Bluebonnets: Seeds

Bluebonnets tend to grow well in poor and even rocky soil, where they have little competition from grasses. They are legumes, and put roots deep where they fix nitrogen into the soil. They love the cracks in my driveway; must remind them of the caliche they came from. But in the rest of the yard, they get a lot of competition from grasses, mostly rescuegrass and bermuda grass. More on that later.

[Pictured: bluebonnet seeds. Someone told me they look like small pebbles, and I do have to be careful not to pick up loose gravel from the driveway when I’m collecting them.]

Many wild plants, including bluebonnets, develop a seed bank when they've been in an area for awhile. The seeds don't all germinate in any given year, leaving seeds for following years even if a bad year happens. That makes it easier for the gardener to maintain a self-seeding plot of flowers, but harder to get rid of invasives, like grasses, that have left a seed bank.

I've seen elaborate instructions about how to get bluebonnets to grow, like scarifying the seeds, but I haven't done any of that. At the beginning, I did dig shallow rows and covered the seeds with soil. That might increase germination rate when just starting.

Now, the seeds my plants produce sit out in nature for several months before it's time to germinate, and nature takes care of the preparation. I don't mind that birds eat some of the seeds; they'll spread them to new homes.

I do help by tossing the seeds that fall on pavement back into soil. I wouldn't want all the seeds to germinate at once anyway; a bluebonnet seed bank is a great thing to have.