{"title":"On the Horizon","description":"\u003cp\u003eNot every plant in propagation will tell you when. On the Horizon holds the ones too early or too uncertain to promise a season: seed just sown and slow to germinate, cuttings that have only begun to root, small numbers of something rare that we are coaxing along without a firm date. Consider this the deep water of the propagation house, the plants we are working on but cannot yet put on the calendar. Add your name to any of them, and when the growing catches up to the hoping, you will be among the first to know.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"aesculus-pavia","title":"Aesculus pavia","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe red buckeye is the South's hummingbird herald, a clump-forming, round-topped deciduous shrub or small tree whose lustrous, palmately compound leaves break very early, often before the last frosts, and whose six-inch panicles of tubular scarlet-red flowers open in spring just as the ruby-throated hummingbirds return north. The bright bloom, unusual among the buckeyes, draws hummingbirds and bees in numbers and gives the plant a long place in the affection of native-plant gardeners across the southern United States.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNative peoples knew the buckeye well, though not as food without effort: every part is poisonous, rich in the saponin aescin and the glycoside aesculin, and the bright seeds are the most dangerous. The same saponins made the buckeye useful, the crushed seeds and branches tossed into still pools to stupefy fish, which rose to the surface to be gathered, while leached and roasted nuts could be eaten and the lather of the seeds served as a soap. Handsome as the seeds are, treat the red buckeye as ornamental, and keep the poisonous parts away from children and livestock.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBy late summer the red buckeye often drops the leaves early, so site where a summer gap reads as seasonal rather than sad, among other shrubs or at a woodland edge that fills in around the bare frame. Plant in sun to part shade in moist, well-drained soil, and enjoy the early flowers as one of the first nectar sources of the southern spring. Lovely with native azaleas and dogwoods that bloom in the same season.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057807102067,"sku":"AESC-PAVI-01G","price":27.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-7.jpg?v=1720136191"},{"product_id":"amsonia-montana","title":"Amsonia montana","description":"\u003cp\u003eDwarf bluestar is the compact, well-behaved member of the clan, a tidy mound of upright stems and soft green leaves topped in late spring with clusters of powder-blue, star-shaped flowers. Often treated as a low form of the eastern bluestar, \u003cem\u003eAmsonia montana\u003c\/em\u003e stays small and shapely, a fine choice where the taller bluestars would sprawl.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eStanding only about a foot, dwarf bluestar suits the front of a border, a rock garden, a container, or any tight, sunny spot, where the spring flowers and the gold fall color both earn their keep on a small frame. Like the rest of the genus, the plant carries a milky sap that deer and rabbits refuse, and asks little once settled.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGrow dwarf bluestar in sun to part shade in most well-drained soils with moderate moisture, and shear lightly after bloom to keep the mound dense. Easy, long-lived, and tidier than the tall cousins.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057809920115,"sku":"AMSO-MONT-01G","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1228.jpg?v=1720136338"},{"product_id":"amsonia-ludoviciana","title":"Amsonia ludoviciana","description":"\u003cp\u003eMost bluestars are smooth, cool customers; \u003cem\u003eAmsonia ludoviciana\u003c\/em\u003e is the outlier of the group. The Louisiana bluestar belongs to the dogbane family, Apocynaceae, and shares the clan's five-petaled, star-shaped flowers and milky sap, but the leaves set the species apart: narrow and willowy, and unusually clothed beneath with a grey-white felt, a woolly tomentum that catches the light and lends the whole plant a soft, silvered cast rare in the genus. In spring, clustered flowers of a clean sky-blue open at the tips of the upright stems, quiet and steely and worked over by the first butterflies of the season.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThere is a real story behind these plants. Woodlanders obtained the Louisiana bluestar years ago from Brookgreen Gardens on the South Carolina coast, where the perennial had grown in cultivation since the celebrated botanist Dr. J. K. Small introduced the plant there in perhaps the 1920s. For a long stretch the species was feared lost, thought extinct in the wild, before being rediscovered in Louisiana; today botanists record scattered, uncommon populations from South Carolina west through Louisiana and Mississippi. Growing a nursery-raised plant of this rank keeps a rare Southeastern native in gardens and in circulation, a quiet piece of conservation.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe names carry their own small histories. The genus \u003cem\u003eAmsonia\u003c\/em\u003e honors Charles Amson, an eighteenth-century physician of colonial Virginia, while the epithet \u003cem\u003eludoviciana\u003c\/em\u003e means simply of Louisiana, the state that sheltered the rediscovered plants. Like the milkweeds to which the bluestars are related, the stems run with a milky latex that browsing deer and rabbits leave strictly alone, so the plant reads as both delicate and durable: pollinators come for the spring nectar, and almost nothing comes to graze.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden the Louisiana bluestar earns a place three seasons running. Site the plant in full sun to light shade and give lean, well-drained ground; despite wet-flatwoods origins the deep-rooted perennial shrugs off drought once settled, and only floppy, over-lush growth comes of rich soil. The spring flowers read against the silvered foliage, the fine-textured mound holds all summer, and in autumn the leaves turn a warm butter-gold that lights the border before the stems die back for winter. Set a plant among little bluestem, coneflower, and baptisia for a sunny native planting, or let a drift carry the cool blue through the edge of a meadow.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057809985651,"sku":"AMSO-LUDO-01G","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1077.jpg?v=1720136343"},{"product_id":"asimina-obovata","title":"Asimina obovata","description":"\u003cp\u003eAsimina obovata is the bigflower pawpaw, a Florida native that carries the largest, showiest blooms in a genus better known for its fruit. The pawpaws are the temperate outliers of the Annonaceae, the custard apple family whose tropical members include the cherimoya, soursop, and ylang-ylang, and Asimina alone among them ventures north into the sandy uplands of the American Southeast. The genus name descends from an early Native American word for the fruit, carried into English through the French asiminier, while obovata describes the egg-shaped leaves, broadest above the middle.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn spring, as the new leaves emerge, the plant opens creamy white flowers several inches across, far larger and paler than the deep maroon bells of the common pawpaw, Asimina triloba. Beetles and flies do the pollinating, and by late summer some flowers give way to aromatic, fleshy green fruits holding large brown seeds. The fruit is edible, though most gardeners rate the flavor below that of the northern pawpaw and grow this species instead for the flowers, the foliage, and the wildlife.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is a plant of the Florida scrub, at home in the peninsula's dry sandhills and sandy ridges where little else will grow, in blazing sun and sharp, fast-draining sand. Bigflower pawpaw earns a place in the native and butterfly garden as a larval host for the zebra swallowtail, whose caterpillars feed only on Asimina leaves, and for the pawpaw sphinx moth as well. Where the common pawpaw wants rich, moist woodland, this southern cousin asks for the opposite, lean sand and excellent drainage.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGive Asimina obovata full sun to light shade and the sandiest, sharpest soil available, with little competition from neighbors. Like other pawpaws the plant sends down a deep taproot and resents disturbance, so site the shrub thoughtfully and let the roots settle undisturbed. In a sandhill restoration, a xeric native border, or a butterfly garden, the big white spring flowers and clean summer foliage make this rare Florida endemic a quietly distinctive choice.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003ePhotos courtesy of Jay Horn and Alan Cressler\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057813393523,"sku":"ASIM-OBOV-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/AsiminaobovataJayHorn.jpg?v=1784297285"},{"product_id":"aspidistra-elatior-variegata","title":"Aspidistra elatior 'Variegata'","description":"\u003cp\u003eA boldly striped form of the cast iron plant, \u003cem\u003eAspidistra elatior\u003c\/em\u003e 'Variegata' carries the same broad, leathery, evergreen blades, each brushed lengthwise with bands of creamy white over deep glossy green. The variegation lights up a shaded corner, and the toughness is all there too: this is a near-indestructible evergreen for difficult, low-light places.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA useful quirk: the white striping holds best on lean soil, so resist the urge to feed heavily, and the plant keeps the brightest variegation when grown a little hungry and somewhat root-bound. Native in parentage to China and Japan, slow and steady, with foliage that lasts for years before aging out.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGrow variegated cast iron plant in shade to part shade, in well-drained soil, as a striking foliage accent, an evergreen groundcover under trees, or a container plant for a covered porch or a bright room indoors. The bold, architectural leaves bring structure and light to shaded plantings, and the variegation stays put rather than reverting to plain green.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057814016115,"sku":"ASPI-ELAT-VARI-01G","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/F122E6EB-29EC-40DF-A597-9BFE0B5A8CB3.jpg?v=1724700130"},{"product_id":"baptisia-australis","title":"Baptisia australis","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhen Woodlanders began in 1980, this was about the only Baptisia known to gardeners; we went on to introduce many of the species that have since become popular garden perennials. \u003cem\u003eBaptisia australis\u003c\/em\u003e, blue wild indigo, is a long-lived native, essentially a prairie plant of open glades on limestone soil, with handsome olive-green compound leaves topped in spring by spikes of bright indigo-blue, pea-like flowers.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNamed the Perennial Plant of the Year in 2010, blue wild indigo is as tough as a perennial comes: nitrogen-fixing, drought-tolerant, deer-resistant, and long-lived, growing a deep taproot that lets the plant shrug off heat and dry spells. The black seed pods that follow the flowers rattle into fall and add a second season of interest. Native to the eastern and midwestern United States.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePlant blue wild indigo in a sunny, well-drained spot, in a border, a prairie or meadow planting, or a native garden, where the blue spring spires read against fresh green and the bold, shrubby clump holds its shape all season. Site once and leave undisturbed, since the deep root resents moving. Lovely with peonies, amsonia, and early grasses.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057816735859,"sku":"BAPT-AUST-01G","price":13.6,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-614.jpg?v=1720136585"},{"product_id":"baptisia-minor","title":"Baptisia minor","description":"\u003cp\u003eBaptisia minor is the dwarf of the blue false indigos, a compact native perennial that gives all the drama of the well-known Baptisia australis on a smaller, tidier frame. Often treated botanically as Baptisia australis var. minor, the plant stands lower and more compact, yet carries full-sized spires of indigo-blue, pea-shaped flowers held well clear of the blue-green foliage. Much admired in the Woodlanders garden, this is a perennial that settles into a sunny bed for decades.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe genus name comes from the Greek bapto, to dip or to dye, for the old use of these plants as a homegrown substitute for true indigo. Colonial dyers, following a practice learned in part from the Cherokee, boiled wild indigo to draw a blue far less brilliant than the real Indigofera, and the common names false indigo and wild indigo still carry that history. Being a legume, Baptisia also feeds the soil, fixing nitrogen through deep roots, and the inflated seed pods ripen charcoal-black and rattle in the wind, good for dried arrangements.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn spring the blue racemes draw queen bumblebees and other long-tongued native bees, and the foliage serves as a larval host for the wild indigo duskywing and the frosted elfin among other butterflies. Deer and rabbits leave the plant alone, put off by the alkaloids that make every part mildly toxic to eat, so a word of care is due where the seed pods might tempt a curious child. In the garden, few native perennials give so much for so little fuss.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBaptisia minor wants full sun and average, well-drained soil, and asks mainly for patience, sending down a deep taproot that makes the plant slow to establish, long-lived, and best left unmoved once planted. Native to the prairies and glades of the south-central United States, the dwarf blue false indigo suits a sunny border, a rock or gravel garden, a meadow, or a native planting, where the spring blue, blue-green summer mounds, and black autumn pods carry three seasons of interest. Give the plant room, sun, and time, and the plant repays all three.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057816932467,"sku":"BAPT-MINO-01G","price":17.