No mantel in Texas is complete without a bluebonnet photograph. But as any amateur roadside shutterbug will tell you, it’s notoriously difficult to capture the stately flower on film. The bloom’s vibrant colors look washed-out; the petal’s delicate details are lost in a blur. “The flowers are small,” says
Besides books and my own mistakes, I’ve learned almost everything I know about wildflowers from volunteering at the National Wildflower Research Center, Lady Bird Johnson’s visionary gift to Texas. Perhaps my inexperience was evident on my application, because the volunteer coordinator wisely placed me where I couldn’t do much harm,
1Find Yourself Texas has a range of soils and climates. To know what to plant, you have to know where you are among its ten vegetational regions.2Flower Plot Pick a sunny, well-drained site for your meadow. When choosing which flowers to plant, think about bloom times, size, and color.3Go
During the infamous drought of 1996, roadside wildflowers frizzled and fried. But at the National Wildflower Research Center, just southwest of Austin, blossoms, shrubs, trees, and grasses were sleek and sassy. Why? Because 1995’s rains watered 1996’s flowers, thanks to the largest rooftop rainwater-collection system in North America. One of
