Name My New Border!
All my beds and borders have names, though most are rather pedestrian. There’s the Sidewalk Border, the Driveway Border, the Patio Border, etc. The most evocative name I’ve come up with is the Left Bank Border, for the area north of the ‘Donald Wyman’ crabapple on the far side of the driveway.
Now I have dug a new border (or would you call it a bed?) on the parkway across the sidewalk along the Left Bank. What to call it? I’ve considered calling it the Maginot Line, thus maintaining a Gallic theme, but that sounds too martial.
So I am turning to my readers to come up with a name via a contest. The judges (specifically Judy and I) will pick from among the suggestions offered in the comments. The winner gets the thanks of a grateful nation.
I finished the planting today. The bulk of the plants were from Prairie Nursery, and arrived a couple of days ago. I’m afraid I crammed too many plants into the available space, which is my normal practice. As my grandmother Tessie would say when people were coming for dinner, “Better too much than too little!”
So here’s the plant list:
Prairie Smoke (Geum triflorum). I’m using this to edge both sides of the sidewalk.
Prairie Onion (Allium stellatum).
Wild Petunia (Ruellia humilis).
Whorled Milkweed (Asclepias verticillata).
Butterflyweed (Asclepias tuberosa).
Aromatic Aster (Aster oblongifolius). Just one of these, to provide a splash of blue in autumn.
Bluestem Goldenrod (Solidago caesia).
Praire Dropseed (Sporobulus heterolepis).
Prairie Baby’s Breath (Euphorbia corollata). These are hard to find. They arrived bare root from Prairie Moon about two weeks ago. I planted them right away but I’m still waiting for them to show themselves. I was really impressed when I saw them growing in Pat Hill‘s garden.
Most of these plants are repeated on both sides of the sidewalk. In addition, there are two plants I received as an unexpected gift from the kind people as Klehm’s Song Sparrow Farm, one each of ‘Priceless Gold Strike’ Daylily, and Helenium autumnale ‘Short’n’Sassy’.
So taking this plant list or anything else you like as inspiration, what do you think I should name my new border?
gardeninacity 
You could either name it after me–where did you see all those plants? or call it your Midwestern Native Plant Garden. Both the Prairie Baby’s Breath and the Butterfly Weed are slow to appear in the spring. If you want to make the trip to St. Charles, Midwest Groundcover carries it in a 32 flat, a 10 flat and a #1 pot. While Midwest Groundcover is a wholesale Nursery, they do sell retail, as well. If you do go out there, ask for Trish Bjeckford and tell her you’re a friend of mine.
The Pat Hill Garden? Has a certain ring to it. I have never been to Midwest Groundcover – St. Charles is not easy for me to get to.
jason I love the plants you are putting there….I would name it Pollinator Heaven.
Good suggestion, thanks.
How are you going to mow the middle strip and the small area by the sidewalk? Why not cut it all out? Just wondering.
My push mower will fit in the area by the curb, and I can use the weed wacker for the other area. The area by the curb is so people can open their car doors. The middle strip I think I’ll take out and replace with stepping stones.
Thanks for the reply. No one looks like they will park there anyway with the driveway (?) so near. If it is driveway, why not pave there too. The stepping stones in the middle will look great. Are you planting between them or butting them up on each other?
Here where I live people can and do park very close to the driveway. I could pave there too, I suppose. I think I would put something like Thyme or maybe a really low sedum between the steps. Or maybe pussytoes.
Stumpy!
I like how your mind works!
Prairie Garden. I see a lot of prairie names.
Good point.
Yes, the Prairie Parkway.
Nice, and it’s alliterative.
Why not just call it ‘La Rive Gauche’ (I mean, things always sound better in French.)
Hmmm, but a Fracophone might get confused.
This is so exciting!! And yes I think a container on the stump will do the trick! Now for a name….Hmmm….natives along the way….Can’t wait to see more of your bed grow and change Jason!! Have a great week! Nicole
Very creative name, Nicole, I like it.
Very cool! Can’t wait to see how some of the plants develop. Love your naming idea. I like something with natives as well…maybe “native lands” or “native square”?
“Native Square” sounds interesting.
I agree with some of the comments above… something with ‘Prairie’. Or with all those lovely plants attracting the bees and butterflies to gather from all directions, something like ‘The Hub’!
Good suggestions.
I agree with the comments above – definitely think prairie parkway (or something similar) is a winner!
Prairie Parkway is a strong contender.
OH, WOW!!! How about the “THE WOW BED”?
You can call it that if you like, seems a little presumptuous for me to call it that.