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-617.jpg?v=1720136596"},{"product_id":"baptisia-alba","title":"Baptisia alba","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eBaptisia alba\u003c\/em\u003e, white wild indigo, is a striking native perennial of tall spires of white, pea-like flowers over deep blue-green foliage. Native to the eastern and central United States, the species carries a rich history as a dye plant, used by Native American peoples and early settlers as a substitute for true indigo, and the genus name, from the Greek bapto, to dip, records that role.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBeyond the beauty, white wild indigo fixes nitrogen to enrich the soil and draws bees and butterflies to the spring flowers. Drought-tolerant, long-lived, and low in fuss, the plant grows a deep taproot that resents disturbance, so site once and let the plant settle in place. A piece of American garden history for a sunny border or a naturalized planting, with handsome black seed pods that rattle into fall.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePhoto courtesy of David Brenda.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057816965235,"sku":"BAPT-ALBA-01G","price":17.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Baptisia-alba-closeup_lg-DavidBrenda.jpg?v=1725495481"},{"product_id":"calycanthus-hybridus-venus","title":"Calycanthus hybridus ‘Venus’","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eCalycanthus\u003c\/em\u003e 'Venus' is a white-flowered sweetshrub bred by Dr. Tom Ranney at North Carolina State University, drawing on three species at once: the Eastern Carolina allspice (\u003cem\u003eCalycanthus floridus\u003c\/em\u003e), the California sweetshrub (\u003cem\u003eCalycanthus occidentalis\u003c\/em\u003e), and the Chinese sweetshrub (\u003cem\u003eCalycanthus chinensis\u003c\/em\u003e, long known as \u003cem\u003eSinocalycanthus\u003c\/em\u003e). The result is a deciduous shrub that carries the best of all three: hardiness, substance, and an unusual flower.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePlump, yellow-green buds open to broad white blooms, magnolia-like and a little smaller than a star magnolia, washed with yellow and a flush of purple at the center. The flowers are fragrant, ripe and fruity in the manner of strawberries and melon, and appear from late spring into summer above glossy, dark green leaves.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e'Venus' grows upright and full, roughly five to six feet tall and wide, and asks little beyond sun or light shade and a moist, well-drained soil. Clean foliage, a long season of bloom, and a tidy, non-running habit make this hybrid an easy choice for a mixed border, a fragrant foundation planting, or anywhere a white-flowered shrub is wanted near a path or seat.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057822339187,"sku":"CALY-HYBR-VENU-01G","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Calycanthushybridus_Venus_JohnGrimshaw.jpg?v=1784858664"},{"product_id":"camellia-crapnelliana","title":"Camellia crapnelliana","description":"\u003cp\u003eTwo camellias do most of the work in American gardens, \u003cem\u003eCamellia japonica\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eCamellia sasanqua\u003c\/em\u003e, in countless named forms. The Far East holds far more, and Woodlanders is among the few nurseries offering the lesser-known species to gardeners here. \u003cem\u003eCamellia crapnelliana\u003c\/em\u003e, the Crapnell camellia, is one of the most distinctive: a slow, upright evergreen first described from Hong Kong Island and named for the collector Crapnell.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe species is grown as much for bark and fruit as for bloom. Mature trunks peel and glow a warm cinnamon-red, a feature rare among camellias, and the large, dark green, finely toothed leaves give the plant real presence the year round. In late winter come the flowers: single and white, the broad petals faintly ruffled at the edge and gathered around a boss of golden stamens. They are followed by woody, globular seed capsules the size of a small orange, among the largest fruit in the whole genus.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLike most camellias, the Crapnell camellia is happiest in semi-shade, in sandy, slightly acid soil kept mulched and watered, sheltered from hard freezes at the cold edge of zones 8 and 9. Site this plant where the cinnamon bark can be read at close range, by a path, an entry, or a courtyard wall, and underplant with ferns and other shade lovers that will not hide the trunk. A collector's evergreen, and a quiet piece of camellia history.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057824632947,"sku":"CAME-CRAP-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/CamelliacrapnellianaWoodlanders.jpg?v=1730390731"},{"product_id":"camellia-sinensis-rosea","title":"Camellia sinensis 'Rosea'","description":"\u003cp\u003e'Rosea' is a pink-flowered form of the tea plant, \u003cem\u003eCamellia sinensis\u003c\/em\u003e, the same species behind every cup of green, black, white, and oolong tea, here carrying soft pink flowers in place of the usual white and a reddish flush through the new foliage. The leaves still make tea, so this is an ornamental and a useful plant at once, a little prettier in flower than the straight species and just as willing in the garden.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSmall pink blooms with bright yellow stamens open in early fall, set against fine, willow-textured evergreen leaves on an upright, rounded frame. Like the species, the pink tea plant takes well to hedging, foundation use, or a large container, and the tender new flushes can be picked and brewed at home. Grow in sun to part shade in well-drained, acidic soil kept mulched and watered, and enjoy both the flower and the harvest.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057825157235,"sku":"CAME-SINE-ROSE-01G","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1109.jpg?v=1720136929"},{"product_id":"camellia-sasanqua-leslie-ann","title":"Camellia sasanqua 'Leslie Ann'","description":"\u003cp\u003eTwo Hall of Fame inductions hang on Leslie Ann's lineage, though neither is for a flower. The award stamped on her record, the Ralph Peer Sasanqua Award, carries the name of the man who in 1923 hauled recording equipment south to Atlanta and captured the first commercial sides of country and blues. Ralph Peer pioneered field recording and sits in both the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Blues Hall of Fame, then turned that same restless curatorial instinct on camellias late in life, founding the Los Angeles Camellia Society in 1948 and rising to president of the American Camellia Society by 1957. The man who recorded the Carter Family also decided which sasanquas deserved to be remembered. In 1961, one of them was this one.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eShe is, despite the species name, an American plant. 'Leslie Ann' began as a chance seedling raised by Ray Davis of Mobile, Alabama, and first bloomed in 1954. Mobile is the right birthplace for her: the city has grown camellias since a single plant arrived from Liverpool in 1838, and more than a century later that obsession was still throwing seedlings worth naming. Davis grew his out, watched the first flowers open, and recognized what most chance seedlings never earn, a reason to keep going.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat he kept is a flower that resists being called simply pink or white. The bloom opens as a tight rosette and unfurls gradually to three and a half or four inches across, white washed with rose and finished at the petal edges in a fine lavender-pink line, around a center of yellow stamens. The edging reads almost like a picotee, drawn rather than brushed. An unusual lasting quality holds each bloom close to two weeks, with a few petals twisting as they age, so an established plant in full October bloom carries a layered, slightly windblown look rather than a flat uniform one.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe habit is the quiet surprise. Where most sasanquas read as dense shrubs, 'Leslie Ann' grows open and upright, and gardeners who know her keep reaching for the same comparison: the Juniper Level Botanic Garden likens the plant to a flowering cherry far more than a camellia. That openness earns a use a stiffer shrub cannot, a narrow profile for a tight space, a candidate for espalier against a warm wall, or simply a specimen given room to throw her branches. She blooms when most of the garden has finished, from mid-fall into early winter, and does it on the year's old wood without fuss.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057825222771,"sku":"CAME-SASA-LESL-ANN-01G","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Camelliasasanqua_LeslieAnn_Woodlanders1.jpg?v=1731726758"},{"product_id":"camellia-sasanqua-yuletide","title":"Camellia sasanqua 'Yuletide'","description":"\u003cp\u003e'Yuletide' is one of the most widespread and instantly recognizable red camellias in the trade, and the popularity is well earned. Dense growth carries lustrous dark green foliage on an upright, tidy, naturally columnar frame, and against that backdrop the flowers arrive in real quantity from late fall into early winter: single blooms about three inches across in a clean fire red, each one centered on a boss of bright golden stamens. The contrast is the thing. Very few plants are doing anything at all in December in a southern garden, and a shrub covered in red and gold at that moment tends to end arguments about where to put it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe origin is well documented. 'Yuletide' arose as a chance seedling of \u003cem\u003eCamellia\u003c\/em\u003e × \u003cem\u003evernalis\u003c\/em\u003e 'Hiryu' at Nuccio's Nurseries in Altadena, California, first flowering in 1959 and released to the trade in the years that followed. That parentage is why you will see the plant listed two ways. Most American nurseries, ours included, sell 'Yuletide' as a \u003cem\u003eCamellia sasanqua\u003c\/em\u003e, which is how the trade has always handled it; the Royal Horticultural Society and a number of camellia authorities file the same clone under \u003cem\u003eCamellia\u003c\/em\u003e × \u003cem\u003evernalis\u003c\/em\u003e, a hybrid group between \u003cem\u003eC. sasanqua\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eC. japonica\u003c\/em\u003e that sits between the two parents in leaf size and blooms in the gap between their seasons. Both labels point at the same plant.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCamellias came to the American South by way of Europe in the late eighteenth century and became so thoroughly naturalized in southern garden culture that most people assume they were always here. The genus belongs to Theaceae, the tea family, and the same botanical neighborhood produces \u003cem\u003eCamellia sinensis\u003c\/em\u003e, from which every cup of black, green, and oolong tea is made. In Japan \u003cem\u003esasanqua\u003c\/em\u003e is \u003cem\u003esazanka\u003c\/em\u003e, valued for centuries for autumn bloom and for the oil pressed from the seed, which has long been used on hair and skin and to protect steel blades from rust. The sasanquas differ from the showier japonicas in three useful ways: they take considerably more sun, they flower months earlier, and they shed their petals cleanly instead of hanging on to brown flowers.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePlant in semi-shade in sandy, slightly acid soil, kept mulched and watered; morning sun with afternoon shade is close to ideal in the Deep South, though 'Yuletide' tolerates more sun than a japonica ever would. The columnar habit makes this a natural for a narrow bed, a foundation planting under eaves, a screen, or a pair flanking a door, and the same habit means very little pruning is required. When pruning is needed, do it right after flowering, since next year's buds form on new growth through summer. Set where the December bloom will be seen from indoors. Bees still working on a mild winter afternoon will find these flowers when there is almost nothing else on offer.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057825583219,"sku":"CAME-SASA-YULE-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1803.jpg?v=1720136950"},{"product_id":"camellia-sasanqua-misty-moon","title":"Camellia sasanqua 'Misty Moon'","description":"\u003cp\u003e'Misty Moon' is a relatively new selection of the favorite fall-blooming sasanqua, an upright, bushy evergreen carrying large, rounded, single to semi-double flowers in a soft lavender-pink with gently wavy petals. The fading flowers do something unusual, taking on a cool grayish-blue cast before the petals drop, the detail that earns the name. Woodlanders has grown 'Misty Moon' in the ground for many years here in Aiken, and the old-nursery specimen has become a real showstopper just as the rest of the garden winds down for the year.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLike most camellias, the plant is at finest in semi-shade, in sandy, slightly acidic soil kept mulched and watered, where the upright frame holds the year and the lavender-pink flowers light the cool months against dark, glossy foliage. A fine choice for a shrub border, an informal screen, or a foundation planting where late-season color is wanted.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057825648755,"sku":"CAME-SASA-MIST-MOON-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1425.jpg?v=1720136952"},{"product_id":"carya-ovata","title":"Carya ovata","description":"\u003cp\u003eCarya ovata, the shagbark hickory, is one of the great native trees of the eastern woods, as easy to know by the bark as by the nuts. Mature trunks shed long, gray plates that curl away at the ends and hang loose, giving the tree a genuinely shaggy silhouette against a winter sky. Beneath that ragged coat stands a tall, straight, long-lived hardwood that can shade a landscape for two centuries and more.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe nuts are the other glory, sweet and rich and widely counted among the finest of all the hickories. That food value runs deep in the land's history, for the word hickory itself comes from the Virginia Algonquian pawcohiccora, a nourishing milk pounded from the nuts, and the crop still feeds squirrels, chipmunks, turkeys, and bears through the fall. A shagbark begins bearing slowly, then rewards generations, with the best years coming to trees well over half a century old.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eShagbark hickory belongs to the walnut family, kin to the pecan and the walnuts, and like them casts a little juglone into the soil, though far more gently than a black walnut. The pinnately compound leaves turn a warm golden brown in fall and release a clean, spicy scent when crushed, and the tree stands among the most valuable of native hosts, feeding the caterpillars of the luna moth and the great hickory horned devil. The hard, shock-resistant wood has long gone into tool handles and, famously, the smoke that flavors hickory-smoked meats.