Plants

Chicago Botanic Garden

The plants of the Wild Mile and our other locations are *painstakingly* chosen by the Chicago Botanic Garden’s Woman’s Board Curator of Aquatics, Peter Nagle. Peter has over a decade of experience working with the artificial lake’s shoreline at the Botanic Garden, and his expertise has been critical to the health and success of the gardens. Through our work together, we have identified a handful of rockstar species that perform exceedingly on our floating wetlands, coming back year after year, despite the faunal attrition (e.g. perpetual war with geese & muskrats). Since planting the first islands, our top performing plants have been:

Asclepias Incarnata (Swamp Milkweed), Carex Comosa (Bristly Sedge), Eupatorium Perfoliatum (Common Boneset), Euthrochium Maculatum (Joe Pye Weed), Filipendula Rubra (Queen of the Prairie), Hibiscus Moscheutos (Swamp Rose Mallow), Iris Virginica (Blue Flag Iris), Juncus Effusus (River Bulrush) and Verbena Hastata (Blue Vervain)

Chicago Botanic Garden’s Budburst Program also helps us compare blooming times between our plants and the same species in more traditional wetland or terrestrial settings. This is important, as many insects, birds and other pollinator species need diverse food types available year round, and the phenology of the plants (when they start growing, blooming, producing seed) could be an important factor when considering plant selection.