midwesterner, That's great that you're taking so many actions to help native plant species. I've only done a small subset. I do end up discussing the topic of the problems invasive plants cause and the benefits of native plants with various people I know. I knew so little about these topics until about 7 years ago, and find many people are still unaware about them. Many times the attitude people have is that they still want their pretty flowers and don't care about other effects, but many times I think I at least get people to consider these things. I also do the research for friends and family when they're thinking of adding to their garden. Sometimes if they're considering an invasive plant I'm able to come up with a native or at least non-invasive alternative for them, that will serve as well. Many times I think I end up doing the research with no result other than my learning a bit more, but sometimes it does make a difference to what ends up getting planted. I became interested in native plants by way of my interest in wildlife gardening. Native butterflies and birds are often more interesting to people than native plants at first, and making people aware of the importance of native plants to wildlife is one way to spark an interest in natives. I know that was the case for both me and one of my SILs. Years ago if I had been told that I'd probably attract hummingbirds to my yard if I planted some Monarda didyma (bee balm) I would have done it in a minute. I also try to get people to read "Noah's Garden". It really made me realize I could have an effect by making some small changes in my yard. Our house is on a little bit more that a quarter acre in a mature suburb, but it is definitely a wildlife garden now, and a place that native plants have started showing up on their own.

If you have a moist, semi-shady area you could try planting a thicket for the birds using plants like Viburnum trilobum, other viburnum, elderberries, native plum thicket, etc. Lindera benzion, spicebush, grows very well in shady moist areas and birds love the berries (and it provides habitat for spicebush swallowtail caterpillars). Plant a Clematis virginiana (virgin's bower) over it and voila! Instant cover and food sources. I would add Lonicera sempervirens for the hummers if you can (native honeysuckle). Some of your hummer plants are not native, such as the chives, scabiosa, parsley...hummers also enjoy columbine, penstemon, and garden phlox. Seed-eating birds also love the seeds of coreopsis, native sunflowers, rudbeckia and echinacea. Your Bradford pear is unfortunately an invasive species in Virginia and you may want to consider replacing it with a native alternative if you can. Sounds like you're off to a wonderful start with what you have. Adding a water source to your yard will really bring the birds flocking!

As far as I know, there aren't many evergreen shrubs that are also host plants for butterflies. I've heard of people planting red bay (Persea borbonia) or swamp bay (P. palustris) which are evergreen and keeping them pruned to bush size, but they're only regularly used by palamedes swallowtails, which don't occur in north Alabama. Once in a blue moon I find a spicebush swallowtail caterpillar on mine, but it wouldn't be worth it for you. Spicebush swallowtails lay eggs just as freely on sassafras as they do spicebush, so you could plant some 'out back' for them. Sassafras doesn't need a shady swamp like spicebush. If I were you, I'd use one of the native viburnums for foundation planting, like V. acerifolium/maple leaf viburnum or V. dentatum/arrow wood. Maple leaf viburnum has some of the most beautiful leaves, plus azalea sphinx moths occasionally use viburnums as host plants. Bird just LOVE the berries! The best thing about the native viburnums is that they're so easy to grow, they can survive foundation soil, which is usually full of subsoil turned over by the builders and hard to repair. If your foundation area is real wet, you could plant the possumhaw viburnum, which is evergreen. The best wildlife plant out there is wild black cherry/Prunus serotina, but it makes a big tree. If you have a big enough yard, it would be well worth it to have several. It's host to both tiger swallowtails and red-spotted purples, plus many of the big moths, like cecropia moths, use it as a host plant, bees use the flowers, and birds love the fruit. In regard to butterflies, you probably should watch to see what butterflies occur in your area, look up their host plant/s, and plant them if you'd like to see more of them. Buttonbush is a real draw as a nectar plant for butterflies and MANY other insects, but, unless you have a consistently wet spot for it, it might not make it. I have about a dozen blueberry bushes which have gotten big, and they keep me and the birds eating blueberries from about the first week in June until August - I have different varieties that mature at different times. And they're SO easy to grow, no insecticides needed, just acid soil! There are many plants that make good nectar plants. I have a bottlebrush buckeye that butterflies just LOVE, but it only blooms once a year. You could plant some pentas, which butterflies like to nectar on and tersa sphinx moths like to use as a host plant. Of course, there's milkweed, the monarch host plant that all butterflies like to nectar on, zinnias, butterfly bush, and lantana, which can't be beat! A good butterfly book that includes host plants, and a good bird book would be a great buy! Sherry

Mike, seeds of KCT are said to be poisonous to sheep and cattle. While not your concern exactly, that may lend guidance. Interestingly, this species is considered an ecological toilet bowl-swirler because all the mega-fauna thought to have once dispersed its rather large seeds are themselves extinct; Think such critters as woolly mammoths and so on! Strange situation. Now I'm no purist in my forest plantings myself. I have actually purposely made careful introductions of exotic tree species to my plantation and adjacent woods. So I'll skip the polemics, but I would be interested in hearing more about the existing forest stand, its composition, general condition, what, if any, advance regeneration may be going on. What I'm getting at here-and this relates to my opinions, not yours, so may be irrelevant-if there were say, lots of hemlock, white pine, cedar, any of several high-quality northern hardwoods, etc....I may ask myself why I'm trying to alter what's there. Just saying......but again, I myself am somewhat doing the same, although tending to move in the opposite direction. I'm not trying to bring more southerly species into my NE WI setting. That may make sense from the climate-change standpoint, but I bought the land I did because of the very mix of species present there-and because there was open land upon which I could do afforestation. That latter point was very important to me-I had to have open land to plant trees on, and this land directly abuts the forested part of the property. So I too risk altering the overall site. I like to think my ideas are good, and I'm sure you feel the same way about yours! For what it's worth, the Menominee Indian Reservation, which lies just a few miles west of our land, and which is often said to be the finest, most well-managed forestland east of the Mississippi, is now experimenting with, among other species, sycamore. So there's an idea more akin to your own.....the purposeful introduction of a more southerly species into the woods. I can't outright say that, or what you propose, is wrong. ;^)