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGive Carya ovata full sun and room, on moist, well-drained soil, and plant while the tree is young, since a deep taproot makes an older hickory very hard to move. This is a tree for the long view, a canopy shade tree for a large lawn, a woodland, or a wildlife planting where the nuts and autumn gold can be enjoyed for lifetimes. For a gardener planting for the future, few native trees give more than a shagbark hickory.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057827844211,"sku":"CARY-OVAT-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1135.jpg?v=1720137044"},{"product_id":"chimonanthus-praecox","title":"Chimonanthus praecox","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn the dead of winter, when the garden has given up on color and scent alike, \u003cem\u003eChimonanthus praecox\u003c\/em\u003e quietly does the impossible. On bare, leafless branches, often in January and February, the wintersweet opens small, waxy, cupped stars of translucent pale yellow, each flushed at the heart with maroon, and from them pours a fragrance so rich and far-carrying that a single sprig will perfume a room. The Chinese name, la mei, the wax plum, catches the look of the petals exactly.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA deciduous shrub of the Chinese mountains, wintersweet has been cherished in Chinese gardens for well over a thousand years, planted by doorways and courtyards for the midwinter perfume and gathered for the new-year house. The flowers earn their keep beyond the garden as well: in Chinese tradition the buds, known as la mei hua, are floated in tea, used to scent and flavor, and hold a long place in folk medicine, recorded in herbals as early as the fifteenth century for easing summer-heat, slaking thirst, and quieting a cough. The South has prized the shrub for generations for that same unreasonable winter fragrance.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden, forgive wintersweet a somewhat gawky, upright habit and plant for the nose. Site the shrub where a winter path, a door, or a gate brings people within reach of the scent on a mild afternoon, and where summer's plain green frame can recede behind showier neighbors. Cut branches in tight bud and bring them indoors, where they open in the warmth and fill a house with perfume. Plant toward the back of a border, give room, and let later, bolder plants carry the warm months while the wintersweet waits for the cold.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057833644147,"sku":"CHIM-PRAE-01G","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-31.jpg?v=1720137193"},{"product_id":"cistus-x-purpureus","title":"Cistus x purpureus","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe rockroses bloom as if for a single day, and in a sense they do. Each papery flower of \u003cem\u003eCistus\u003c\/em\u003e x purpureus lasts only from morning to evening before dropping, yet through late spring the shrub opens fresh bloom after fresh bloom, so the whole plant seems perpetually covered. The flowers are the draw: two to three inches wide, crushed-silk petals of pinky purple, each stamped at the base with a deep maroon blotch, a marking that earned the old garden name orchidspot rockrose. Rockroses are not roses, and are not related; the resemblance is only in the open, five-petalled face.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA hybrid of two Mediterranean species, \u003cem\u003eCistus ladanifer\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eCistus creticus\u003c\/em\u003e, this rockrose has been grown in gardens since the early nineteenth century and ranks among the hardiest of the clan. The narrow, dark green, faintly resinous leaves carry the aromatic, sun-warmed scent of the Mediterranean maquis, the same family of shrubs that yields labdanum, the fragrant resin long used in perfumery. Long a favorite in European and Californian gardens, this rockrose does well in the South too, given the one thing all rockroses insist on: a hot, sunny, airy site with very sharp drainage.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden, treat rockrose as a sun-baked Mediterranean and ask little else. Plant on a hot bank, in a gravel or dry garden, along a wall, or at the front of a sunny border, in lean, fast-draining soil and full sun, free from crowding. Drought, wind, and salt spray are all taken in stride, which makes this shrub a natural for coastal and xeric plantings. Best treated as short-lived and not moved once settled, since rockroses resent transplanting; site them right the first time and enjoy the yearly flood of bloom.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057834823795,"sku":"CIST-PURP-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/059317F1-0A53-480D-8659-1BDAE4528F64.jpg?v=1773760417"},{"product_id":"citrus-x-citrus-ponciris-trifoliata-x-citrus-reticulata-changsha-x-english-large","title":"Hardy Citrus 'Changsha x English Large'","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis is a cold-hardy citrus hybrid bred to carry oranges into gardens too cold for ordinary citrus, a cross between the trifoliate orange, Poncirus trifoliata, in the large-flowered form called 'English Large', and the notably hardy Changsha mandarin, Citrus reticulata. Both parents are prized for cold tolerance, and stacking the two produces a small, thorny tree that shrugs off freezes that would kill a true orange. The cross matches the well-known US-852 citrandarin, a hardy-citrus line from the USDA breeding program.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe result is a small, thorny tree, semi-evergreen in mild winters and briefly deciduous in hard ones, carrying fragrant white spring flowers and small orange fruits. The chief value here is toughness rather than dessert quality, since the fruit runs small and seedy, a curiosity and an ornament more than a fresh-eating orange. Where the appeal lies is in growing recognizable citrus, in flower and in fruit, far outside the citrus belt.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWoodlanders has been a leader in cold-hardy citrus for decades, and this Poncirus and Changsha hybrid fits squarely in that tradition, hardy to somewhere near zero degrees and reliable through zone 7. The trifoliate orange parent lends both the cold hardiness and the fierce thorns, which make the tree a formidable barrier or security hedge as well as a conversation piece. Fragrant in spring and studded with little oranges in fall, this is citrus for the adventurous northern gardener.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGive the hybrid full sun and well-drained soil, and expect steady growth into a small, well-armed tree. Use the plant as a cold-hardy citrus novelty for the edible-landscape enthusiast, a thorny living fence, or a collector's piece with a real breeding pedigree behind it. For a gardener who has always wanted to grow an orange where oranges are not supposed to grow, few plants are as satisfying.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003ePhoto used is straight Changsha, we do not yet have a photo of this hybrid.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057838461043,"sku":"CITR-PONC-TRIF-CHAN-01G","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Citrus_reticulata_Changsha_Woodlanders_2.jpg?v=1731555826"},{"product_id":"clematis-crispa","title":"Clematis crispa","description":"\u003cp\u003eClematis crispa, the swamp leather flower, is a small and delicate native vine that trades the flat, showy face of a garden clematis for something quieter and stranger. The flowers hang solitary and nodding, little urns of thick, leathery blue-purple, paler within, their four recurved sepals frilled and crimped at the tips like curled ribbon. Slightly fragrant and endlessly charming, this is a clematis scaled for a small garden rather than a barn wall.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAs the common names swamp and marsh leather flower suggest, this vine belongs to the wet places of the southeastern United States, the floodplains, swamps, wet woods, and ditch banks from Virginia to Florida and west to Texas. That wetland heritage makes the plant unusually tolerant of moist and even soggy ground, where few flowering vines will grow. The species name crispa means curled, for those wavy, crisped sepal margins that give the flower its curly-clematis nickname.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is a herbaceous vine that climbs politely by twining leaf-stalks and dies back to the ground each winter, returning fresh each spring, so the plant never overwhelms a small trellis or a shrub the way a woodier clematis might. Bloom runs from late spring well into summer, followed by silky, feathered seed heads that carry the interest on. Give full sun to part shade and moist, fertile soil, keep the roots cool, and the swamp leather flower asks for little else.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSet Clematis crispa on a small trellis, an arbor, or a low fence, or let the vine scramble through a shrub at the edge of a rain garden or pond, where the nodding bells can be met at eye level. Bees and other pollinators work the flowers through the long season, and the plant fits happily into native, pollinator, and water gardens. As with all clematis, the leaves and sap are mildly toxic if eaten and can irritate skin, worth a note where children play.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057839149171,"sku":"CLEM-CRIS-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1667.jpg?v=1720137430"},{"product_id":"clerodendrum-indicum","title":"Clerodendrum indicum","description":"\u003cp\u003eClerodendrum indicum, the Turk's turban, is a bold, tropical-looking perennial that stages two very different shows in a single season. First come tall, nearly unbranched stems, ringed with long narrow leaves and topped in summer by great airy sprays of long-tubed white flowers, shooting outward like a burst of fireworks, which earns the plant its other names, tube flower and skyrocket. Then, as the blooms fade, the real surprise arrives.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEach spent flower leaves behind a shining, blue-black berry cradled in an enlarged, star-shaped calyx that flushes deep red, and it is this jewel-like fruit, not the flower, that gives the Turk's turban its name and its longest season of beauty. Native to India, Myanmar, and tropical Asia, the plant has an exotic, almost theatrical presence, and has naturalized here and there across the warm Southeast. Butterflies and bees work the white summer flowers.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn frost-free gardens Turk's turban grows woody and shrub-like, but through most of the South the plant behaves as a die-back perennial, cut down by frost and resprouting vigorously each spring to bloom by late summer. Given full sun, rich soil, and ample water, the stems shoot up fast in the heat. One caution belongs on the label: the plant spreads by suckers and can colonize a bed if left unchecked, so site the Turk's turban where that vigor is welcome, or contain the roots.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eUse Clerodendrum indicum at the back of a sunny border or as a bold tropical accent, where the skyrocket flowers and the red-and-blue fruit can carry a planting from midsummer into fall. In its native range the leaves have long been used in traditional medicine for asthma and other complaints of the chest, a piece of the plant's history rather than any advice for the garden. For drama on a big scale in a hot, sunny spot, few perennials deliver quite like the Turk's turban.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057840984179,"sku":"CLER-INDI-01G","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/ClerodendrumindicumForestKimStarr2.jpg?v=1784304362"},{"product_id":"clethra-alnifolia-anne-bidwell","title":"Clethra alnifolia ‘Anne Bidwell’","description":"\u003cp\u003eSummersweet, \u003cem\u003eClethra alnifolia\u003c\/em\u003e, is one of the great fragrant natives of the eastern United States, a shrub of moist woods and pond edges whose white summer spikes carry a honey-and-clove perfume across the whole garden. Colonists called the plant Sweet Pepperbush, for the peppercorn-like seed heads that follow, and Summersweet, for the scent; the flowers even lather softly in water and once served as a field soap.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Anne Bidwell' is the selection to grow for sheer flower power. Raised in Massachusetts from a commercial seed source, this summersweet is most remarkable for the flowers: densely clustered, multi-branched spikes far larger than the straight species, some eight to ten inches long, borne in such profusion that the bush seems to foam white. The blooms open around two weeks later than most selections, in mid to late August, stretching the summersweet season and the fragrance deep into the late-summer garden. The habit stays fairly compact and upright, dressed in lustrous dark green leaves that turn clear yellow in fall.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePlant 'Anne Bidwell' where the late, oversized spikes can be met at close range, beside a path, a seat, or a window left open on a warm evening, and where the bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds are part of the pleasure. Wonderfully at home in moist shrub borders, rain gardens, and the heavy, damp shade that defeats showier plants. Pair with ferns, itea, and other moisture-loving companions.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057842851955,"sku":"CLET-ALNI-ANNE-BIDW-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-322.jpg?v=1720137481"},{"product_id":"conradina-canescens","title":"Conradina canescens","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe conradinas are dense, aromatic, low shrubs of the mint family, dressed in small, usually needle-like green or gray leaves and hung with little pale purple flowers. Six or seven species grow wild in the southern United States, most of them in Florida on sand or very sandy soil, and the genus carries an unusual weight of rarity: four species are federally listed, \u003cem\u003eC. brevifolia\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eC. etonia\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eC. glabra\u003c\/em\u003e as endangered and \u003cem\u003eC. verticillata\u003c\/em\u003e as threatened, with two more carrying state protection in Florida. \u003cem\u003eConradina canescens\u003c\/em\u003e is the exception and the common one, a somewhat variable plant of the Gulf Coast dunes of northwest Florida and adjacent Alabama and Mississippi.