Bundleflower is a warm-season perennial nitrogen-fixing forb, a word that basically means they’re a flowering plant but they’re not a grass. They do, however, grow really well with grasses in meadows and prairies, in a versatile range from Florida and the Carolinas over to Tennessee and Kentucky and on to South Dakota and Colorado. Bundleflower seems to grow equally well in alkaline and acidic soil, sometimes at home on rocky slopes and streambanks, sometimes in ravines and along roadsides, and often in grasslands. They prefer moisture but are decently drought-tolerant if they’re not stressed out from lots of competition.

We’ve watched Bundleflower sprout multiple stems with compound frilly fern-like leaves. The delicate leaves also lend them the name Prairie Mimosa and fold in on themselves when touched. Despite shy sensitivity, Bundleflower gives a lot away! They fix nitrogen and the whole plant is filled with protein. Rabbit and Deer love to munch on the leaves while Pheasants and Quail raise their broods under the plant’s cover and snack on the green-and-purple seedpods shaped like a tight whirlpool. Bundleflower’s high protein content makes them a desired livestock fodder, and a possible human fodder! The farmer-researchers at the The Land Institute have been studying their potential as a grain crop given that dry seeds contain nearly 40% protein, pretty comparable to soybeans. Pawnee people have boiled Bundleflower leaves for an itch-relieving wash, while Omaha and Ponca tribes named it the Rattle Plant because of the sound made by the dried seedpods. The leaves are high in protein but also high in tannins, which can decrease digestibility in later season, so keep that in mind when planting for forage.

We propagate our Bundleflower from seeds saved from plants intercropped with Figs for nitrogen-fixing aid and mulch-making. Small five-parted flowers bloom in June and mature into seeds in August. Sow them into a bed and let them overwinter for Spring sprouting.