Laurustinus flowers when almost nothing else does. From late autumn the flat heads are already formed and waiting, tight clusters of deep pink buds sitting on the ends of the shoots, and through winter and into spring they open a few at a time into small fragrant white flowers, so the shrub carries pink and white together for months. The leaves are lustrous and leathery, dark above and noticeably paler beneath, held densely enough that the plant works as a screen the whole year. What follows the flowers is stranger and better: ovoid fruits of a hard metallic blue, almost enameled, ripening slowly to black.
Some viburnums are grown for the eye and some for the nose; the Burkwood viburnums are firmly the latter. Viburnum x burkwoodii is a cross between the intensely fragrant Viburnum carlesii and the glossy evergreen Viburnum utile, first raised by the brothers Burkwood and their partner Skipwith at their nursery near Kingston-on-Thames in England in 1924. 'Park Farm Hybrid' is a sister seedling from that same celebrated work, selected for a bolder flower and a deeper bud.
A neat, dome-shaped evergreen bred for foliage and form. Viburnum x globosum is a garden hybrid between Viburnum calvum and the well-known Viburnum davidii, and 'Jermyn's Globe' was selected as the best seedling from a batch raised at the celebrated Hillier Nurseries in England around 1964, chosen for the way the plant rounds into a dense, self-shaping globe. The cultivar name honors Hillier's Jermyns arboretum in Hampshire.
A tough, glossy evergreen born of two Chinese parents and a Prague nursery. Viburnum x pragense is the cross of the leatherleaf viburnum, Viburnum rhytidophyllum, with the service viburnum, Viburnum utile, first raised by the plantsman Josef Vik at the Municipal Nurseries of Prague in 1955 and named for the city in 1959. The epithet pragense simply means of Prague, a rare instance of a garden hybrid carrying a birthplace rather than a botanist.
A native violet grown as much for the leaf as the flower. Viola walteri, Walter's violet, belongs to the violet family, Violaceae, and honors the British-born botanist Thomas Walter, whose Flora Caroliniana of 1788 was the first flora of the American Southeast. The prostrate blue violet ranges in the wild from Texas east to Florida and north to Virginia and Ohio, threading the floors of moist deciduous woodlands and shaded rocky ledges.
A superior selection of the ancient chaste tree, chosen for the size and color of the bloom. Vitex agnus-castus 'Shoal Creek' is a deciduous large shrub or small tree, native in the species to southern Europe and western Asia and long grown across the South for a long season of summer flower. The palmate, aromatic leaves have now and then been mistaken for those of cannabis, a passing resemblance that gives the plant a certain conversational charm.
A tough, salt-defying seaside groundcover with a serious caveat. Vitex rotundifolia, best known as beach vitex, is a low, prostrate, trailing shrub of the mint family, native to the coasts of eastern Asia, the Pacific islands, and Australia, where the plant binds shifting sand along the shore. Rounded, blue-green leaves about two inches across clothe the running stems, aromatic and slightly spicy when crushed, and spikes of bright lavender-blue flowers open in late summer.
A brightly variegated cousin of the chaste tree, grown for foliage as much as flower. Vitex trifolia, sometimes called the three-leaf chaste tree or Arabian lilac, is a warm-climate shrub of the mint family, native along tropical and subtropical coasts from eastern Africa through southern Asia to Australia and the Pacific. The species name trifolia points to the leaves, usually held in threes, and the selection 'Variegata' edges each gray-green leaflet in creamy white for a cool, luminous effect.
The muscadine is the South's own grape, and 'Triumph' is one of the finest for the home garden. Vitis rotundifolia is a vigorous native vine of the southeastern United States, the first North American grape brought into cultivation, long grown for thick-skinned, intensely flavored fruit and the honeyed wines of Scuppernong fame. 'Triumph', a bronze-fruited selection, carries that heritage forward with unusual quality and ease.
A timeless favorite with a bright twist. Weigela florida 'Variegata' is a compact, deciduous shrub grown for two gifts at once: cream-edged, softly variegated foliage and a late-spring flood of deep rose-pink, trumpet-shaped flowers. The genus honors the German botanist Christian Ehrenfried Weigel, and the species florida, meaning flowering, ranges as a wild plant through northern China, Korea, and Japan.