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe species holds the back slope of the primary dunes and any face of the secondary dunes, and runs inland into sand pine scrub and dry longleaf pineland, from Escambia County east to Wakulla. Pale lavender flowers with dark purple spotting on the lower lip open from March into November, heaviest in spring, and native bees work them throughout. The plant burns to the ground in a fire and comes back from seed, which is exactly the arrangement the whole sandhill flora has arrived at. Beach mice shelter in the mounds, and a specialist plant bug lives on the woody mints and almost nothing else.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eCanescens\u003c\/em\u003e means turning white, for the fine gray pubescence over leaves and flowers, and the genus honors Solomon White Conrad, 1779 to 1831, a Philadelphia printer and bookseller who lectured in mineralogy and ended as professor of botany at the University of Pennsylvania. Gray false rosemary would grace an herb garden handsomely and looks the part, though nothing in the literature documents a culinary or medicinal tradition for any \u003cem\u003eConradina\u003c\/em\u003e, and we would not invent one. The foliage is rich in camphor and 1,8-cineole and is a documented natural source of ursolic acid, which accounts for both the resinous scent and the habit this shrub has of chemically discouraging close neighbors.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSite gray false rosemary where the fine gray foliage and pale flowers can be read up close: a rock or gravel garden, a hot sunny bank, a sandy coastal bed, or the front of a dry border, among other sun-and-drought lovers that will not crowd the low mound. Full sun, sharp drainage, and lean sand; drought tolerant once established and a natural for xeriscape and low-water planting. Deer pass the aromatic leaves by. Nursery-grown plants are softer than wild ones and appreciate a season of shelter before facing open coastal wind.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/woodlanders.net\/blogs\/the-node\/an-exploration-of-the-conradina-genus\"\u003eLearn more about the Conradina genus here\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003ePhoto courtesy of \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.wildflower.org\/gallery\/result.php?id_image=45869\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\"\u003eAlan Cressler\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057846227059,"sku":"CONR-CANE-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/IMG-7513.heic?v=1771508232"},{"product_id":"cotinus-obovatus","title":"Cotinus obovatus","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe American smoketree, \u003cem\u003eCotinus obovatus\u003c\/em\u003e, is an uncommon small to medium native tree, kin to the familiar European smoketree but bolder in leaf and rarer in gardens. The common name comes from the fruiting stage, when the loose, fuzzy flower panicles blur the whole crown into a soft haze of smoke. The broad, oval, blue-green leaves are noticeably larger than those of the European \u003cem\u003eCotinus coggygria\u003c\/em\u003e, and they close the year in a spectacular blaze of orange, yellow, and red-purple, some of the finest fall color of any native tree.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the wild the American smoketree turns up in widely scattered pockets, usually on limestone, from eastern Tennessee to central Texas, which points to the tree's real preferences: sharp drainage and a tolerance, even a liking, for sweet, alkaline soil. Give well-drained ground, a touch of lime where soils are acid, and full sun for the strongest fall color. The tree is often smaller and shrubbier in cultivation than in the wild, and the scaly, characterful bark adds winter interest.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSite the American smoketree as a specimen where the smoke and the fall color can both be enjoyed, in a lawn, a mixed border, or a dry, sunny bank, and pair with other tough, well-drained-soil natives. A handsome, drought-tolerant, and increasingly hard-to-find tree for the collector of native woody plants.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057852289139,"sku":"COTI-OBOV-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-978.jpg?v=1720137702"},{"product_id":"croton-alabamense","title":"Croton alabamensis","description":"\u003cp\u003eFew native shrubs carry as much quiet history as \u003cem\u003eCroton alabamensis\u003c\/em\u003e, the Alabama croton, a rarity known in the wild from only a handful of counties along the Cahaba and Black Warrior rivers, where the shrub clings to dry, limestone bluffs. This is a plant of the Southern woodland edge, once more widespread and now treasured wherever a gardener can offer the Alabama croton a home.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe foliage is the whole show. Each leaf is bright green above and silver below, so the smallest breeze sets the shrub shimmering, and a crushed leaf releases a soft banana-and-apple fragrance that surprises anyone expecting a croton to smell of nothing. Small greenish-yellow flowers open in spring, modest but useful to the earliest pollinators. Then autumn arrives and the older leaves turn a warm pumpkin orange that lingers into winter, a color worth planting for.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGive the Alabama croton partial shade and well-drained, slightly alkaline soil, and the shrub asks for little else. Drought tolerant once established and left alone by deer, this croton settles happily into a native understory, a conservation planting, or a shaded border, holding to a modest four to six feet beneath oaks, hickories, and other hardwoods. To grow the Alabama croton is to keep a piece of the Southern flora close, a living link to the limestone country where the shrub still holds on.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057854189683,"sku":"CROT-ALAB-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/CrotonalabamensisBillDoddWoodlanders1.png?v=1749064877"},{"product_id":"daphniphyllum-humile","title":"Daphniphyllum humile","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eA quiet aristocrat of the evergreen garden, with roots in the misty woodlands of Japan.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn an age when flamboyance so often overtakes quietude in the garden, \u003cem\u003eDaphniphyllum humile\u003c\/em\u003e stands as a gentle reminder of grace, restraint, and presence without spectacle. With broad, lustrous leaves that catch the morning light like polished green pewter, this evergreen shrub offers the stature and poise of a Rhododendron, but without the fuss or floral fanfare.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNative to the shaded, moist forests of Japan, this refined understory plant brings an old-world calm to woodland gardens and dappled borders. The leathery foliage, deep green and architectural, stays evergreen year round, forming a rounded, symmetrical mound that holds the quiet corners of the landscape. Though the flowers are inconspicuous, the structural beauty more than compensates, especially where subtlety is prized.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGardeners who know \u003cem\u003eDaphniphyllum macropodum\u003c\/em\u003e will find in \u003cem\u003eD. humile\u003c\/em\u003e a more modest cousin, a scaled-down version for the smaller garden or the intimate planting scheme. Introduced to American horticulture by none other than Woodlanders, this plant crossed the Atlantic from England's esteemed Hillier Nursery, and has since found favor among collectors and connoisseurs alike.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is a plant for poets and naturalists, those who walk their gardens not for show but for solace. Planted in moist, semi-shady soil, Daphniphyllum humile rewards patience with year-round presence, unbothered by heat or mild winter chill, and steadfast in quiet beauty.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNative to Japan. Foliage: large, leathery, evergreen, Rhododendron-like in form. Size: typically three to six feet tall and wide. Notable traits: architectural foliage, shade-loving, rare in cultivation. Garden use: woodland gardens, shade borders, and collector's plantings.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003ePhotos courtesy of John Grimshaw and John Anderson.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057858875507,"sku":"DAPH-HUMI-01G","price":27.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/daphniphyllum-humile-woodlanders1.jpg?v=1750865436"},{"product_id":"eremocitrus-x-citrus-glauca-x-meyer-lemon","title":"'Razzlequat' Cold-Hardy Citrus","description":"\u003cp\u003eWoodlanders has long been a leader in offering citrus and citrus hybrids hardy well beyond the usual citrus belt, and the 'Razzlequat' is one of the odder and hardier of the lot. The plant is a cross between the Australian desert lime, \u003cem\u003eEremocitrus glauca\u003c\/em\u003e, a tough, drought- and cold-tolerant native of the arid Australian interior, and, most likely, the familiar 'Meyer' lemon. From the desert lime parent come thorny, wiry branches, small narrow gray-green leaves, and a hardiness and drought tolerance rare among citrus; from the lemon come size and flavor.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe small, lemon-shaped fruits are unlike any ordinary citrus. Only semi-segmented inside, the little round, juice-filled vesicles sit loose and separate easily, releasing a bright, distinctly sour juice. Southeastern citrus expert Tom McClendon put it plainly: \"They were tart but good, much like a lime and with no unpleasant aftertaste at all.\" The overall impression is closer to a wild lime than a lemon, useful anywhere a sharp, fragrant citrus juice is wanted.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn spring, and sometimes again in late summer, the plant carries fragrant white to pale pink citrus blossoms with the classic sweet perfume of the tribe, followed by the curious fruit. Compact, thorny, and wiry, the 'Razzlequat' makes an intriguing specimen for a hot, sunny spot, a conversation piece in an edible or collector's garden, or a container plant that can be moved under cover where winters bite hardest. The gray-green foliage and dense, spiny habit also lend the plant to an informal, fruiting hedge.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGive the 'Razzlequat' full sun and sharp drainage, and the desert-lime blood will carry the plant through heat and dry spells that would sulk an ordinary lemon. Hardy in USDA zones 8 through 11 and among the more cold-tolerant citrus hybrids, the plant still appreciates protection from hard freezes, especially while young; gardeners at the cold edge often grow the 'Razzlequat' in a pot for easy winter shelter. For anyone drawn to unusual, tough, genuinely useful citrus, this is a rare and rewarding oddity. Photos courtesy of UCR.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057865527411,"sku":"EREM-GLAU-MEYE-LEMO-01G","price":32.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/EremocitrusglaucaxMeyerlemonUCR1.png?v=1744301802"},{"product_id":"fontanesia-phillyreioides","title":"Fontanesia phillyreioides","description":"\u003cp\u003eFontanesia is one of those quiet shrubs that rewards a close look and a little curiosity. A deciduous member of the olive family, Oleaceae, and a near relative of the privets, the plant carries narrow, lanceolate, opposite leaves several inches long on a fine, twiggy frame, and shares the easy, adaptable constitution that makes the privets so obliging in difficult ground.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA gentle taxonomic puzzle hangs over the genus. Botanists have long debated whether the shrub of the Middle East and the one of China are one species or two: the former has been called Fontanesia phillyreoides, the latter Fontanesia fortunei, and the two are so alike that even the experts hedge. The plants we offer were labeled as the Middle Eastern species at Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah, Georgia, and are said to be the smaller-growing of the pair.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhatever the name, the plant can reach a fair size in good conditions. One growing as Fontanesia fortunei in our Citywide Arboretum here in Aiken, South Carolina, stands over twenty feet tall with stems six inches thick, a reminder that this modest privet relative has ambitions once settled in. In late spring, small greenish-white flowers open in slender clusters, followed by flat, winged fruit in the privet manner.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhatever the label, Fontanesia earns a place as an easy, drought-tolerant screen or informal hedge, a tough and unfussy backdrop that asks little once established. Collectors will want the shrub simply for the pleasure of growing an uncommon olive-family curiosity; everyone else can enjoy a reliable, fine-textured green wall for sun or light shade. Give any soil that drains, full sun to part shade, and room to grow into the ample frame.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057870508147,"sku":"FONT-PHIL-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-2129.jpg?v=1720138173"},{"product_id":"fortunella-obovata-changshou","title":"Fortunella obovata 'Changshou'","description":"\u003cp\u003eFortunella obovata 'Changshou' is the Changshou kumquat, the sweetest and most generous of the kumquat tribe, whose fruit swells to the size of a ping-pong ball, far larger than the little oval kumquats most people know. Round to gently obovate, ripening bright orange, that fruit is eaten whole, skin and all, the thin rind sweeter and more tender than any other kumquat's. A compact, dense, thornless evergreen, the Changshou is as pretty in a pot as it is productive.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe name Changshou means long life in Chinese, and this kumquat has long been treasured across China and Japan, where the plant also goes by the name Fukushu, as an auspicious potted plant carried indoors for the New Year. The broad, rounded leaves set the Changshou apart from the narrow-leaved oval and round kumquats, and the whole plant carries the glossy, tidy good looks that make citrus such rewarding container subjects. Small, white, sweetly fragrant flowers open in spring, sometimes again later, perfuming the air around them.