I vote Prairie too
Duly noted, thanks.
the twin beds ?
Something original and worth considering, thanks.
I don’t understand the grass strips either Jason, as to a name, what about ‘beyond the left bank’.
Another good suggestion. The strip on the curb is to let people open their car doors. The middle strip, though, I think I’ll dig up and replace with stepping stones.
Giverny in Chicago!? Love your plant list.
Love the idea, but seems too ambitious until I get a pond with a bridge draped in Wisteria.
I vote for Jacqueline’s suggestion–Prairie Parkway! I’ll be interested in seeing how your Prairie Baby’s Breath does. I recently saw it highly recommended on someone’s post, and thought about ordering some, but backed out. Maybe next year.
I have high hopes for the Prairie Baby’s Breath.
Prairie Baby’s Breath has always done well in my gardens, but I have prairie soil, no clay.
My soil is pretty good also. Should I be seeing the PBB now?
Yes, it’s emerging. It will start to bloom in July, carrying on through the end of summer or longer.
I think you need a name like developers give to former industrial areas that they’ve renovated to convert to luxury housing. It used to be a hellstrip but now it’s Pollinator Heights. The Pearl?
Hard to call it a “heights” since it’s flat. Maybe ‘Pollinator Meadows’. Though come to think of it, the lack of height would not deter most developers from using the word ‘heights’.
Ahhh, the possibilities!
My suggestion would be ‘The Twinnies’ – since you have repeat planted both sides.
Makes sense.
I’m thinking along the lines of Narnian Nights, after the lamp in the Narnian stories and, as the planting will always be illuminated by the lamp.xxx
Narnian Nights – very creative. Or maybe Narnian Prairie.
A vote for “twin beds” here, as being appropriate and clever too! 🙂
OK, that is clever.
I wish I had a clever name for you but I don’t. But you do have a lot of the same plants I do. I suppose you could go with ‘Mariposa del Norte’ or The Prairie, which is what it is. Because prairie is a French word, it already fits with your Left Bank.
Or Mariposa del Oueste, since I am more west than north of you.
You have a great selection of plants. I won’t even attempt a name, but great idea.
Thanks!
I vote for prairie border too. A lot of the plants have that name.
True.
Interesting choice of plants. How exciting having a new bed to plant up.
A name? I have named children, dogs, donkeys, cats, rabbits , goldfish and guinea pigs but never a flower bed. Bert, perhaps? Or is your bed a she? Then it has to be Flora or Flossie.
Flora sounds good, but then every flower bed could be called Flora.
My paternal grandmother’s name was Flora, my maternal grandmother’s name was Myrtle, I had a Greaty Aunt Flossie, and my mother’s name was Fern. How could i possibly be anything other than a gardener/
The prairie parkway is a great name I think. Great plants, and I´m looking forward to seeing it later in the summer.
Me too!
I always like names that honor a figure from history. For example, depending on the soil, it could be the Henry Clay Border (Did you know that the street I live on is named for Henry Clay’s estate, Ashland?).
I really don’t find Henry Clay to be very admirable. How about the Jens Jensen border, or the Sidney Hillman Border?
Given the plant list, how about ‘the bright pair’ ?
Nice.
Bricolage Borderline
Hmmm … a little obscure, maybe.
Bricklayer Border
That I like better. Has some urban grit.
Cement & Sediment
Urban grit, but also poetic.
Obama O my!
This one I don’t even understand.
It’s a play on words…
Saw what looked like a lamp post and I wanted to sit down a while and relax. How about the Lampost Garden?
Oh, I really like that one!
Wish I had something to add. I like the sound of prairie parkway but am drawn to vote for Stumpy or Stumpy’s Corner — something like that. It would probably turn into a mosquito heaven but I think if it were my stump I would hollow it out partially and then add water to make a bird bath or source of water for wildlife. You could even plant a little fern like a maidenhair inside.
I had the same thought about cutting a depression into it for holding water – but how would you do that? With a chisel?
That is how I would do it but maybe a person could use a chainsaw depending on how big/tough the stump is.
I would probably go for very simple and direct, like “The Strip Beds” – after all, you’re already calling them the strips anyway. And not to be too wink-wink over it, it does have a certain crazy allure, too, when you consider how this would sound to someone not understanding the context:
“Say, would you like to come over and see my new Strip Beds?”
This would be fun.
I’ll have to think about that one!
I would be boring and just call it “The Lamp Post Border” seeing as there’s a lamp post in it. I like to think that my gardening is much more imaginative than my border naming skills!
The Lamp Post Border is actually a good idea. It’s definitely a contender.
Prairie Parkway.