Home » Plants & Animals » North American Wildflowers » Monarda, Wildflowers Gardeners Invite In

Monarda, Wildflowers Gardeners Invite In

© Gregg Pasterick

I had no qualms when it came to "inviting' wildflowers into the garden. It was all fair game in my yard. Other gardeners are not so enthusiastic, and many wildflowers are considered to be nothing more than backyard pests. The enemy. Weeds. A few wildflowers, however, are so lovely their, ahem, pedigree is overlooked, and soil is eagerly turned for them somewhere in the flower bed.

One group of wildflowers the garden door is always open for are in the Mint Family (Lamiaceae), and are members of the Monarda genus. These include Bee Balm (M. didyma), Wild Bergamot (M. fistulosa), Purple Bergamot (M. media), Lemon Balm (M. citriodora) and Spotted Horsemint (M. punctata), native species all. They are lovely, colorful flowers that attract butterflies, hummingbirds (particularly Bee Balm, a scarlet explosion on a stem) and Hummingbird moths (particularly Wild Bergamot, perhaps the most common of the clan). They can be used in herbal teas, salads and jellies. And they cross-pollinate like horny bunny rabbits, which leads to new shades of color. What gardener wouldn't hold the door open for these, common wildflowers from the wrong side of the tracks?

It's hard to say which species is the most popular, or the loveliest, but if I had to hazard a guess, it would be Bee Balm. No, make that Wild Bergamot. No, wait. It's Purple Berg...no, it has to be Lemon B... No. Uh. Hmmm.

Well, I can't decide. And that's why you could find them all in my garden.

Wild Bergamot, which grew wild near my home in Ohio, bears its small lavender flowers in dense clusters. It prefers the calcareous soils of dry fields, thickets and woodland borders, and can be found from the East Coast into Texas. In my garden, it wasn't uncommon to find a half-dozen or more Hummingbird moths hovering among the blossoms, uncoiling their long proboscis, and plunging them into the tubular flowers to sip from the well of nectar inside.

Bee Balm, which can be found from New York to Georgia, over to Tennessee and up into Michigan, prefers moist woods and thickets, often decorating stream banks. It is also known as Oswego Tea, a name which refers to the Oswego Indians of New York, who brewed a tea from its leaves. Early settlers also used it in this fashion, and after the Boston Tea Party, when imported tea was no longer available, Bee Balm was the substitute of choice.