I didn’t really think much of coneflowers until I planted some in my yard last year and go to know them. That’s when I found that coneflowers are a great foundation for not just a native prairie garden, but any flower garden. Easy to grow, heat and drought tolerant, they bloom from mid-summer right through to fall, and they cover the three Bs: bees, butterflies and birds. In particular, birds love the seeds, and hummingbirds love the nectar.
There are a lot of native flowers called coneflowers—yellow coneflower, orange coneflower, narrow-leafed, pale purple, green-headed coneflower, and they’re all great, but the one I’m going to talk about today is the one you usually think of when you say “coneflower,” and that’s the purple coneflower, Echinacea purpurea. It used to grace prairies all over the eastern and central U.S., but today I guess they’re rare in wild.
They’re making a big comeback, though, in restored prairies and in gardens everywhere. You can recognize purple coneflowers by the droopy pinky-purple petals that surround their spiny orange-brown central “cones.” Because coneflowers are so resilient and easy to grow, they’ve become popular for breeding, and now they come in tons of shades of yellow, orange, red, white and even green. In fact, I couldn’t resist getting a couple orange varieties myself last year.
It can take two or three years for Echinacea purpurea to get to full size, but once they do, they take up a fair amount of space, getting to three or more feet tall and 18 to 24 inches wide. Their leaves are dark green, fuzzy, tough and leathery, indicating their ability to withstand heat and drought. If you know anything about herbal remedies, you may recognize the name echinacea, which is sold as an immune system booster.
One of the many great things about purple coneflowers is that they’re deer-resistant. Deer don’t like things that have weird or strong smells, tastes or textures, and coneflowers definitely fall into the weird texture category. Last year I was disappointed to find that a bud on one of my first coneflowers had been nipped off—thanks, deer. But then I found the bud itself lying nearby. Apparently the deer tried it, didn’t like it, and spit it out. There hasn’t been a problem since.
Planting coneflowers
Purple coneflowers are good in zones 3-9, so they can be grown just about anywhere in the U.S. They aren’t too fussy about soil type or pH and don’t need plant food or fertilizing, and although they prefer things to be on the dry side, they should do okay in all sorts of normal garden situations and can even withstand a little neglect once they’re established.
Because they get tall, think about where you want to put them. They should go toward the back of your garden so they don’t block your view of your shorter plants or don’t shade them out.
If an individual purple coneflower plant is getting too big for its space, you can divide it. Dividing is a good way to share plants, too, and the purple coneflower is a good candidate for that. Unlike other flowers in the Echinacea family, the purple coneflower has fibrous roots, which means it has a lot of roots that grow in kind of a mass. Roots like this—and purple coneflower’s general resilience—make them easy to divide: dig the plant up, pull a section off, put the original plant back in its spot, and share the other part.
Just a side note: Other coneflowers in the Echinacea family, like E. angustifolia (narrow-leafed coneflower) or E. pallida (pale purple coneflower), have a single big tap root that dives deep down into the soil. That makes them great for drought resistance and breaking through tough soil, but it also means they can’t be divided—trying to do so would pretty much guarantee killing the plant. It also makes them hard (but not impossible) to move, so again, think about where you’ll be putting them. Instead of dividing these kinds of coneflowers, you’re better starting them from seed, or you can buy individual plants at the nursery.
Care for purple coneflowers
Once they start blooming, watch for the bees and butterflies to appear. Deadhead them to encourage ongoing blooming throughout the summer and if you don’t want them to reseed. If you want the seeds for the birds and you don’t mind the chance of them reseeding, then leave the heads on when they’re done blooming for the summer and let the flowers stand in the garden over the winter. The dead plants add interest to a winter garden, and the birds will appreciate the seeds.
When you first plant them, they’ll need regular watering until they get their roots established, especially in hot weather. Check the soil. If it’s dry an inch or so down and your coneflowers are looking droopy in the morning, give them some water. Also, if the sun is very strong and the weather is especially hot, they might need some shade in the afternoons for a while. Find a cardboard box that will fit over the plant and set it over your coneflower plant with one side open for some air circulation until evening. This is a good practice for any new plants in strong, full sun.
Coneflowers are relatively hardy and disease-free, except for a disease called aster yellows, which, if you saw my Instagram account, has struck my coneflowers. It’s a disease spread by aster leafhoppers that leaves the plant yellow, stunted and deformed. You can see this in the photo below. One stem of the coneflower seems to be okay—it’s blooming normally, but you can see the weird green “flowers” on the rest of the plant behind it.
I’ll have to dig up and dispose of my coneflowers now, which is about the only way to control the spread of the disease. It breaks my heart, but fortunately, the disease doesn’t live in the soil, so I can plant new coneflowers in the same area. It’s a gamble whether any new plants might be reinfected, but then gardening is a gamble. You can read more about aster yellows on the University of Minnesota Extension web site and the Missouri Botanical Garden web site.
Another less serious problem coneflowers could have are powdery mildew, which doesn’t usually kill a plant, it just looks bad. This can be controlled by improving the air circulation around the plants and spraying them with copper fungicide, a natural fungicide that’s pretty effective if you apply early enough in the season before the powdery mildew sets in. Even if you don’t get to it in time to prevent it, copper fungicide can often keep it from getting worse.
Another issue at this time of year (mid-summer) is Japanese beetles. I’ve seen Japanese beetles trying to nibble on my coneflowers, but they don’t seem to make much progress. I think the leaves are too tough for them.
Many coneflowers
There are several native plants that are called coneflowers that you might want to check out. Most are in the Echinacea family, like the pale purple coneflower and the narrow-leafed coneflower, but a couple are in the Rudbeckia (black-eyed Susan) group: Rudbeckia fulgida and Rudbeckia laciniata. There is also Ratibida pinnata, or yellow coneflower. With their bright cheery colors and easy-going ways, all these native coneflowers are great candidates for starting your microprairie.
Any questions? Just ask in the comments below!
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