From grasses like big bluestem and switchgrass to flowering plants such as black-eyed Susan and butterfly weed to sedges like fox sedge, Minnesota prairie plants come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors.
Many of these are grasses and sedges, and about 20 percent are forbs or wildflowers. Using native Minnesota prairie plants, you can create a low-maintenance landscape that encourages a diversity of plant and animal life.
Native Minnesota prairie grasses
A prairie plant has a deep and extensive root system that keeps the soil structure firm and resilient. They’re more resistant to drought and fire while their flexible stems and low-growth help them withstand wind.
Native prairie grasses naturally occur and thrive in Minnesota’s prairie ecosystems, i.e., they are adapted to the cool, snowy winters and humid, hot summers. These grasses play a crucial role in the ecosystem by improving soil health, providing food and favorable habitat for wildlife here, and managing water runoff.
These are some of the best native prairie grasses for your landscape.
Prairie dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepis)
This is an all-purpose prairie plant that, once established, is super low-maintenance. It grows as tall as 3 feet, and its low, fountain-like appearance lends a soft look to any landscape. Prairie dropseed is used as an ornamental grass with narrow, long leaves that form attractive round tufts.
The plant thrives in a variety of growing conditions, and has an aroma similar to coriander or buttered popcorn.
Native to type of prairie: Tall grass and mixed prairie regions
Ecological benefits: Provides habitat and food for birds and various wildlife species. Attracts pollinators like bees and butterflies and helps prevent soil erosion.
Maintenance needs: Low
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Long, narrow arching leaves in tufts range in color, changing from rich green in summer to golden, orange hues in fall to light bronze in winter.
- Flowers: From late July to mid-September, you will see a cloudy haze of tiny flower heads with their unique fragrance rising to 36 inches on slender stems, above the foliage in late summer to early fall.
- Fruit: Produces a small fruit along the branched structures that hold the flowers. It drops from the branch once mature.
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Moist but well-drained, chalk, clay, loam
- Sunlight: Full sun
- USDA hardiness zones: 3 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season: Autumn
- Mature height: 2 to 3 feet
- Edibility: Not known to be toxic
Big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii)
Also known as “king of the prairie,” big bluestem is a warm-season tall grass that reaches as high as 8 feet (if protected from grazing). It’s quite easy to identify because of its distinctive finger-like array of spikes atop tall stems.
The grass is tufted, long-lived, and super easy to grow. Once established, its deep fibrous roots help it resist drought and withstand salt. Ecologists often use this beautiful ornamental grass for prairie restoration.
Native to type of prairie: Short grass prairie regions
Also known as: Turkey foot, broomsedge, bluestem
Ecological benefits: Big bluestem develops deep root systems that help prevent and control soil erosion. It also provides excellent wildlife cover and food.
Maintenance needs: Low to moderate
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Forms upright clumps of stems with flattened, dark green leaves. These leaves are crowded on the lower stem mostly and are flat, green to blue-green, and up to 18 inches long with a textured surface and white, long, spreading hair.
- Flowers: Purplish to yellowish 3-parted, finger-like spikes clustered at the top of the stem, resembling turkey feet, and tips of branches that bear
- Fruit: Golden brown, approximately as long as the spikelet, and narrowly elliptical
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Well-drained, average to dry
- Sunlight: Full sun (6 or more hours of direct sunlight daily)
- USDA hardiness zone: 3 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season: July to August
- Mature height: 2 to 8 feet
- Edibility: Non-edible
Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum)
This summer perennial grass is a resilient and versatile warm-season grass that’s adapted to a variety of soil types and is popular in landscaping for its tall, graceful appearance.
Switchgrass is robust and resists many pest and plant diseases. It also withstands drought pretty well. Its attractive appearance makes switchgrass a popular ornamental grass amongst Minnesota homeowners.
Also known as: Tall panic grass
Native to type of prairie: Tall grass prairies
Ecological benefits: Used for various native plant restoration projects as it develops a deep, extensive root system that often reaches 10 feet or more into the soil, making it effective for erosion control. It’s also an important forage and biomass crop.
Maintenance needs: Low
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Has tall, upright stems, reaching 3 to 8 feet in height. It has long and narrow leaves with a nice, distinctive blue-green color that turns golden-ish in the fall.
