source for many song birds. In the Museum’s pollinary park we have a couple buttonbushes.

Although a buttonbush likes wet sloppy clay soil, she grows fine in average soil and even can grow in drier places as long as she is watered during extended dry periods. She likes sun or light shade.

The Museum of Transportation’s Pollinator Junction promotes a healthy growing environment and happy place to “bee” for pollinators and us.

Pollinator Junction’s mission is to demonstrate “Gardening for Life:” living creatures, interactive opportunities, food chain support and an eco-balance for us all!

This Missouri parkland, located in St. Louis County’s metropolitan area, offers a unique relaxed opportunity in a condensed space where people can “pause for pollinators” in a naturally pleasant place and see them as they live and thrive.

Enjoy “backyard ecology” as you watch and learn about our flower-powered pollinators.

Visitors will see season-long displays of “functional” flowers,  grown for their ability to make food for all of Missouri’s primary pollinators.

Our winged pollinator guests are butterflies and skippers, nectar moths, hummingbirds, various types of “too busy to care about us” bees including our native gentle orchard bees, bee mimics and flower beetles such as ladybugs.

View day-to-day gardening and stewardship activities that are part of the fun of caring for this “home for pollinators.”

The Transportation Museum Association and St. Louis County Parks coordinated on this pollinator preserve. Nearly 7,000 square feet, the pollinator park was installed in September 2016 in co-operation with, and support from, the St. Louis Chapter of Wild Ones, Madelyn. A. Kestler, St. Louis County Parks Foundation, The St. Louis County’s Children’s Garden Club, Shaw Nature Reserve, Hillermann Nursery, Sherwood Forest Nursery, Greenscape Nursery, Isabee’s Bee Keeping Supplies, Forrest Keeling Nursery, Forest Lawn Nursery, Forshaw St. Louis, Tom Krauska, Sugar Creek Nursery, Missouri Wildflower Nursery, Forest Releaf, Papillon Perennials and our horticulture volunteers.

Once an expansive sterile monoculture of grassy turf, Pollinator Junction is now a living exhibit of various cultivated and natural site conditions including wet, dry, sun and shade–an all season food fest for pollinators. All of the trees, shrubs perennials, bulbs and annuals were chosen for their ability to feed and support the tiny workforce of pollinators that that have the big job of transporting pollen from flower to flower!

Come see how to help your landscape become a well stocked “food pantry” for pollinators!