Vaccinium darrowii 'John Blue'

Darrow's blueberry is the silver-leaved evergreen of the group, a low, fine-textured native of the pine flatwoods and sandy scrub from southern Georgia through Florida to eastern Louisiana. The species honors George M. Darrow, the United States Department of Agriculture scientist whose breeding work built much of the modern blueberry, and the wild plant has passed its own heat tolerance into many of today's Southern highbush cultivars. 'John Blue' is a North Carolina State University selection chosen for looks as much as fruit, and the leaves are the reason.

Small, fine, and glaucous blue-green, the evergreen foliage gives 'John Blue' a cool, silvered presence that few blueberries can match, held on a naturally dense, tidy frame. The color reads beautifully against darker greens and burgundy foliage, so the plant works as an ornamental first, in a native plant garden, an edible landscape, or a mixed shrub border, and as a fruiting blueberry second.

In spring the branches carry the small, white, bell-shaped flowers typical of the blueberries, mildly fragrant and busy with native bees, followed by small dark blue berries that are edible and as welcome to birds as to gardeners. The crop is modest beside a rabbiteye, but the pollinator and wildlife value is real, and the fruit is a pleasant bonus on a plant grown chiefly for the foliage.

Native to the hot, sandy pinelands of the Deep South, 'John Blue' wants full sun and well-drained, sandy, acid soil, and dislikes any spot that stands wet. Give the plant a bright, sharply drained bed, avoid low ground that holds water, and the reward is year-round blue-green structure, spring bloom for the bees, and a touch of Southern heritage in a compact, resilient shrub.