PrairieTech

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Our landscapes are beautiful while supporting the local ecosystem.

PrairieTech is an ecological landscape design and prairie restoration firm based in Dane County and serving commercial and residential clients all throughout Wisconsin.

09/16/2026

Mark your calendars!

We’re teaming up with the McFarland Historical Society for an end-of-summer pop-up sale, September 26th & 27th, 11am–3pm. 50% of proceeds go directly to supporting the Historical Society.

Stop by and browse our selection of native plants, and find something great to tuck into your garden before fall planting season winds down. Whether you’re finishing off a new bed or picking up a few favorites, this is your chance to shop in person and see what’s in season.

And even if you’re not buying, come say hello. We’d love to talk native gardening, help troubleshoot what’s happening in your yard, or swap stories about the season so far. Bring the family, bring your questions, and spend a relaxed afternoon with fellow plant lovers in the community.

📍McFarland Historical Society
5814 Main St, McFarland, WI
🗓️ September 26–27
🕚 11am–3pm

09/12/2026

We’re excited to announce the launch of our blog! Here we’ll be diving into landscape design, ecology, and all things native plants. We’re going to aim for a fresh post every month.

To kick things off, our good friend, and former ISTHMUS reporter, Liam Beran visited Piet Oudolf’s Vlinderhof garden in Utrecht, Netherlands.

Oudolf, a defining voice in naturalistic garden design, is a pioneer of the New Perennialism movement, a design philosophy that views a garden as a living, evolving ecosystem rather than a static display. An ethos we embody in our own work.

Read more about Oudolf’s design philosophy and how you can apply his approach to sustainable, wildlife-friendly design in your own home garden.

Link to read:
https://linktr.ee/Prairie_Tech

Available on Wix or Substack.

If there are any topics you’d like us to cover in future blog posts, drop a comment!

08/27/2026

This week we’re highlighting a naturalistic prairie planting that we completed at Verona Veterinary in Verona, Wisconsin this past June.

Our goal was to bring life and color to all parts of the property, including the areas of an urban landscape that are typically left barren and devoid of beauty, like the parking lot and entry sign. To achieve this, we designed a low-maintenance prairie planting able to handle full sun exposure that factored in working around the property’s existing mature oaks and oak saplings.

Adhering to our design, we installed a mixture of prairie grasses and forbs across the open slope, tucking in some woodland grasses, notably Bottlebrush Grass and Virginia Wild Rye, in the dappled shade beneath the oak canopy. Along the retaining wall we planted native grasses and sedges, including Prairie Dropseed, Little Bluestem, and Plains Oval Sedge as ground cover to prevent rainwater runoff and soil erosion. These grasses deep, fibrous root systems help to hold soil in place and slow runoff far better than turf grass ever could.

We also left open areas and pathways throughout the planting so the clinic’s boarding animals could have room to roam.

Since installation, the planting has pushed through one of the heaviest droughts we’ve seen in recent years, an excellent reminder of why native, drought-tolerant species are worth the investment.

There is still some work to be done, but we’re proud of the progress that our planting has made in just a few short months.

Species installed: Little Bluestem, Purple Lovegrass, Prairie Dropseed, Switchgrass, Plains Oval Sedge, Virginia Wild Rye, Bottlebrush Grass, Purple Coneflower, Pale Purple Coneflower, Black-eyed Susan, Hoary Vervain, Butterfly W**d, Prairie Onion, and a host of other full-sun prairie forbs.

08/18/2026

When designing a garden, grasses typically get overlooked in favor of flowers and flowering shrubs. But here’s why you should incorporate them into your garden:

The Foundation of the Prairie:
Underneath a healthy prairie planting is a scaffold of roots, some running six to ten feet into the ground. Those roots are key to the longevity of a landscape. They help hold a slope in place, pull rainwater into the soil preventing runoff, and help build the dark, dense soil that forms the lifeblood that an entire ecosystem depends on.

Four-season Texture and Color:
Above ground, grasses are doing something just as important. While flowers can carry a garden from spring through early fall, grasses provide life and structure throughout the entire year: soft green growth in spring, motion and texture all summer, flashes of bronze and gold coloration through fall, and a standing skeleton that holds its shape through the harshest months of winter.

Ecological Benefits:
The winter months are when grasses do their quietest work. Long after flowers have collapsed, grasses remain standing, still full of life. Songbirds rely on their plentiful seed heads as a vital food source through the coldest months, while the dense clumps at the base of a grass planting hide ground-nesting birds and overwintering insects from wind, snow, and predators.