- Flowers: Produces finely textured, reddish-purple open panicles of small flowers mid-summer in green, purple, or bronze color from late summer to fall. They appear to be hovering over the foliage like a lovely, airy cloud.
- Fruit: Bears a dry and grain-like fruit (seed without plume)
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Moist but well-drained, chalk, clay, loam
- Sunlight: Full sun and partial shade
- USDA hardiness zone: 5 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season: Summer till early fall
- Mature height: 3 to 6 feet
- Edibility: Yes, but may be toxic for sheep, goats, and horses
Native flowering prairie plants
Just like native prairie grasses, these flowering plants are adapted to the climate and soil in Minnesota and grow with minimal care. Here are our picks.
Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta)
Belonging to the sunflower family, black-eyed Susan boasts iconic bright yellow flowers in prairies all across Minnesota.
Black-eyed Susans are also called coneflowers because of their cone-shaped heads and are one of the most common Minnesota native plants. The flower is robust and attracts a good amount of pollinators with its halo of yellow petals that lure them in, acting as a landing pad.
Also known as: Brown-eyed Susan, Yellow Ox-eye Daisy, brown Betty, yellow daisy
Native to type of prairie: Tall grass prairies, mixed-grass prairies
Ecological benefits: Attracts a variety of pollinators such as bees, butterflies, and insects, and provides seeds for birds too. It also improves soil stability and prevents erosion with its deep root system.
Maintenance needs: Low to moderate
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: It has large, narrow, lance-shaped, toothed leaves and hairy, sturdy stems.
- Flowers: Famous Rudbeckia hirta, daisy-like flowers are large, with bright yellow to orange petals that surround a dark, purplish-black central cone. They appear from early summer to fall and are often used as cut flowers giving you 8 to ten days of vase life.
- Fruit: The central disk of the flower becomes a head of dry, dark-brown-black seeds which is consumed by birds.
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Moist but well-drained, chalk, clay, loam
- Sunlight: Full sun
- USDA hardiness zone: 3 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Annual or short-lived perennial
- Fruiting season: July to the first frost
- Mature height: 1 to 3 feet
- Edibility: No
Butterfly weed (Asclepias tuberosa)
Known for its bright orange flowers, butterfly weed makes a fantastic garden plant with its long bloom season (June to September) and vivid color. Because of the long season, it’s among the most favored native Minnesota wildflowers for bees and other pollinators.
Milkweed co-evolved with one of the earth’s most important pollinators, the monarch butterflies, and attracts several other species along with monarchs. It’s also used for medicinal purposes.
Also known as: Butterfly milkweed, orange milkweed, chigger flower
Native to type of prairie: Tallgrass, shortgrass, and mixed prairies
Ecological benefits: Desirable to butterflies, especially monarchs, bees, and other pollinators. It also serves as a food source for caterpillars of the monarch butterfly and other butterfly species. They are often used for erosion control and prairie restorations.
Maintenance needs: Low
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Hairy, clumped to bushy stems that grow as tall as 3 feet. Leaves are also hairy, an inch wide, and about 4 inches long, pointed and smooth on the edges. Leaves provide a nice dark green backdrop to the showy flower heads, making them more attractive to the onlooker, no matter the species.
- Flowers: Flowers grow in flat-topped, spreading clusters (up to 25 flowers each), right where the leaves join the stem. They can range in color from bright yellow to blazing orange
- Fruit: Produces grayish-green, spindle-shaped pods about 6 inches long. Pods are covered in fine hair while seeds are large and brown with white silken parachute-like structures that carry them in the wind.
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Prefers moist but well-drained soil but will grow in dry soils too. It’s one of the many drought-tolerant plants in Minnesota.
- Sunlight: Full sun
- USDA hardiness zone: 3 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season:
- Mature height: 1 to 2 feet
- Edibility: No
Native prairie sedges
Sedges are grass-like plants and Minnesota prairies are home to a variety of them. These are some of our favorites.
Fox sedge (Carex vulpinoidea)
This evergreen sedge grows aggressively and is adaptable. Primarily, fox sedge is grown for its ornamental fruit that displays an abundance of showy spikes from late summer to early winter. That, paired with attractive, glossy light green foliage that retains the color year-round makes up a treat for the eyes.
Fox sedge is a herbaceous perennial grass that is often useful in rain gardens, stormwater basins, and on the edges of marshes, lakes, springs, and ponds.
