It’s easy to dismiss what you don’t understand. And even easier to malign it when fueled by peer pressure. That’s where I found myself shortly after meeting American pokeweed (Phytolacca americana). Though struck by its beauty—it was the most gorgeous specimen in the otherwise lifeless turf-covered property my husband and I bought 14 years ago—I couldn’t help but feel it didn’t belong here.
And that’s because it didn’t, not at that time, when the only plants in the entire two-acre backyard were two ash trees, a lone forsythia bush and a raggedy little rosebush, plopped down randomly amid the sea of poison-soaked lawn. Those didn’t belong there either. Nothing was in its place because there was little nature left.
Except this stunning plant for which I had no name. Turning to my books and magazines, I was happy to see it was a featured species in the latest issue of Organic Gardening. Unfortunately for the pokeweed and the animals in my yard, though, pokeweed wasn’t being highlighted for its virtues. Rip it out! the article said. Now, before it takes over everything, ruthlessly and in short order!
For the next 12 years, I dutifully murdered pokeweed wherever I saw it, pulling and digging and cutting its roots out of a fear-induced panic that if I let it go, even a little bit, it would swallow us whole by the end of summer.
You can probably guess where this story is going. Over the years, as I abandoned some of my many unkempt gardens to focus more strategically on a few, I noticed the pokeweed proving all of us wrong. Yes, it liked to plant itself here and there. It even liked to spread a little. But whenever it spread a lot, it was filling a void, a vacuum of little to no other life. When it stayed more tame, it was harmonizing with all the other natives I had intentionally cultivated.
As I learned more about the critical connection between native plants and native animals up and down the food chain, I realized that pokeweed was doing far more for the wildlife I wanted to help in my gardens than most of the other plants. The wide range of animals who dine on the berries of the remarkable pokeweed includes robins, mockingbirds, mourning doves, catbirds, bluebirds, cardinals, pileated woodpeckers, brown thrashers, cedar waxwings, foxes, squirrels, opossums and raccoons. Even the hardy plant’s delicate flowers feed ruby-throated hummingbirds and other pollinators.
As if that weren’t enough, pokeweed’s leaves are helpful to giant leopard moths, one of whom we saw for the first time this summer, probably because we finally had served up a favorite food with abandon.
Much advice about how to live in the modern world revolves around acting with intention and being mindful. Based on my experiences in the garden, I say sometimes we need to do the opposite. Let others act with intention instead. Give them room to grow. Don’t have a plan for every single detail of your life. Stop listening to the voices of the crowd. And watch what loveliness unfolds.
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