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eKumquats are among the most cold-hardy of all the citrus, and the Changshou is no exception, taking cold that would harm an orange and holding evergreen through the milder South. Even so, this is citrus, and gardeners north of the warmest zones do best to grow the tree in a large pot that can shelter indoors when hard frost threatens. Give full sun, a free-draining soil, and steady summer water, and expect fruit young, held ornamentally on the branches deep into winter.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWoodlanders offers the Changshou kumquat as an uncommon fruit worth wider trial in the milder Southeast, a dooryard citrus as ornamental as it is edible. Grow the plant as a patio or courtyard specimen, an evergreen accent by a door where the flowers can be smelled, or a productive container tree, and enjoy the fruit fresh, candied, or in marmalade. Sweet, hardy, and handsome, the Changshou earns a place wherever citrus can be coaxed to grow.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057871655027,"sku":"FORT-OBOV-CHAN-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Fortunellaobovata_Changshou_Woodlanders1.jpg?v=1731724084"},{"product_id":"gelsemium-rankinii","title":"Gelsemium rankinii","description":"\u003cp\u003eGelsemium rankinii is one of the South's gentler mysteries, a twining, semi-evergreen vine that has long threaded through the quiet wetlands and river margins of the Gulf Coast. Where other vines sprawl boldly, the swamp jessamine moves with a kind of restraint, weaving through shrubs and small trees on glossy, fine-textured foliage, with a poise born of deep, humid landscapes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn spring, and again in fall, the vine shows a clear kinship: clusters of soft yellow, funnel-shaped flowers that echo the famous cousin, Gelsemium sempervirens, the beloved Carolina jessamine. Rankin's jessamine gives a more delicate performance, smaller and refined blooms carried in generous succession as the weather warms, though without the rich fragrance of the Carolina kind. Early botanists in the coastal plains of Louisiana and Mississippi noted this species quietly brightening bog edges and cypress shadows, the blooms flickering like droplets of gold where sunlight filters through the canopy.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe horticultural history is equally understated. While the showier Carolina jessamine captured early gardeners and became a staple of Southern landscapes, Gelsemium rankinii lingered in the wings, treasured mostly by naturalists and those who paid attention to the subtler threads of the region's flora. Today the plant stands as an elegant, well-behaved alternative for gardeners who prize native charm without overwhelming vigor.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn cultivation the swamp jessamine is adaptable and rewarding, a graceful climber for a trellis, a small arbor, or a woodland edge. True to the swampy origins, the vine appreciates moisture but proves surprisingly tolerant once established, especially in dappled shade, and holds foliage through winter in mild climates when little else stirs. One caution belongs with the beauty: like all jessamines, every part of the plant is poisonous if eaten, and even the nectar can harm, so site the vine away from where small children might be tempted.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eAdditional photo courtesy of Alan Cressler.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057874735219,"sku":"GELS-RANK-01G","price":34.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/GelsemiumrankiniiAlanCresslerWoodlanders.jpg?v=1764122325"},{"product_id":"grevillea-rosmarinifolia","title":"Grevillea rosmarinifolia","description":"\u003cp\u003eGrevillea rosmarinifolia is a fine-textured Australian evergreen, a rounded to semi-prostrate shrub whose narrow, deep green leaves look uncannily like rosemary, giving the plant both the species name and a handsome, needled presence the year round. The likeness is only skin-deep, for this is a member of the protea family, Proteaceae, worlds away from any herb.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe flowers are the surprise: clusters of small, spider-like blooms in red tipped with cream, curling and intricate, borne in dense racemes along the branches. Where most shrubs rest, rosemary grevillea flowers through the cool months, from fall into winter and on toward spring, a rare source of color and nectar when the garden is otherwise quiet. Hummingbirds and bees find the blooms readily.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTough and undemanding, the plant thrives in full sun and sharp drainage, taking heat, wind, and drought once established, and reaching perhaps four to six feet, often lower and wider or nearly prostrate. Rosemary grevillea suits a dry border, a gravel garden, a hot bank, or a coastal planting in the milder South, and works beautifully in native-style or water-wise schemes alongside other lean-soil companions.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOne quirk is worth knowing: like all grevilleas, this shrub is sensitive to phosphorus, so skip ordinary fertilizers and rich compost and let the plant settle in on poor, fast-draining ground. Give sun, drainage, and restraint at the feeding trough, and rosemary grevillea rewards with evergreen structure and flowers in the off-season for very little trouble.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057876013171,"sku":"GREV-ROSM-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-372.jpg?v=1720138334"},{"product_id":"hamamelis-virginiana","title":"Hamamelis virginiana","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eHamamelis virginiana\u003c\/em\u003e does everything backwards, and that is the entire appeal. When the rest of the woods has shut down for the year, when the leaves are gone and nothing else is in flower, witch hazel chooses that exact moment to bloom: spidery yellow flowers, all thin crimped strap-like petals, scattered along the bare branches through late fall and into the cold. They carry a faint sweet scent on a mild day and they wait, patiently, for whatever gnat or late fly is still working, because almost nothing else is. This is the shrub that flowers when flowering makes no sense, and is all the more loved for the defiance.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe name written into the genus tells you the other half of the trick. \u003cem\u003eHamamelis\u003c\/em\u003e comes from Greek for \"fruit at the same time,\" because this is very likely the only native woody plant in America to carry this year's flowers, last year's ripening seed capsules, and next year's leaf buds on the branch all at once. And those capsules do something worth waiting for: when they finally dry and split, they fire their hard black seeds as far as twenty-five feet, with an audible snap, then hang on the twigs afterward like little open beaks. A plant that blooms in the cold and flings seed across the clearing is not trying to be ordinary.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen there's the name itself, which is half the romance. Early settlers, confusing the plant with the European hazel and borrowing an old Anglo-Saxon word for \"bend,\" watched Native peoples cut the forked branches into divining rods and walk them over the ground to dowse for water, the fork dipping where the well should go. The Mohegan are credited with teaching the practice, which followed well-diggers into the twentieth century. The famous astringent came later: in 1866 Thomas Dickinson built a distillery and turned the steeped twigs into the witch hazel still sold in every pharmacy, a recipe learned in part from the Cherokee and Iroquois.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor all that history, this is an easy plant. A large multi-stemmed shrub or small tree of the eastern woods, adaptable to most soils and sites, sun to shade, with leaves that turn a clean buttery gold before they drop to reveal the flowers beneath. Notably, after centuries in cultivation the species has produced no garden cultivars worth keeping, a quiet endorsement of the original: nobody has improved on the wild plant, because the wild plant is already right. \u003cem\u003eHamamelis virginiana\u003c\/em\u003e is native magic, the kind you plant once and watch do something strange and lovely every November when everything else has called it a year.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePhotos courtesy of \u003ca rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/plants.ces.ncsu.edu\/plants\/hamamelis-virginiana\/\" target=\"_blank\"\u003eKurt Wagner and Randy Harter\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057878077555,"sku":"HAMA-VIRG-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Hamamelisvirginiana_Kurt_Wagner.jpg?v=1723299375"},{"product_id":"hedychium-coccineum-disney","title":"Hedychium coccineum 'Disney'","description":"\u003cp\u003eHedychium coccineum 'Disney' is a hardy ginger lily that brings the tropics to a temperate garden, sending up tall leafy canes each summer and crowning them, from late summer into fall, with bold spikes of fragrant orange flowers. Each bloom throws out long, whiskery stamens for a bottlebrush effect, and the whole spike carries a sweet perfume that drifts on warm evening air. 'Disney' is among the best and most upright selections of the scarlet ginger lily, holding the flower heads proudly above the foliage.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe lush, lance-shaped leaves clothe upright canes to five or seven feet through the growing season, a wall of tropical green that makes a fine backdrop or a bold accent all on its own. The scarlet ginger lily hails from the Himalayas, and that mountain origin is exactly what makes 'Disney' hardier than most gingers, able to weather winters that would finish a tender one. Butterflies and hummingbirds work the orange flowers through the late season.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGrow 'Disney' from spreading rhizomes in full sun to part shade, in rich, moist, well-drained soil, and give plenty of heat and water through the summer for the fullest growth and bloom. In all but the warmest gardens the canes die to the ground with the first hard frost and resprout from the rhizomes in spring, so cut the spent stems down after frost and mulch the roots where winters are cold. Where the plant is happy, the clump widens a little each year.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eUse Hedychium coccineum 'Disney' where the size and scent can be enjoyed, at the back of a sunny border, beside a patio or pool, or in a big container, paired with cannas, bananas, and other bold tropicals. The fragrant orange spikes are magnets for butterflies and hummingbirds, and the whole planting reads as pure exotic luxury on a plant tough enough to come back year after year. For a hardy taste of the tropics, few gingers do it better.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057879945331,"sku":"HEDY-COCC-DISN-01G","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Hedychium_Disney_3NC.webp?v=1784309385"},{"product_id":"hibiscus-aculeatus","title":"Hibiscus aculeatus","description":"\u003cp\u003ePineland hibiscus is the wilder, pricklier cousin among the native mallows, and all the more charming for a slightly untamed look. Through the summer the plant opens broad flowers several inches across in soft creamy yellow, each centered on a deep maroon eye, the classic hibiscus form scaled down and set on a low, spreading, bristly frame. The deeply lobed leaves are rough to the touch and the stems carry fine prickles, so the whole plant reads as a hardy native of open, sunny ground rather than a pampered border hybrid.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe plant belongs to the Malvaceae, the mallow and hibiscus family, and the species name \u003cem\u003eaculeatus\u003c\/em\u003e, meaning prickly, records exactly the bristly texture that sets this species apart from the smoother native rose mallows. Pineland hibiscus is a plant of the southeastern Coastal Plain, native from Florida north to North Carolina, where the roots run in wet pine flatwoods, savannas, and the damp margins of roadside ditches. The common names, pineland hibiscus and savanna hibiscus, place the plant exactly in that open, sunny, seasonally wet country.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA third common name carries the ethnobotany: comfortroot. Indigenous peoples of the Southeast valued the thick, mucilaginous roots as a soothing demulcent, brewed into a preparation to ease sore, irritated throats, the slippery root mucilage coating and calming the way marshmallow root or slippery elm does. Woodlanders has written a fuller account of this history; you can \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/woodlanders.net\/blogs\/news\/hibiscus-aculeatus-a-deep-dive-into-its-ethnobotanical-history\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\"\u003eread the deep dive here\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden, pineland hibiscus makes a fine, tough native for a sunny bed or border, a rain garden, a wet meadow, or a native and pollinator planting in the warmer zones, where the pale flowers draw bees and other pollinators through the heat of summer. Give full sun to part shade and moist to average, sandy or loamy soil, and let the plant weave among grasses and other Coastal Plain natives. One of many native plants little known in cultivation when first offered by Woodlanders, and still an uncommon pleasure.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057883123827,"sku":"HIBI-ACUL-01G","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/6C94338C-860C-408C-8D20-72276F3D193C.jpg?v=1725369456"},{"product_id":"hibiscus-mutabilis-plena","title":"Hibiscus mutabilis 'Plena'","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe name requires a brief clarification, and then we can move on to the more interesting parts. \u003cem\u003eHibiscus mutabilis\u003c\/em\u003e has been called the Confederate rose since the nineteenth century, when the plant naturalized so thoroughly in the gardens of the American South that people assumed it belonged there. The plant does not. The species belongs to Hunan Province in China, where gardeners have grown the shrub for nearly three thousand years, where the flower serves as the emblem of Chengdu, a city known on its account as the City of Hibiscus, and where classical texts on materia medica describe the flowers and leaves in medicinal detail. The name stuck here out of regional habit rather than botanical or historical accuracy, and the plant is indifferent to the label.