Articles by Bill Ward

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on October 29, 2004 Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) The plant of the month for November is cedar elm

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on October 15, 2004 Big red sage (Salvia penstemonoides) is now a fairly common garden plant, but it is scarce in the wild. Presently it is known from only three Texas counties and nowhere else in the world. There are a few small populations of big red…

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on October 1, 2004 If you drove westward toward the Trans-Pecos earlier this summer, you know that 2004 is the Year of

By Bill WardPublished in The Boerne Star on September 17, 2004Big red sage (Salvia penstemonoides) is a tall perennial favored for its burgundy-red flowers, long bloom period, appeal to hummingbirds, and adaptability to a variety of garden conditions. Nowadays it is common to see this Central Texas endemic plant in flower gardens all over Texas,…

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on September 3, 2004 Zexmenia daisy is the Operation NICE! plant for September, and to paraphrase Jackie Gleason, “How NICE! it is!”

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on August 27, 2004 “Native Plants”, the quarterly publication of the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, recently had an article by Katherine

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on August 10, 2004 Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) takes a break during August, because few people are interested

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on July 23, 2004 Everyone knows the official State Flower of Texas. The bluebonnet, of course. It’s almost as much a symbol

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on July 9, 2004 It is well publicized these days that several places in the Texas Hill Country are having problems with

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on July 2, 2004 Some horticulturists, such as Pat McNeal, are questioning whether there should be much soil preparation when planting natives.

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on June 25, 2004 Just after we crossed the Pecos River on a recent drive to Big Bend National Park, we started

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on May 25, 2004 The Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) plant for June is a hot item to start

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on May 7, 2004 It used to be that when I heard, “Dogwood is blooming in Texas,” I thought it must be

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on April 30, 2004 Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) recommendation for May is the long-blooming yellow bells or esperanza

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on April 16, 2004 Admittedly, some of the native plants lauded in this column over the past two years are not readily

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on March 19, 2004 The Boerne Chapter of the Native Plant Society of Texas recently initiated the SUN Award (Standing Up for

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on March 5, 2004 The miniature shrub damianita is the Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) plant for March. Damianita

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on February 27, 2004 By now, nearly everyone who lives in the Boerne area is aware of the substantial problem with water

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on February 6, 2004 Bill and Jan Neiman of Junction, Texas, were honored with the Fellows Award for special service at the

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on January 23, 2004 Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) commonly selects a native plant of the month which might

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on January 13, 2004 When lawnmowers became widely available during the late 1800s, many people in the US started keeping manicured lawns

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on December 24, 2003 The Plant of the Month to begin our 2004 Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) is

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on December 5, 2003 When the Boerne Chapter of the Native Plant Society of Texas initiated its Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on November 7, 2003 At the Annual Symposium of the Native Plant Society of Texas (NPSOT) last month, the Boerne Chapter was

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on October 24, 2003 If I remember correctly, oak wilt moved down here from Wisconsin or thereabouts. In Wisconsin, however, the infected

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on September 26, 2003 When some folks first move to the Hill Country from more northerly latitudes, they are given to muttering

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on September 5, 2003 When protected from deer, several kinds of wildflowers just naturally sprout up in our backyard. Three falls ago

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on August 22, 2003 Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!) took a timeout during the hottest summer month, but fall

By Bill Ward Published in The Boerne Star on August 8, 2003 August in the Hill Country is not a time when thoughts naturally turn to gardening and landscaping. The