Grasses are not just for decoration. They are the foundation an entire landscape is built on.

Ready to add them to your garden? Use code GRASSROOTS for 15% off on grasses and sedges at goprairietech.com/category/shop through August 31st!

06/20/2026

A monarch caterpillar can taste the difference between milkweed and every other leaf in a garden. Of the thousands of plants it might encounter throughout its life cycle, only one is ever deemed edible for consumption.

This is a host plant: the single species a caterpillar is equipped to digest, and the one its mother seeks out to lay her eggs. Adult butterflies feed on nectar from almost any bloom. Their young are far more particular, each species bound to a specific plant their diets and biological needs were built around.

The partnership reaches further than just insects. A clutch of songbird nestlings is raised almost entirely on caterpillars, thousands of them per brood. A single host plant can support an entire chain, insect to bird, and with the proper care it can be sustained unbroken season after season.

A few tips for properly caring for host plants:
Skip pesticides, even organic ones, while caterpillars are actively feeding. Leave stems and seed heads standing through winter rather than cutting the bed back in fall. Hold off on raking or mulching the base until the soil has warmed in spring.

A few host plants we carry:
Common Milkweed – the primary host plant of the monarch butterfly

Sundial Lupine – the exclusive host plant of the Karner Blue butterfly

Showy Goldenrod – hosts dozens of moth species and feeds pollinators all through fall

Wild Bergamot – host to the Hermit Sphinx and Raspberry Pyrausta moths

Wild Columbine – sole host of the Duskywing Skipper butterfly

New England Aster – hosts Pearl Crescent and Gorgone Checkerspot butterflies

Not sure where to start? Our Native Pollinator Garden Kit comes pre-planned with a mix of host and nectar plants ready to go in the ground.

🔗 www.goprairietech.com

06/06/2026

Project Spotlight:

This week we had the great privilege of working at this beautiful property in Cambridge, WI. The property owner came to us with a vision of expanding the biodiversity of her already naturalized hillside and bringing a native woodland garden to life at its base. To achieve this, we installed 311 plugs across 14 native species, weaving together sedges, grasses, and forbs to create a naturalistic woodland garden that flows naturally into the existing landscape. From the delicate blooms of Wild Columbine and Woodland Phlox to the bold texture of Bottlebrush Grass and the striking Purple Coneflower, every plant was chosen with the purpose of supporting local pollinators and creating a garden that will become more beautiful with each passing season.

Species installed:
Common Oak Sedge, Plains Oval Sedge, Bottlebrush Grass, Wild Lupine, Jacobs Ladder, Woodland Phlox, Pink Nodding Onion, Wild Columbine, Calico Aster, Big Leaved Aster, Hairy Beardtongue, Purple Coneflower, Virginia Waterleaf, Culver’s Root

03/05/2026

Over the years, our neighborhoods have slowly slipped further away from the beauty of nature. Years of habitat loss, chemical applications, and the dominance of the American lawn have chipped away at songbird and pollinator populations.

We’re here to help change that. We, like many of you, envision a future of naturally beautiful landscapes that support wildlife populations and fill our neighborhoods with life. Imagine suburbs with tasteful natural plantings instead of empty lawns, or industrial parks with prairie instead of vast cut-grass fields.

Hi everyone, our names are Josh Gutman and Zach Goetz. We’re entering our 2nd season in business and are eager to build on what we accomplished last year. Our mission is simple: bring our urban landscapes into harmony with nature.

Based in Dane County, but operating throughout Wisconsin, we are a landscape design and prairie restoration firm specializing in plants native to our home state. Our landscapes are beautiful to look at while providing habitat that supports the local ecosystem.

We’ll post a mix of educational content regarding ecology, conservation efforts, and native gardening tips. You can also expect to see behind the scenes of us at job sites, in our nursery, and highlights of projects we complete. We’d love to have you along for the journey!

Excited for the future,
Josh & Zach

03/06/2025

Replacing portions of your lawn with native grasses and wildflowers is a great idea, here’s why:

• offers a space of tranquility and complex beauty
• leaves an everlasting positive impact on the environment
• saves you time & money

PrairieTech provides a greener approach to traditional lawn care and landscaping.

Call today for a free consultation!

Address

Waunakee, WI
53597

Website

https://www.goprairietech.com/

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