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat 'Plena' actually is: a fully double-flowered form of one of the most theatrically interesting shrubs available to Southern gardeners. The flowers of \u003cem\u003eH. mutabilis\u003c\/em\u003e change color over the course of a single day, driven by a steady accumulation of anthocyanins in the petals. A bloom opens white in the morning, blushes pink by midday, and deepens to rose-red by evening. In the straight species each flower lasts a day before dropping; in 'Plena' the fully double, peony-form flowers hold longer, and the layered petals make the color shift more gradual and more visible. On a mature plant in October you will find all three colors at once on the same shrub, white, pink, and red in various stages of the day's progression. The effect is anything but subtle.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe shrub is fast-growing and substantial. In the Deep South the plant can reach ten feet or more in a single season, carrying large, palmately lobed leaves with a soft, slightly fuzzy texture that lends a lush, almost tropical character. In zone 7 the top dies to the ground in winter and returns vigorously from the roots each spring; in zone 8 and warmer the plant grows effectively woody and persistent. Either way, the space is well earned.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBeyond the spectacle, the plant carries a long ethnobotanical history: in traditional Chinese medicine the leaves and flowers, known as Fu Rong, have been used for centuries in cooling poultices and washes for burns, boils, and skin inflammation. In the garden, give 'Plena' full sun and rich, moist, well-drained soil at the back of a large border or as a specimen with room to spread, and enjoy a shrub that saves the finest show for autumn, when so much else has finished.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057883910259,"sku":"HIBI-MUTA-PLEN-01G","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-374.jpg?v=1720138583"},{"product_id":"hosta-yingeri","title":"Hosta yingeri","description":"\u003cp\u003eHosta yingeri is one of the more recent hostas to reach gardens and one of the most distinct, a species found only on a scatter of rocky islands in the Huksan Archipelago off the southwestern coast of Korea. The American plantsman Barry Yinger collected the plant on Taehuksan Island in 1985, and the botanist Samuel B. Jones formally named the species in 1989 in Yinger's honor. For a genus most gardeners associate with the woodlands of Japan, this Korean islander broadened the family map.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat sets the plant apart is a hard, lacquered shine. The elliptic leaves are thick and almost succulent, a deep to medium green polished to a gloss on top and a pale grey-green beneath, built to endure sun-warmed rock and salt wind. Rather than the soft, quilted mounds of a classic blue hosta, this Korean species forms a low, tidy rosette barely a foot high, more chiseled than billowy, holding a clean shape through the season.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe flowers are the real surprise. Where most hostas hang their bells to one side of the stem, Hosta yingeri spaces near-radial, star-shaped purple flowers evenly all the way around the scape in late summer, with an unusually long second set of stamens giving each bloom a spidery, almost orchid-like poise. Bees work the flowers, and the airy purple spikes rise well above the glossy leaves just as the summer garden starts to tire.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLike other hostas, the plant belongs to a long tradition of shade gardening across East Asia, where the tightly rolled spring shoots of several species, called urui in Japan, are gathered as a seasonal vegetable. In the garden, Hosta yingeri earns a spot at the front of a shady bed, tucked into a shaded rock garden, or edging a woodland path where the polished leaves can catch what little light reaches them. Ferns, sedges, and epimediums make natural companions, and the glossy, substantial foliage shrugs off much of the slug damage that plagues thinner-leaved hostas, though deer will still browse a tender clump.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057884926067,"sku":"HOST-YING-01G","price":19.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1305.jpg?v=1720138629"},{"product_id":"hydrangea-serrata-woodlander","title":"Hydrangea serrata 'Woodlander'","description":"\u003cp\u003eHydrangea serrata 'Woodlander' is a Woodlanders introduction with a story, a compact, small-leaved mountain hydrangea grown from seed collected at the Chollipo Arboretum in Korea and selected here for real garden charm. Daintier than the big bigleaf hydrangeas, this is a refined shrub of two to four feet, carrying flat lacecap flower heads of clear blue in acid soil, ringed with showy sterile florets around a center of tiny fertile ones. The serrated leaves take on a handsome purplish cast that deepens toward autumn.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLike all the mountain hydrangeas, the color of the flowers answers to the soil: blue where the ground is acid, as it is in the Woodlanders beds, and shifting toward pink where the soil turns alkaline. The lacecap form is more than pretty, for the ring of fertile florets at the heart of each head draws bees and other pollinators that the sterile mophead hydrangeas leave hungry. Bloom comes in early summer, on wood formed the year before.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis little hydrangea has grown well for us in semi-shade, in well-drained, acid soil with steady moisture and a bit of irrigation through dry spells. Hardier and more sun-forgiving than the bigleaf kinds, the mountain hydrangeas still bloom on old wood, so prune only right after flowering, and site the plant where late frosts are less likely to nip the buds. In autumn the small leaves flush red and purple, a quiet last act.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSet Hydrangea serrata 'Woodlander' in a shaded or part-shaded border, a woodland edge, a foundation planting, or a large container, where the blue lacecaps and purplish foliage can be enjoyed at close range. Compact and well-mannered, the plant suits small gardens and mixed shade plantings, and the fertile florets keep the bees coming all through the bloom. For a refined, pollinator-friendly hydrangea with a real Woodlanders pedigree, this seed-grown selection is a quiet gem.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057886597235,"sku":"HYDR-SERR-WOOD-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Hydrangeaserrata_Woodlander_BrokenArrow.jpg?v=1784324885"},{"product_id":"ilex-vomitoria-hoskins-shadow","title":"Ilex vomitoria 'Hoskins Shadow'","description":"\u003cp\u003eYaupon is the small-leaved evergreen holly of the southeastern coastal plain, native from Virginia to Texas and a member of the holly family, Aquifoliaceae. Adaptable almost to a fault, salt tolerant, drought tolerant, and content in sun or shade, \u003cem\u003eIlex vomitoria\u003c\/em\u003e takes shearing as neatly as boxwood and has served Southern gardens for generations as hedge, screen, and clipped structure. ‘Hoskins Shadow’ is a standout among the named forms: a dense, fast-growing shrub or small tree, 15 to 20 feet in time, chosen for unusually large, dark green foliage and, above all, for cold hardiness well beyond the ordinary yaupon.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe plant carries history as well as good manners. Roasted yaupon leaves and twigs were the source of the caffeinated black drink that Indigenous peoples of the Southeast brewed for ceremony and trade, and that coastal settlers later adopted as a homegrown coffee or tea. Yaupon remains North America’s only caffeine-bearing native plant. The harsh species name, \u003cem\u003evomitoria\u003c\/em\u003e, records a European misreading of the ritual purging that sometimes accompanied the drink, a blame the plant did not earn, since modern analysis of the leaves finds no emetic or toxic compounds at all; the common name is kinder, from the Catawban ya’pa, a diminutive meaning small tree. The fruit is another matter, mildly toxic to people and pets, and better admired than sampled.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e‘Hoskins Shadow’, also listed in the trade as ‘Shadow’s Female’, was selected for that big dark foliage and toughness by the Tennessee nurseryman Hoskins Shadow, of Winchester, Tennessee. The plant has reportedly come through minus ten degrees Fahrenheit, a cold that would kill most yaupons outright, which pushes this holly a full zone north of where the species usually stops. Female and generously fruitful, ‘Hoskins Shadow’ hangs abundant scarlet berries that hold from fall through spring when a male yaupon grows within reach.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFew evergreens give this much for so little trouble. Use ‘Hoskins Shadow’ as a fast, dense screen or a large clipped hedge, or let a single plant grow into a small multi-stemmed tree limbed up to show the pale trunks. The dark leaves make a fine backdrop for lighter foliage and for the scarlet winter fruit, so site where the berries can be seen from a window or walk, and set a male yaupon within bee range to guarantee the crop. Our straight \u003cem\u003eIlex vomitoria\u003c\/em\u003e male does the job, and the narrow ‘Will Fleming’ does it in a footprint two feet wide, which is useful when there is nowhere obvious to put a second shrub. One male serves six to eight females. Gardeners in the upper South and lower Midwest, long shut out of yaupon, finally have a form worth trying.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057889710195,"sku":"ILEX-VOMI-HOSK-SHAD-01G","price":32.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-110.jpg?v=1720138773"},{"product_id":"ilex-vomitoria-male-will-fleming","title":"Ilex vomitoria (male) ‘Will Fleming’","description":"\u003cp\u003eYaupon is the small-leaved evergreen holly of the Southeast, native along the coastal plain from Virginia to Texas and a member of the holly family, Aquifoliaceae. The wild plant is a broad, twiggy shrub, so a yaupon that grows straight up like a green column is a genuine oddity. ‘Will Fleming’ is exactly that: a male selection with a strict fastigiate habit, reaching twelve to fifteen feet tall on a base only two or three feet wide, a living exclamation mark carrying the fine yaupon leaf all the way up.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYaupon is more than an architectural curiosity. Roasted yaupon leaves and twigs were the source of the caffeinated black drink that Indigenous peoples of the Southeast brewed for ceremony, council, and trade, and that coastal colonists later drank as a homegrown coffee or tea. Yaupon remains North America’s only caffeine-bearing native plant. The harsh species name, \u003cem\u003evomitoria\u003c\/em\u003e, records a European misreading of the ritual purging that sometimes attended the drink, a charge the holly did not earn, since analysis of the leaves finds no emetic compounds; the common name, from the Catawban ya’pa, means simply small tree.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe narrow form is said to have been found in east Texas by Will Fleming, whose name the plant now carries, and circulated for years as ‘Will’s Upright’. We have not found the origin documented outside the trade, so take the attribution as the nursery world’s account rather than a matter of record. What is not in doubt is the usefulness. As a male, ‘Will Fleming’ sets no berries, but pollinates female yaupons within bee range, and does it from a footprint barely two feet across, which makes this the pollinator to reach for when there is nowhere obvious to put a second shrub. One male serves six to eight females. One caution earns mention: with age the upright stems can lean and splay, so most gardeners tie or lightly shear the column now and then to keep the crisp vertical line.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNothing draws the eye upward like a true column, and ‘Will Fleming’ delivers one where space is tight: flanking a doorway, marking the corners of a formal bed, punctuating a long border, or standing in a row as a narrow living screen along a fence or property line. Pair with low mounding evergreens or perennials at the base, give full sun for the densest growth, and site within reach of the female yaupons whose fruit you actually want. Drought, salt, and shearing leave the plant untroubled.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057890070643,"sku":"ILEX-VOMI-WILL-FLEM-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-113.jpg?v=1720138781"},{"product_id":"ilex-vomitoria-male","title":"Ilex vomitoria (male)","description":"\u003cp\u003eYaupon is the small-leaved evergreen holly of the southeastern United States, native along the coastal plain from Virginia to Texas and a member of the holly family, Aquifoliaceae. Salt tolerant, drought tolerant, and willing in sun or shade, \u003cem\u003eIlex vomitoria\u003c\/em\u003e shears as cleanly as boxwood and has long been a Southern mainstay for hedges, screens, and topiary. This is the straight male form: no berries, since male hollies never fruit, but a dense, dependable evergreen and the pollen source that every berried female yaupon needs.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eYaupon is more than a well-mannered evergreen. Roasted yaupon leaves and twigs were the source of the caffeinated black drink that Indigenous peoples of the Southeast brewed for ceremony, council, and trade, and that coastal colonists later drank as a homegrown coffee or tea. Yaupon remains North America’s only caffeine-bearing native plant. The harsh species name, \u003cem\u003evomitoria\u003c\/em\u003e, records a European misreading of the ritual purging that sometimes attended the drink, a charge the holly did not earn, since analysis of the leaves finds neither emetic nor toxic compounds; the common name, from the Catawban ya’pa, means simply small tree.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA male yaupon does quiet, essential work. Hollies are pollinated by bees and other insects rather than by wind, so the male has to stand where an insect can make the trip while both plants are in flower. Yaupon blooms March into May, and unlike winterberry it has no documented early and late races, so any male of the species flowering in the same spring should serve. One male will fruit six to eight females. The plant is no less useful standing alone, building the same fine-textured, close-sheared evergreen mass as any yaupon, and asking for nothing once established.