Also known as: Brown fox sedge, common fox sedge
Native to type of prairie: Wet, lowland, and mesic prairies
Ecological benefits: Used for bioremediation, erosion control, naturalizing, i.
Maintenance needs: Low
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Leaves are narrow, tapering to a sharp point, and vary in color from green to bluish-green. They bring a delicate texture to the landscape and should be used to full effect. It has triangular stems in cross-section that bear several reddish-brown seed heads.
- Flowers: Features dainty spikes of green hop-like flowers with chartreuse overtones that rise above the foliage from late spring to early summer.
- Fruit: Developing in early to mid-summer, fox sedge fruit is a dry, one-seeded fruit called achene. It is wrapped in a sac-like casing called perigynium and formed in clusters inside the pistillate spikes.
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Moist to wet soils
- Sunlight: Full sun
- USDA hardiness zone: 3
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season: June to July
- Mature height: 1 to 3 feet
- Edibility: No. Some birds and small mammals may eat the seed.
Prairie sedge (Carex prairea)
This grass-like perennial has a clump-forming, tufted growth habit. It’s a resilient plant that’s mostly found in Minneosta’s wet prairies.
It’s a low-maintenance plant with impressive soil-balancing properties, making it an excellent pick for environmentally-conscious landscaping projects.
Native to type of prairie: Wet, mesic, and lowland prairies
Ecological benefits: Serves as a cover and nesting material for birds and small mammals. Wildlife also eats the seeds. Due to its dense root system, it’s used to stabilize soils and prevent erosion issues, especially in wetlands. Prairie sedge also traps sediments and aid in water filteration.
Maintenance needs: Low
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Develops narrow, grass-like leaves, about ¼ to ⅛ inches wide with an attractive bright green color and a smooth texture. The stems are triangular in cross-section.
- Flowers: The flowering part of prairie sedge is a cluster of spikelets. Each spikelet contains multiple tiny and wind-pollinated florets.
- Fruit: A small, dry, one-seeded structure (achene) that develops in late spring through early summer. It’s enclosed in a sac that has a beak-like tip.
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Moist and wet soils
- Sunlight: Full to partial sun
- USDA hardiness zone: 3 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season: June and July
- Mature height: 1 to 2 feet
- Edibility: Not edible
Native prairie shrubs
Shrubs play just as important a role in Minnesota prairie ecosystems as grasses and forbs. They contribute to biodiversity and provide food and habitat for wildlife. Here’s a good one.
Leadplant (Amorpha canescens)
This small, lovely deciduous shrub comes with grayish-green, aromatic, feathery leaves and grows up to 3 feet. It thrives in full sun and prefers dry to medium moisture, well-drained soils, but is also dry soil and drought tolerant.
It works great for beds and borders and wildflower gardens apart from prairies for erosion control. Leadplant may also attract pollinators like bees and butterflies.
Also known as: Leadplant amorpha, prairie shoestring
Native to type of prairie: Dry to mesic prairies
Ecological benefits: Leadplant is a nitrogen-fixing plant that works to improve soil fertility. It also attracts pollinators, including butterflies and bees. It develops very deep roots, growing more than 15 feet into the ground at times, which helps stabilize soil.
Maintenance needs: Low
What it looks like:
- Leaves and stem: Develops pinnately compound foliage covered with dense, short hair that give leadplant a silvery-gray appearance. The stem is initially green but turns brown and woody as it matures.
- Flowers: It has spikes of tiny, bluish-purple flowers with gold anthers that bloom for three weeks late in spring to early summer. These flower spikes are rich in nectar and attract butterflies, bees, moths, and other beneficial insects.
- Fruit: A densely hairy pod that contains a single, smooth, brown bean-like seed.
Favorable growing conditions:
- Soil: Well-drained, loam, sand
- Sunlight: Full sun
- USDA hardiness zone: 2 to 9
Characteristics:
- Life cycle: Perennial
- Fruiting season: June to August
- Mature height: 1 to 3 feet
- Edibility: No
Need some help?
Maintaining native prairie plants sure is easier, but you might still need a professional’s hand for, say, complex soil issues, pest problems, a lawn disaster, or any other lawn chore. Lawn Love is here to help, call a pro near you and let their expertise and experience benefit your landscape in the best way possible.
Main Image Credit: Anna | Adobe Stock Free | License
