Gelsemium sempervirens 'Pride of Augusta'

'Pride of Augusta' is the old double-flowered Carolina jessamine, a twining evergreen vine that turns the familiar Southern gold into something fuller and more lavish. Where the wild species opens simple funnels, this selection packs each bloom with extra petals, so the vine carries a long, generous show of ruffled, double yellow flowers, sweetly fragrant, from late winter into early spring.

The double blooms last longer than the single wild type and often keep the vine in color for weeks, a bright curtain against the glossy evergreen leaves. Because the flowers are doubled, the plant sets little or no seed and pours the saved energy into a heavier, more sustained display.

'Pride of Augusta' carries a piece of Southern horticultural history: the selection traces to the historic Fruitland Nurseries in Augusta, Georgia, the nineteenth-century nursery whose grounds later became the Augusta National golf course. A native vine with a pedigree, the plant twines readily up a fence, a trellis, a post, or an arbor, and holds evergreen structure the year round.

Give full sun to part shade and ordinary, well-drained soil, and 'Pride of Augusta' asks little once established, taking heat and occasional drought in stride. One caution belongs with the beauty: like all jessamines, every part of the plant is poisonous if eaten, so site the vine away from where small children or pets might reach the flowers.