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePlant a male yaupon wherever female yaupons are grown for fruit, within roughly forty to fifty feet so the bees can do their work; treat that as a planning figure rather than a fence, since isolated hollies have been recorded fruiting well anyway. Beyond pollination, use the dense evergreen habit for a sheared or informal hedge, a screen, a topiary, or clipped structure, in sun for the tightest growth or in shade where few evergreens hold up so well. Salt spray, drought, and hard pruning leave the plant unbothered, which is much of why yaupon remains a Southern workhorse.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057890234483,"sku":"ILEX-VOMI-MALE-01G","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-109.jpg?v=1720138790"},{"product_id":"ilex-pedunculosa-male","title":"Ilex pedunculosa (male)","description":"\u003cp\u003eIlex pedunculosa (male) is the pollen partner for one of the most refined and cold-hardy evergreen hollies in cultivation. Like the female, this male longstalk holly carries smooth, spineless, glossy leaves closer to mountain laurel than to a prickly Christmas holly, on a slow, medium to large shrub or small tree of quiet good looks. What the male does not do is fruit; what the male does is make that fruit possible.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLongstalk hollies are dioecious, with male and female on separate plants, and a female sets the signature red, long-stalked berries only with a male in bloom nearby. This plant fills that role, opening small pollen-rich flowers in step with the females and carrying the same clean evergreen foliage and notable cold-hardiness, holding leaves as far north as USDA zone five where most broadleaf evergreens fail.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe species comes from central and southern China, Taiwan, and Japan, and takes both botanical and common names from the long peduncles, the slender stalks that hold the fruit well clear of the branches on female trees. Little known in the trade, longstalk holly has drawn steady praise as among the handsomest evergreen hollies for cooler gardens, and a male plant is the quiet requirement behind every berried female.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePlant this male wherever a female longstalk holly is grown for fruit, and let the dense, spineless, deer-resistant evergreen earn a place as a screen, a background shrub, or a specimen in sun to part shade and moist, well-drained soil. One male covers several females nearby, so a single plant tucked into a border sets the whole group fruiting. Pair the roots with rhododendron, mountain laurel, and other acid-loving evergreens.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057891741811,"sku":"ILEX-PEDU-MALE-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-107.jpg?v=1720138825"},{"product_id":"illicium-floridanum-variegated","title":"Illicium floridanum (variegated)","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe anise trees, genus Illicium, are aromatic broadleaf evergreens of the star-anise family, Schisandraceae, their Latin name meaning an allurement, for the spicy scent of the leaves. Illicium floridanum, the Florida anise, is a Southeastern native of shaded streambanks and moist ravines from Georgia to Louisiana, valued as one of the finest flowering evergreens for shade. This is a variegated selection, carrying the usual two-inch, starfish-shaped maroon flowers over foliage marked with a subtle, quiet green-on-green variegation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe variegation is understated, a soft patterning of lighter and darker green rather than the bold cream or gold of a splashier plant, and it gives the dark evergreen foliage a gentle, dappled depth in the shade. The crushed leaves are anise-scented, characteristic of the genus, and, as with every Florida anise, the foliage and fruit are toxic if eaten and unrelated in use to culinary star anise. That toxicity is also why deer leave the plant alone.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis form was found in northwest Florida by Steve Riefler, who noticed the pairing of the deep maroon-purple flowers with the subtle leaf variegation, an uncommon combination in a native shrub. Like the wild species, the plant builds into a medium, rounded evergreen of eight to ten feet, adaptable to most garden soils that are not too dry.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSite the variegated Florida anise in shade or semi-shade with moist, rich soil, where the quiet foliage patterning and dark flowers can be seen up close. Use as a woodland specimen, a shaded foundation shrub, or an evergreen screen in a damp, shady spot, and let the subtle variegation lighten a dim corner. Ferns, hostas, hellebores, and native azaleas make fitting company; keep the ground evenly moist and mulched.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057897377907,"sku":"ILLI-FLOR-VARI-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-119.jpg?v=1720138959"},{"product_id":"iris-tectorum-blue","title":"Iris tectorum (blue)","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe horticulturist Scott Ogden, in \u003cem\u003eGarden Bulbs for the South\u003c\/em\u003e, sets the scene: the Japanese roof iris, \u003cem\u003eIris tectorum\u003c\/em\u003e, is famous in the native country as a flower for planting on sod roofs, just as houseleeks are used on the cottage roofs of France. In gardens the silky green fans of leaves form large patches, a fine subject for the foreground of a shady border, and in April the ruffled, orchid-like blooms appear among the handsome leaves. This is the common form, in which the flowers open a rich mottled blue, veined and freckled toward the center, with white crests.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe common name and the Latin \u003cem\u003etectorum\u003c\/em\u003e, meaning of roofs, both come from a genuine and rather poignant piece of history. \u003cem\u003eIris tectorum\u003c\/em\u003e is native to China, where the species has been grown since at least the seventh century, and reached Japan long ago. During a period of famine and war, so the story goes, an imperial decree reserved all arable land for food crops and made growing flowers on the ground illegal, so Japanese households moved the iris up onto the thatched ridgelines of their roofs, where the plant grew and bloomed out of reach of the law.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe roofs were not only a hiding place. The real value lay underground, in the thick, thumb-sized rhizomes, ground into a fine white powder used as a face cosmetic, the pale makeup of the geisha among the uses, and worked into hair dye and corn plasters besides. In China the same rhizome carries a long medicinal history under the name chuan she gan, taken in traditional practice as a decoction to soothe sore throat, ease cough, and clear what the old texts call heat. Modern laboratories have since studied the flavonoids and other compounds the rhizome holds, though the tradition ran centuries ahead of the chemistry.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the garden the roof iris is grown for foliage as much as flower. Set the broad, ribbed, silky green fans at the foreground of a shaded border, along a path, or at the top of a low wall where the fans can spill, and let the mottled blue, white-crested blooms open among the leaves in mid to late spring. Pair with ferns, hostas, and other shade companions in fertile, well-drained soil, give a little afternoon shade where summers are fierce, and divide every few years to keep the clump flowering. Deer tend to leave the fans alone.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057899442291,"sku":"IRIS-TECT-BLUE-01G","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-674.jpg?v=1720139020"},{"product_id":"iris-tectorum-album","title":"Iris tectorum 'Album'","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe horticulturist Scott Ogden, in \u003cem\u003eGarden Bulbs for the South\u003c\/em\u003e, sets the scene: the Japanese roof iris, \u003cem\u003eIris tectorum\u003c\/em\u003e, is famous in the native country as a flower for planting on sod roofs, just as houseleeks are used on the cottage roofs of France. In gardens the silky green fans of leaves form large patches, a fine subject for the foreground of a shady border, and in April the ruffled, orchid-like blooms appear among the handsome leaves. In the common form these are a rich mottled blue with white crests; even lovelier, Ogden adds, are the white, yellow-crested blooms of the form offered here.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe common name and the Latin \u003cem\u003etectorum\u003c\/em\u003e, meaning of roofs, both come from a genuine and rather poignant piece of history. \u003cem\u003eIris tectorum\u003c\/em\u003e is native to China, where the species has been grown since at least the seventh century, and reached Japan long ago. During a period of famine and war, so the story goes, an imperial decree reserved all arable land for food crops and made growing flowers on the ground illegal, so Japanese households moved the iris up onto the thatched ridgelines of their roofs, where the plant grew and bloomed out of reach of the law.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe roofs were not only a hiding place. The real prize lay underground, in the thick, thumb-sized rhizomes, which were ground into a fine white powder used as a face cosmetic, the pale makeup of the geisha among the uses, and worked into hair dye and corn plasters besides. In China the same rhizome has a long medicinal life under the name chuan she gan, taken in traditional practice as a decoction to soothe a sore throat, ease cough, and clear what the old texts call heat. Modern laboratories have since taken an interest in the flavonoids and other compounds the rhizome holds, though the tradition, as ever, ran centuries ahead of the chemistry.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the garden the white roof iris earns a place for foliage as much as flower. Set the broad, ribbed, pale green fans at the foreground of a shaded border, along a path, or at the top of a low wall where the fans can spill, and let the clean white, yellow-crested blooms light a shady corner in mid to late spring. Pair with ferns, hostas, and other shade companions in fertile, well-drained soil, give a little afternoon shade where summers are fierce, and lift and divide every few years to keep the clump flowering. Deer tend to leave the fans alone.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057899573363,"sku":"IRIS-TECT-ALBU-01G","price":16.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1600.jpg?v=1720139026"},{"product_id":"jasminum-nudiflorum","title":"Jasminum nudiflorum","description":"\u003cp\u003eJasminum nudiflorum, the winter jasmine, is the great cold-weather bloomer of the genus, a deciduous scrambling shrub from western China that opens bright yellow, six-petaled flowers on bare green stems in the depth of winter, often from January into March, long before the leaves return. The name says as much: nudiflorum, the naked-flowering jasmine, blooming on stripped, leafless wands.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eUnlike the perfumed white jasmines, winter jasmine is scentless, trading fragrance for the far rarer gift of color in the coldest, barest weeks of the year. The arching green stems spread from a central crown and root where they touch the ground, so the plant makes an easy cascade over a wall or bank, a loose mound in the open, or, tied to a support, an informal climber. In China the flower is beloved as yingchun, the one that welcomes spring.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat Chinese name carries more than sentiment. Winter jasmine, yingchun, has a long place in traditional Chinese medicine, where the leaves and flowers were used to cool fevers and inflammation and, applied externally, to treat cuts, bruises, swellings, and wounds, and were sometimes brewed as a tea. Modern phytochemical work has found antioxidant and antibacterial compounds in the plant, though the research is still early. This is traditional-use and early-research information, shared for interest only, and not medical advice.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWinter jasmine is one of the toughest and easiest of the clan, hardy to zone 6, thriving in ordinary soil in sun or part shade, and asking only a hard cut every few years to renew the tangle of stems. Use the plant to spill down a slope or retaining wall, to cover a bank as a groundcover, to soften a fence, or trained up a trellis for a winter show. Full sun brings the heaviest bloom; plant where the yellow flowers can be seen from indoors in the cold months.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057901637747,"sku":"JASM-NUDI-01G","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-423.jpg?v=1720139092"},{"product_id":"kalmia-latifolia-bullseye","title":"Kalmia latifolia 'Bullseye'","description":"\u003cp\u003eOf all the patterned mountain laurels, 'Bullseye' plays the boldest trick with color. The cinnamon-purple buds are handsome in their own right, and when they open the flowers reveal a broad band of deep purple-maroon ringing a white throat and a clean white edge, the concentric target that gives this selection a name. 'Bullseye' belongs to Kalmia latifolia, the broadleaf evergreen native to the acid slopes of the eastern United States, and represents the golden era of Kalmia breeding led by Dr. Richard Jaynes at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, whose decades of selection gave gardeners the banded, picoteed, and richly budded laurels grown today.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe name Kalmia was bestowed by Linnaeus for his student Pehr Kalm, and latifolia means broad-leaved, though 'Bullseye' departs a little from type: the emerging foliage flushes reddish and the leaves are smaller and more twisted than those of the wild species, giving the shrub a slightly finer texture. Habit is vigorously upright yet compact. Our own very mature specimen at the old nursery site reached only about five feet tall and spread just as wide, so this is a laurel that furnishes a border without ever bullying the plants around it. The photographs here were taken at the Margaret Reid Wildflower Garden in Raleigh, North Carolina.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMountain laurel carries a long human history alongside all that ornamental beauty. The hard, close-grained wood earned the name spoonwood, carved by Indigenous peoples of the East into spoons and small utensils and later turned for tool handles and bowls. That heritage comes with a firm caution: every green part of the plant, together with the pollen and any honey made from the flowers, contains grayanotoxins and is poisonous to livestock, wildlife, and people. 