Watermark Woods Nursery:
Who doesn’t love watching butterflies? They flitter from flower to flower, wings opening and closing, just doing their thing as they feed off its nectar, it’s no wonder people are fascinated with them. You can create your own butterfly garden, by using plants native to your area. Plants have developed over time, so to speak, to work with the insects and birds and butterflies for your region.
Native plants are part of an evolution of a whole foundation of systems and interactions that support a region’s butterflies, birds, insects, bees, etc., who rely on to grow and live.
Here in the Virginia Piedmont area, one example of how to use native plants is to help feed the Monarch Butterflies during their migration each year. Their populations have decreased dramatically over the last twenty years due to loss of habitat through development and pesticide use. Monarchs have a special relationship with milkweed. Milkweed is the only plant a monarch larva(caterpillar) can survive on. Without milkweed we have no monarchs.
Finding plants native to the Virginia Piedmont area can be a bit difficult, there are organizations such as Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy who help by putting on plant sales every spring and Plant Nova Natives that do a lot to educate people and gardeners on the importance of using native plants. But catching the special sale can be hard, so it’s wonderful to have a nursery in the area that specializes in native plants and grows without pesticides which can be harmful to the monarchs and other wildlife that need plants to survive. Open on a regular seasonal basis, Watermark Woods Nursery in Hamilton, VA can help your landscape be more than something pretty to look at. Your landscape could provide essential habitat for wildlife.
Julie and Chris Borneman started Watermark Woods Nursery as a way of giving back to the community by making native plants more readily available to their community of businesses and homeowners. The staff at Watermark Woods is ready to help with plant choices.
Watermark Woods is open Mid March through October, Wed – Saturdays and is located in Hamilton, VA., just west of Leesburg. Hours and inventory can be found at www.watermarkwoods.com
Watermark Woods Nursery, helps you bring nature home, thank-you!
References:
Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation; website accessed 6/16/2020
https://web.archive.org/web/20121228220059/http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/virginia_naturally/window_into_green_virginia/geographic-overview.shtml (description of Piedmont, Coastal plain areas of Virginia)
Bringing Nature Home – How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants;
Douglas W. Tallamy; copyright 2007;
Native plant; url accessed 6/16/2020; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_plant
Why Native Plants Matter; https://www.audubon.org/content/why-native-plants-matter; url accessed 6/18/2020;
Save the Monarch; PDF available through the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation; https://www.dcr.virginia.gov/natural-heritage/document/stm-flier.pdf; URL accessed 7/1/2020;