Blanketflower

Growing Blanketflower

One of the longest-blooming natives anywhere, asking only for sun and drainage. Short-lived but reseeds to keep the color coming.

Where it belongs

Blanketflower is native to the Plains, Mountain West, Great Basin, Southwest, and inland Pacific Northwest, growing on dry prairie, sagebrush flats, gravel roadsides, and open mountain slopes.

It is one of the few natives that flowers essentially without interruption from early summer until frost. Most perennials give two or three weeks. This gives three or four months, which is why it appears in so many low-water plantings and roadside seed mixes.

Some nurseries sell a hybrid, Gaillardia grandiflora, a cross with an annual southeastern species. It is showier and even shorter-lived. If you want the native, look for the species name.

Growing it

Full sun, dry soil, in sand, loam, or rocky ground, zones 3 to 10. One to two and a half feet.

Drainage, sun, and neglect. In rich moist soil it grows soft, flops, and dies over its first winter, which is the standard complaint about it and is almost always a siting problem.

Its short life is not a flaw to correct. Individual plants persist two to four years and the planting continues from seed, so the way to keep it is to leave some open ground and let a few heads ripen rather than deadheading every one.

Deadheading the rest extends the bloom noticeably. A reasonable approach is to deadhead through July and August, then stop and let September's heads set seed.

It is easy from seed sown in fall or spring, and it often flowers in its first year.

What it feeds

The flat daisy face with a raised center is accessible to almost everything.

Native bees of many sizes work it, along with bumblebees, flower flies, and small beetles. Butterflies and skippers take nectar, and the long season means it feeds them from the early summer brood through the last generation before frost.

Goldfinches take the seed from the standing globes in fall.

Living with it

Deer generally avoid it, and it is drought tolerant to the point of thriving on rainfall alone across most of its range.

It cuts well and lasts in a vase, which is a legitimate reason to grow more than you strictly need.

Leave the last round of seed heads standing over winter. They are round and bristly and hold snow attractively. Cut back in early spring.

Sources: USDA PLANTS Database (native range and nomenclature); Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, University of Texas at Austin (species profile and longevity); USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (plant guide, seeding and roadside use).

It’s deer-resistant, drought-tolerant, long-blooming, showy, and a good cut flower.

Where it grows

Blanketflower is native to the Great Plains. In the wild you’ll find it across Arizona · Arkansas · California · Colorado · Idaho · Illinois · Iowa · Kansas · Minnesota · Missouri and 12 more states. Always confirm it suits your specific county with your state native plant society before planting.

Regional Garden has written state guides covering Blanketflower in 22 of them so far.

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