Organic. Period.

Liatris is one of those medium tall spiked flowers that are fairly easy to grow from seed. The main problems I have with them are:

• The birds like to eat the seeds (and mice do, too)

• The baby plants look like grassy weeds

The flower spikes are such bee and hummingbird attractants that there are always vast numbers of seeds. Here is what the flower spike looks like in the fall when it is full of seeds.

If you want to naturalize with liatris flowers, you can just let the seeds fall to the ground and plant themselves. I try to keep them in some kind of row, but it grows wider every year. Here are the individual seeds separated from the head. Notice that they have slight barbs to catch on animal fur, etc. for natural seed distribution.

Liatris will reseed all during the late summer and early fall. Some seed will overwinter before it sprouts, and some will grow into baby plants before the cold winter arrives. I mulch these, and they will be growing early in the spring. And they DO look like grass, so I have to weed carefully.

Once you establish Liatris, you will be pleased to see them reappear every year. I’ve never used them as cut flowers. I’m just happy to see them standing tall in the garden. Liatris is a reliable grower here in the midwest.