Sisyrinchium nashii 'Suwannee', Nash's blue-eyed grass, is a small, enchanting native perennial of the Southeastern United States, selected from populations in Florida's Suwannee River basin. Despite the common name, this is no grass at all but a diminutive member of the iris family, Iridaceae, betraying the kinship in the fine, flattened, fan-arranged foliage and the six-parted, star-shaped flowers. The species honors George V. Nash, the American botanist who described so much of the Southeastern flora.
This curious little Smilax is one of the quieter treasures in the Woodlanders catalog, a deciduous groundcover built of fine, twiggy, interlacing stems and small leaves, so densely and geometrically branched that the plant earned the house name Chicken Wire Plant. A member of the greenbrier family, Smilacaceae, this dwarf relative of the climbing greenbriers trades the usual vining habit for a low, intricate, shrubby tangle.
Dwarf greenbrier is the gentlest member of a prickly clan. Where most of the greenbriers, the Smilax vines, arm themselves with vicious hooks, Smilax pumila comes up soft and unarmed, a low, scrambling, evergreen groundcover of the Southeastern coastal plain, safe to handle and easy to place. The mottled, arrow-shaped leaves hold a quiet, marbled green through the year, and on female plants clusters of bright orange to red berries glow in the winter undergrowth like drops of fire.
Florists across the South have a name for the green that turns up at every wedding worth attending and every Christmas mantel worth dressing: Jackson vine. Southern smilax, if that is how you came up. The town of Evergreen, Alabama took its name from this very plant, which gives you some idea how far Smilax smallii has wound itself into the region's notion of celebration. Looped down a staircase, run along an altar, drawn the length of a table, they are the foliage that announces something is happening here.
This vigorous evergreen vine blooms from mid summer to mid fall. The showy star shaped white flowers are tinged with blue and produce a wonderful fragrance. It can grow in sandy soil, clay, or rich gardening soil and can withstand both humid and dry climates. Plant in full or half sun. It is native to Brazil.
This South American shrub is perhaps correctly Lycianthes rantonetti. It is a scrambling vine-like shrub which is best trained up as a trellis or espalier plant where it can get up to 15 feet in mild areas. It is valued for the loose clusters of bright violet flowers produced over a long period. Needs sun and regular moisture. Can be grown as a container plant and given greenhouse protection where climate is not subtropical.
Slender vine. Showy blue to purple flowers in axillary cymes. Scarlet fruit.(See HRT, RIF)Cut back plants after the frost kills the tops. Mound 10 inches of coarse sand over the stubs. Mulch over with pine straw. As weather warms, remove this covering to allow new shoots to emerge. Given rich soil and ample water, these plants will thrive during hot summers.
This is an evergreen shrub with grayish leaves. Found in sterile dry sands of sandhills and old dunes in SC, GA, FL, and AL. It is unusual being a woody shrub as other goldenrods are herbaceous perennials. Do not plant in shade or in rich or poorly drained soil. Woodlanders may have been first nursery to offer this plant. It bears terminal spikes of yellow goldenrod flowers.
Blue-stemmed goldenrod is the goldenrod for shade. Where most of the clan demand open sun, Solidago caesia threads through the dappled light of the eastern woodland, arching slender, blue-purple stems that carry small, brilliant yellow flowers packed into the leaf axils, so the bloom runs the whole length of each stem like a garland. That habit gives the second common name, wreath goldenrod, and the late-summer to autumn color arrives just as the shade garden begins to fade.
Western variety of Showy Goldenrod recently found growing in deep sandy soil in Aiken County, SC. Smaller leaves than straight species. Blooms mid to late summer.
Bartram's Ixia is a very rare native bulb with grass-like leaves and producing for a few hours each morning in May beautiful blue 2 inch flowers on 18 inch stems. This legendary plant was praised by William Bartram in the 1770's but probably never offered by nurseries until Woodlanders made it available. It is native to moist pinelands and sunny seepage areas in northeastern Florida where it is very localized and difficult to spot if not in flower. Grows and multiplies in appropriate garden conditions.
Indian Pink is a choice perennial for semishaded rich woodland sites with neutral soils. The flowers are borne on the ends of 2 foot stems. Flowers are tubular bright red with yellow throat. A much sought after plant which is not readily available. Native to the southeastern U.S. north to southern Illinois and Missouri.
Very low growing stoloniferous groundcover for sunny location with good soil. Small narrow bright green leaves and small single bright yellow daisy-like flowers borne on stems well above the foliage. From the pampas of Argentina courtesy of Alberto Castillo. Hardy and proving a good plant here.
Important: This plant is sold within South Carolina only.In the high-gradient streams of the southern Appalachians, the Gauley, the Bluestone, the Greenbrier, scattered tributaries of the New River, and a handful of similar second- and third-order rivers, grows a shrub that holds on to rocky bars and scoured banks where almost nothing else can. This is Spiraea virginiana, the Appalachian spiraea, a plant that evolved alongside the violent flood regime of these mountain rivers and depends on that disturbance. The floods scour competing vegetation off the banks, expose mineral soil for germination, and break off rhizome fragments that float downstream to colonize new sites. Where the rivers were dammed, the floods stopped, and the spiraea began to disappear.
Blue Bell Arboretum and Nursery in England tells us: "A lovely rare species introduced from China by Wilson in 1908, Stachyurus chinensis 'Celina' has long, stiffly pendulous, racemes of soft-yellow flowers in spring. The flowers are very pretty and complimented by dark, purple-brown stems. The dark green leaves turn handsome shades of pink, red or orange before falling in autumn. An unusual and exciting garden plant !...Stachyurus chinensis 'Celina' will grow in full sun as long as it is planted in a soil which remains moist all year round. As a general rule of thumb, it is usually a little less demanding in a position with partial shade or dappled sunlight.
