A wildscape takes root

After 40 years, Susan and Larry Hanson’s yard on Deerwood Drive has morphed from a landscape into a wildscape, composed of mature native Texas trees, shrubs and flowering perennials offering subtle color almost year around.

As Spring Lake Garden Club’s yard of the month for November, this forested plot is a demonstration garden for most of the native plants which thrive in Central Texas. The property is also a certified wildlife habitat and advanced bird-friendly habitat and recognized for water conservation by the Central Texas Water Efficiency Network.

A Zebrawing butterfly lands on Turk’s cap in the Hanson's yard. Photo by Susan Hanson

The Hansons started with a spec home in a new subdivision where they raised their daughter along with their developing garden. Now they welcome another generation – with a new granddaughter – into the joys of nurturing a natural environment in an urban area. Instead of depending on turf grass as ground cover, Susan Hanson accepted wildflowers and other native plants into the mix and encouraged newcomers – not invasive species – to join the landscape. Some plants arrived as volunteers, other as intentional plantings, but all were part of an experiment in crafting a unique natural landscape, thanks to the gardener’s patience and tolerance.

She explains that instead of a lawn, the property has “lots of paths all over the place, and a tiny (lawn) patch in back, mostly horse herb.” Once native plants are established, pruning or trimming them up to 30 percent each year can suit a gardener’s preferred style – wilder or tamer – and encourage favored plants to grow. She regularly pots small volunteer plants to replant elsewhere or pass on to others.

One of the many little woodland trails inviting exploration on the Hanson's property.

Recently retired from the English faculty at Texas State University, Susan Hanson spent almost 20 years as a journalist with the San Marcos Daily Record and other publications. She is an award-winning photographer whose work has been honored in competitions sponsored by groups from the Texas Native Plant Society to National Geographic. She continues to pursue native plant gardening as well as canoeing, underwater photography, hiking and birding, on the San Marcos River and nearby waterways in Central Texas.

For anyone who wants to nurture and live in a wildscape, Hanson has these suggestions:

1. Be patient. Let things show you what they are and what they want to do before cutting them down or yanking them out.

2. Plant local. Use plants native to this area – although she notes our warming climate is causing plants to migrate north. Native plants require less care and water, spread better and offer more food and shelter to wildlife than generic landscape plants.

3. Keep it at home (as in clippings and other waste vegetation). In the Hanson’s yard, most trimming from bushes or cuttings from plants goes onto the ground, into compost or piled in the woods as cover for wildlife until it breaks down. Hanson notes that “after 40 years of doing this, we’ve got some pretty good soil.”

The Hansons have planted lots of native plants that provide plenty of food and shelter for wildlife, like this swallowtail butterfly on a Mexican olive tree blossom. Photo by Susan Hanson

Hanson describes the garden as “a real refuge and source of inspiration, always full of surprises and something new to learn about.” Adding pleasures for both people and wildlife, such as a backyard pond, increases the enjoyment for all who visit or live in a wildscape. But even an evolving wildscape requires some maintenance: a bench encircling a large Spanish oak in the Hansons’ front yard now crowds the tree’s trunk and is due to be expanded…for a second time. Still, not unreasonable maintenance after 40 years of enjoyment.