Master Gardeners of Northern Virginia
Over 40 Years of Growing Gardens and Gardeners
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
This lovely ground cover, the most widespread native member of the Sedum family in eastern North America, favors rocky banks, cliffs, and woods. Its tiny, slightly-fragrant, starlike flowers rise in showy clusters above succulent foliage in the spring.
The Glencarlyn Library Community Garden coordinators have created a new series of short videos about locally invasive plants and native alternatives. This month's post is on the Mimosa (Albizia julibrissin) tree.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Sassafras offers three-season interest: globelike clusters of chartreuse flowers in spring, three distinct leaf shapes, blue fruit in red cups in summer, and orange to crimson to purple foliage in fall. This native is common in wood edges throughout the Mid-Atlantic except for the northern Pennsylvania border.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
In the Mid-Atlantic, this attractive wildflower is most common in Pennsylvania. Although native to Fairfax County, its occurrence elsewhere in Virginia is spotty. It features leaflets arranged like ladder rungs (the ladder Jacob dreamt about in the Bible story), thus the common name.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
In early spring, clusters of fabulous flowers hug bare branches in a rare occurrence called cauliflory. This understory tree is found in mixed forests from southern Pennsylvania through Virginia. The Virginia Native Plant Society named Eastern Redbud as Wildflower of the Year for 2013.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
This native ground cover, common throughout the Mid-Atlantic, carpets the floor of mixed deciduous forests. Like its Latin epithet, single, vegetative leaves are peltate (umbrella-like). In mid-spring, paired leaves may hide showy but sparse white flowers. Fully ripened fruits, mayapples, are used for preserves.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Indigenous to wooded slopes and floodplain forests, this diminutive iris forms a lovely carpet in various shades of purple when it flowers in spring. Its colorful blooms and easy culture make it a valuable addition to a woodland garden.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Common in woodlands throughout the Mid-Atlantic, this native provides seasonal interest from early spring blossoms through vivid fall color. Edible fruit is ready for picking early summer, but there will be competition with 58 wildlife and 35 bird species that use this tree.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
The creeping habit of Moss Phlox can form a flower carpet as breathtaking in a residential rock garden or sprawling over rock walls as on the mountain slopes and open woodlands of its natural Mid-Atlantic habitat. (In NoVA, it's native to Fairfax County.)
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Noted for beautiful, exfoliating bark and multiple trunks, River Birch is an excellent food source for wildlife, supporting hundreds of species of lepidopterans and songbirds. It is commonly found in the Piedmont and Coastal Plain of the Mid-Atlantic Region from Pennsylvania to Virginia.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
This slow-growing, but long-lived, large tree is indigenous to river banks and flood plains and makes an attractive ornamental specimen for large landscapes with good fall color, distinctive exfoliating bark, and edible nuts. It also supports a variety of wildlife.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
This native tree of northeastern and north central North America can be long-lived; some Canadian specimens could be over 1,000 years old. The common name, “tree of life,” refers to the medicinal properties of the bark and foliage, which cured scurvy.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Though native to parts of the Mid-Atlantic Region (but not NoVA), Sourwood is more common in the South, including Virginia’s southern half. In residential landscapes, this decorative tree offers year-round appeal: lily-of-the valley-like flowers, brilliant fall foliage, persistent fruit capsules, and reddish twigs.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Found along wet stream banks, swamps, and river bottoms, Bald Cypress has a root system, which often produces irregular structures called “knees” that rise above the ground or water’s surface. The tree is referred to as “bald” since it is deciduous.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
An appealing addition to the landscape, this native is rare in Pennsylvania and historical in Delaware’s Piedmont, but frequent to common elsewhere in the Mid-Atlantic Region. The Virginia Native Plant Society named White Fringetree as Wildflower of the Year in 1997. Be aware though, it also appeals to deer!
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Unpalatable to deer, Pawpaw is increasingly prevalent in the upland understories deer frequent. It commonly grows in river valleys and bottomlands in the Mid-Atlantic Region from southern Pennsylvania through Virginia. Its fruit, with a complex tropical taste (some say banana-mango-citrus) and custard-like texture, is the largest edible fruit native to North America and gives rise to common names like False Banana and Custard Apple.
When homeowners picture gardens for pollinators (native bees, flower flies, butterflies and moths), they often think of beds of colorful flowering perennials. Trees and shrubs, the so-called woody plants, can also provide excellent support for these insects.
#PollinatorWeek
June is all about pollinators and how everyone can help support them. Three-fourths of the world’s flowering plants and about 35% of the world’s food plants depend on pollinators to reproduce, and 96% of North American land birds rely on butterfly and moth caterpillars to feed their young.
#PollinatorWeek
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Common names derive from leaf arrangement and from layers of horizontal branches tapering toward the top. Ecologist and entomologist Doug Tallamy calls this native “a great reminder that our plants are our bird-feeders.”
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
Common throughout the Mid-Atlantic Region, Tuliptree is aptly named from the shape of its flowers and leaves to the samara whorls persisting like wooden tulips until spring. It is an excellent shade or ornamental tree for a large property, sited best on lower or concave slopes. It was the favorite tree of Mr. President and the First Lady, bald eagles that nested 80 feet high in a Tulip-Poplar in the U.S. National Arboretum.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
This native member of the Rose Family has four-season interest from showy, fragrant spring blooms to a distinctive winter silhouette. It has high wildlife value, attracting a wide variety of pollinators, serving as the host plant for many Lepidoptera, and providing support to birds.
April is the month to plant and celebrate TREES! No need to wait for Earth Day (April 22nd) or Arbor Day (April 28th) to select and plant a glorious tree to enrich your home landscape.
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
The most climate-adaptable of our native trees, this understory plant is found in both upland and floodplain forests throughout eastern North America. It is noted both for its multi-season interest and the fluted bark which leads to its alternative name: “Musclewood.”
Tried and True Native Plant Selections for the Mid-Atlantic
The Red Maple, which is common throughout the Mid-Atlantic Region, tolerates the widest variety of soil conditions of any North American forest species. Its leaves turn brilliant scarlet, orange, and yellow in the fall, making it a popular ornamental tree.