There are few sights more stirring than a wisteria in bloom, and 'Amethyst Falls' offers all the romance without the unruly habits of the Asian cousins. This refined selection of the native American wisteria, Wisteria frutescens, pours out cascades of fragrant, lavender-violet blossoms in late spring, with smaller flushes through summer, a soft echo of springtime returning again and again.
For the first sixty-five years in the books, this vine was filed as a kind of soybean. Linnaeus named the plant Glycine frutescens in 1753, frutescens meaning turning shrubby, and there the classification sat until 1818, when Thomas Nuttall looked again, decided a woody climber of the southern riverbanks deserved a genus apart, and named the vine for his friend Caspar Wistar, the Philadelphia anatomist. Somewhere between the man and the plant a vowel slipped, Wistar becoming Wisteria, and the misspelling has outlived everyone involved.
A rare white form of the well-behaved native. Wisteria frutescens 'Nivea' is a twining, woody, deciduous vine with compound leaves and short clusters of pure white flowers that open with the foliage, far less rampant than the common Asian wisterias and, in white, a genuine rarity. This form was virtually unknown to American gardeners until Woodlanders brought the plant into the trade. It has long been listed, here and elsewhere, as Wisteria frutescens var. nivea; the botanical variety has no standing in the current literature, so we now carry it under the cultivar name it has earned.
Some years ago the late Lynn Lowrey, a pioneer of Texas native plants, found a fine selection of native wisteria near the dam of an East Texas reservoir. The dam was known as Dam-B, and Lynn gave that name to the plant, though some contend the true name was Damn Bee. Woodlanders thanks Dr. David Creech of Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas, for the start of this and several other fine plants.
The white form of the latest-blooming native. Wisteria macrostachya 'Clara Mack' is a twining, deciduous Kentucky wisteria with compound leaves and long, hanging clusters of pure white flowers, a splendid white version of a species normally blue. The racemes run longer and open later than those of the other native, Wisteria frutescens, extending the native wisteria season.
Join the ranks of discerning plant lovers with the first official, modern piece of Woodlanders merchandise. This premium cotton hat is equal parts utility and quiet allegiance—a nod to those who know their Schima from their Franklinia (and perhaps know about the the Schimlinia too). Wear it out in the field, at the market, or wherever rare plants are appreciated.
A charming citrus hybrid for containers, winter patios, and kitchen harvests. Known as the calamondin orange, x Citrofortunella mitis 'Calamondin' is a compact, cold-tolerant citrus treasured for abundant fragrant blossoms, ornamental good looks, and tart, edible fruit. A natural cross between the mandarin orange, Citrus reticulata, and the kumquat, Fortunella, calamondin is equally at home on a patio or in a bright kitchen window, offering both beauty and bounty the year round.
John Bartram collected Xanthorhiza simplicissima from the Carolina mountains sometime before 1776 and brought the plant back to his famous Philadelphia garden, which tells you two things: that yellowroot has been in cultivation for as long as this country has existed, and that people who know plants have always recognized something worth paying attention to here. The Cherokee had known the plant far longer, using the roots, sliced open to reveal a vivid, almost electric chrome yellow, as a dye, a bitter tonic, and a medicine for ailments from mouth sores to stomach complaints. The active compound is berberine, the same antimicrobial alkaloid found in goldenseal, and the roots produce berberine in striking quantity. Xanthorhiza is Greek for yellow root, and the name is no metaphor.
A brand-new intergeneric hybrid, and a small horticultural triumph. Dr. Tom Ranney of the North Carolina State University research station in Fletcher succeeded in crossing two icons of the Southern flora: the legendary Franklinia alatamaha, the lost Franklin tree that has not been seen in the wild since the early 1800s, with the native loblolly bay, Gordonia lasianthus. The result is xGordlinia grandiflora, a bigeneric cross that carries the best of both parents.
Shiny Xylosma is sometimes listed as Xylosma senticosa. It is an attractive heat and drought tolerant evergreen shrub with glossy leaves about 3" long and 1" wide. It is much grown in California and the Southwest as a hedge, screen planting, or small tree. The greenish yellow flowers are not conspicuous but fragrant. This plant is uncommon in southeastern U.S. landscapes but has done very well here in our area. It should have a sunny or slightly shaded area with good soil and good drainage. This plant is native to eastern Asia.