'Bullseye' is grown purely as an ornamental and pollinator plant, never a medicinal or edible one, and the foliage should be kept away from grazing animals and curious mouths.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden, 'Bullseye' wants the same treatment as any mountain laurel: part sun to part shade, cool and consistently moist roots, and an organic mulch such as pine straw, especially while establishing. Kalmia are slow to settle, but few investments repay a gardener so richly over time. Plant this laurel where the banded flowers can be studied up close, among rhododendrons, blueberries, and native ferns in acidic woodland soil, and let the toxic evergreen foliage do quiet duty as a deer-resistant backbone through the year.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057905504371,"sku":"KALM-LATI-BULL-01G","price":34.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/33F6E107-D3AD-4846-8DE0-410100FD1DD9.jpg?v=1776991834"},{"product_id":"kalmia-latifolia","title":"Kalmia latifolia","description":"\u003cp\u003eMountain laurel is the aristocrat of the American heath family (Ericaceae), a broadleaf evergreen native from southern Maine to the Florida panhandle and west toward Indiana and Louisiana, most at home on the acid, rocky slopes of the Appalachians. Linnaeus named the genus Kalmia for his student Pehr Kalm, the Finnish-Swedish naturalist who botanized the eastern colonies in the 1740s, and the species epithet latifolia means broad-leaved. To gardeners the shrub answers to a whole drawer of common names: calico bush for the patterned flowers, spoonwood for the wood, and simply mountain laurel across most of the range.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn late spring and early summer, mountain laurel covers a dense, rounded, glossy-leaved frame with rounded clusters of cup-shaped flowers, white to soft pink and freckled with deeper rose inside. The buds are the real showpiece, crimped and fluted like tiny cake decorations before they open. Each flower carries the family's signature mechanism: ten stamens bent back into small pockets in the corolla and held under spring tension, ready to snap forward and dust a visiting bee the instant the bloom is jostled. A mature plant, with reddish, sinuous bark and leathery leaves, holds structure through all four seasons.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe common name spoonwood records how deeply people once relied on this shrub. The hard, close-grained wood was carved into spoons and small utensils by Indigenous peoples of the East and later turned for tool handles, bowls, wreaths, and even the gearing of early wooden clocks. That usefulness came with a sharp warning, though. Every green part of mountain laurel, along with the pollen and any honey made from the flowers, contains grayanotoxins, and the foliage has poisoned livestock, wildlife, and people alike. For that reason the shrub is grown strictly as an ornamental and wildlife plant, never a medicinal or edible one, and the leaves are best kept well away from grazing animals and curious mouths.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden, mountain laurel is the backbone broadleaf evergreen for acid, woodland soil. Give the shrub the dappled light of a high pine or oak canopy, plant high rather than deep so the shallow roots never drown, and mulch with pine straw to keep the root run cool and sour. Mountain laurel settles beautifully among rhododendrons, blueberries, inkberry, and native ferns, and the toxic foliage doubles as reliable deer resistance where browsing pressure runs high. Slow to build but long-lived and quietly magnificent once established, this is a shrub to plant for decades rather than seasons.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057905635443,"sku":"KALM-LATI-01G","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/IMG_4820.jpg?v=1775586914"},{"product_id":"kalmia-latifolia-x-hirsuta","title":"Kalmia latifolia x hirsuta","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis seemingly unlikely hybrid crosses the familiar mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia) with the diminutive, far less known sandhill laurel (Kalmia hirsuta) of the Deep South, two species that could hardly look more different. The cross was probably first made by the late, great Alabama nurseryman Tom Dodd, Jr., and further investigated by the Connecticut Kalmia expert Dr. Richard Jaynes, whose lifetime of work did more than anyone's to bring the genus into gardens.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe genus Kalmia was named by Linnaeus for his student Pehr Kalm, the naturalist who explored eastern North America in the 1740s. This hybrid sits neatly between the parents in both size and hardiness, staying a compact three to four feet high and wide, and bears the typical pink flower clusters of a mountain laurel. Each cup-shaped bloom carries the family's signature mechanism, ten stamens held under spring tension in pockets of the corolla, ready to snap forward and dust a visiting bee with pollen. The sandhill laurel parent lends heat tolerance and a smaller frame, making this an intriguing laurel for gardeners in the warmer Southeast.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMountain laurels carry a long human history under the common name spoonwood, from the hard, close-grained wood that Indigenous peoples of the East carved into spoons and small utensils. That heritage comes with a firm caution. Every green part of a Kalmia, along with the pollen and any honey made from the flowers, contains grayanotoxins and is poisonous to livestock, wildlife, and people. This hybrid is grown as an ornamental and pollinator plant, never a medicinal or edible one, and the foliage is best kept away from grazing animals and curious mouths.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the garden, this compact laurel is an attractive and unusual choice for a spot with well-drained acid soil, semi-shade, and dependable moisture. The modest size suits a woodland border, a foundation planting, or a collector's corner among rhododendrons, blueberries, inkberry, and native ferns. Plant high rather than deep, mulch with pine straw to keep the roots cool and sour, and let the toxic evergreen foliage serve as quiet deer resistance through the year.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057906225267,"sku":"KALM-LATI-X-HIRS-01G","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1818.jpg?v=1720139197"},{"product_id":"kalmia-latifolia-croft-carpet","title":"Kalmia latifolia 'Croft Carpet'","description":"\u003cp\u003eMost mountain laurels are shrubs with presence, upright and woody and faintly aristocratic. 'Croft Carpet' flips the script. This rare, prostrate selection of Kalmia latifolia stays low and spreads into a dense evergreen mat, delivering the understory finish that designers chase in shade gardens: lush, deliberate, and quietly polished. A specimen at the JC Raulston Arboretum measured only about one foot tall while spreading many times as wide.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn late spring and early summer, 'Croft Carpet' scatters the ground-hugging canopy with rounded clusters of soft, cup-shaped flowers, white to pink and freckled with rose inside, exactly the intricate blooms that make mountain laurel a native icon. Like every Kalmia, the flowers hide a bit of botanical theater: ten stamens sit under tension in small pockets of the corolla and spring forward to dust visiting insects with pollen the moment a bee trips them.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe genus Kalmia was named by Linnaeus for the botanist Pehr Kalm, one of the early plant explorers of eastern North America, and latifolia means broad-leaved. In the wild, mountain laurel forms evergreen thickets along woodland slopes and edges wherever soils run naturally acidic. 'Croft Carpet' takes that woodland heritage and turns the habit sideways, offering a way to bring year-round structure to places where turf fails and most shrubs feel too bulky. You can read more in the Woodlanders \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/woodlanders.net\/blogs\/news\/a-guide-to-kalmias-the-famed-mountainlaurel\"\u003eGuide to Kalmias\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOne caution belongs with all this charm. Every green part of mountain laurel, along with the pollen and any honey from the flowers, contains grayanotoxins and is poisonous to livestock, wildlife, and people, so 'Croft Carpet' is grown as an ornamental and pollinator groundcover, never a medicinal or edible plant. In the garden, use this low laurel as a carpet layer beneath high pines and oaks, as a ribbon stitching together boulders and paths, or as an evergreen slope stabilizer, a modern native alternative to pachysandra or ivy with far more character. The toxic foliage keeps deer at bay as a welcome bonus.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057906323571,"sku":"KALM-LATI-CROF-CARP-01G","price":42.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-1860.jpg?v=1720139202"},{"product_id":"kolkwitzia-amabilis-pink-cloud","title":"Kolkwitzia amabilis 'Pink Cloud'","description":"\u003cp\u003eErnest Wilson came across this shrub in the late summer of 1901, up in the mountains above Ichang in western Hubei, and sent the seed home to Veitch in Exeter. Of the two thousand or so Asian plants he introduced to the West, \"Chinese\" Wilson counted \u003cem\u003eKolkwitzia amabilis\u003c\/em\u003e among his finest, which is no small ranking once you consider the company they were keeping. Dirr, in the \u003cem\u003eManual of Woody Landscape Plants\u003c\/em\u003e, is content to let the explorer have the last word. The beautybush flowered in England by 1910 and went on to become very nearly the defining garden shrub of America between the wars, then quietly slipped out of fashion. These shrubs turn up far less often now than they ought to.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Pink Cloud' is the form to want. \u003cstrong\u003eSelected from a seedling at Wisley in 1946, and still carrying the RHS Award of Garden Merit, they show a deeper, cleaner pink than the wild type on flowers a shade larger.\u003c\/strong\u003e In mid to late spring the arching branches vanish under paired, bell-shaped blooms, soft pink flaring out of burgundy buds, each throat brushed with yellow. The whole shrub becomes a fountain, six to ten feet of arching growth, the branches bowed gently by the weight of all that flower. Older stems exfoliate to a quiet brown, so there is something to hold the eye once the bloom has passed.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eEasy in full sun, forgiving of most soils with clay among them, and steady through drought once they have settled. Hardy to zone 4, and the deer tend to walk on by. Prune after flowering rather than before, since next spring's flowers are already set on this year's wood. Give them room and a backdrop of green to spill against, and you will spend every May watching the branches go under beneath the pink.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057906880627,"sku":"KOLK-AMAB-PINK-CLOU-01G","price":38.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/Kolkwitziaamabilis_PinkCloud_VisionPictures2.webp?v=1780408506"},{"product_id":"lindera-fragrans","title":"Lindera fragrans","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eLindera fragrans\u003c\/em\u003e is an evergreen shrub or small tree carrying glossy, leathery, narrowly lance-shaped leaves that look more like bamboo than like anything in the laurel family, each one marked with three clear veins running the length of the blade. The effect is light and linear where most broadleaf evergreens are heavy, and the foliage alone is worth the space. Growth is upright to around twelve or fifteen feet with a narrow six-foot spread, and the bark is a quiet yellow-brown.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis plant came to us through the Arnold Arboretum, and so far as we know Woodlanders is probably the first nursery in the United States to have offered the species. The shrub has grown well here in Aiken, South Carolina, in a semi-shaded site with well-drained soil, which is the only cultivation record most American gardeners have to go on. Native to southern China at elevations between roughly seven hundred and two thousand meters, \u003cem\u003eLindera fragrans\u003c\/em\u003e remains almost unknown in cultivation on this side of the Atlantic.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eLindera\u003c\/em\u003e belongs to Lauraceae, the laurel family, in the company of sassafras, bay, avocado and cinnamon, and the family trait is aromatic tissue: crush a leaf or scratch a twig and the spice comes up at once, which is where every spicebush gets the common name. The genus honors Johann Linder, an eighteenth-century Swedish botanist. Like the rest of the genus this species is dioecious, male and female flowers on separate plants, and the flowers themselves are small, yellow and petalless, opening in spring with a fragrance the epithet promises. Female plants follow with small drupes that ripen from blue-green to purple-black in early autumn. The Chinese spicebushes have a long history in traditional medicine, but that tradition attaches to other species in the genus and we make no medicinal claim for this one.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGive \u003cem\u003eLindera fragrans\u003c\/em\u003e the conditions that have worked here: semi-shade, well-drained soil with organic matter, and shelter from hard winter wind, which will burn evergreen foliage faster than cold alone. Use the narrow upright habit where a tall evergreen is wanted in a tight space, at a woodland edge, or as a foliage counterpoint among camellias, mahonias and ferns. Hardy through USDA zones 8 to 9, and one honest caution comes with a plant this little grown: the hardiness limits are an estimate from a small sample rather than a settled figure, so anyone gardening at the cold edge is experimenting alongside us. For the collector, that is most of the appeal.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Woodlanders","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42057912189043,"sku":"LIND-FRAG-01G","price":30.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0605\/7505\/5987\/files\/DETA-441.jpg?v=1720139340"}],"url":"https:\/\/woodlanders.net\/collections\/prophouse-on-the-horizon.oembed?page=4","provider":"Woodlanders","version":"1.0","type":"link"}