Plant Encyclopedia

Search and identify 1,000+ plants, flowers, trees, and succulents — with care, light, water, and how to tell them apart.

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Bitternut Hickory

Bitternut hickory is a tall, fast-growing eastern North American hickory recognized by its bright sulfur-yellow winter buds. Its dense, strong wood is valued for tool handles and firewood.

tree

Bee Balm

A fragrant North American native with shaggy, crown-like flowers in red, pink, or purple that are irresistible to bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds. Its aromatic leaves release a citrusy, minty scent when crushed.

herb

Witchgrass

Witchgrass is a native North American annual grass famous for its huge airy seedhead that breaks off and tumbles in the wind, scattering seed as it rolls.

grass

Red Pine

Red Pine is a tall, straight North American conifer prized for timber, recognizable by its reddish, scaly bark and long needles borne in pairs.

tree

Prairie Smoke

A charming North American prairie wildflower named for its feathery, smoke-like pink seed heads that follow nodding maroon spring flowers.

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Fire Pink

A short-lived native wildflower of eastern North American woodlands, prized for its brilliant scarlet, star-shaped flowers that lure hummingbirds in spring.

flower

Chokeberry

Chokeberry is a hardy North American native shrub with white spring flowers, glossy berries, and fiery fall foliage. It is exceptionally adaptable and wildlife-friendly.

shrub

Cottonwood

Cottonwood is a fast-growing deciduous tree of North American riverbanks, named for the fluffy, cotton-like seeds that fill the air in early summer. Large and vigorous, it provides quick shade and vital riparian habitat.

tree

Toadshade

Toadshade is a woodland trillium with mottled leaves and a stalkless, maroon, upright flower that never fully opens. It is a charming spring ephemeral of eastern North American forests.

flower

Live Oak

Live oak is a massive, sprawling evergreen oak of the American South, famous for wide spreading limbs draped in Spanish moss and an extremely strong, dense wood.

tree

Jewelweed

A native North American annual with dangling orange spotted flowers and seed pods that burst open at a touch. Jewelweed forms colonies in moist, shady habitats.

flower

Boneset

Boneset is a native North American wildflower with clusters of fuzzy white blooms and distinctive leaves that appear pierced by the stem. It is valued as a pollinator plant for moist gardens.

herb

Trumpet Tree

The trumpet tree is a tropical American tree that bursts into a mass of pink-to-magenta trumpet-shaped flowers, often while leafless. Known as pink ipê, it is a prized ornamental.

tree

River Birch

A fast-growing native birch famous for its showy, peeling cinnamon-and-cream bark and tolerance of wet soils. The most heat-tolerant of North American birches.

tree

Pitch Pine

Pitch Pine is a rugged, fire-adapted eastern North American conifer known for its twisted form, three-needle bundles, and ability to resprout after fire.

tree

Sweetbay Magnolia

Sweetbay magnolia is a graceful native North American tree with creamy, lemon-scented summer flowers and silvery-backed leaves. Unusually for a magnolia, it thrives in wet, swampy ground.

tree

California Lilac

California lilac is a western North American shrub celebrated for its dense clusters of intensely blue flowers in spring. It is a magnet for bees and a backbone of water-wise native gardens.

shrub

Butternut

Butternut is a medium-sized North American walnut relative with elongated, sticky nuts and a pale, lightweight wood. Wild populations have been devastated by butternut canker disease.

tree

Buffalo Berry

A tough, thorny North American shrub with silvery leaves and small red berries. Nitrogen-fixing and extremely drought- and cold-hardy, it forms dense thickets on poor soils.

shrub

Lodgepole Pine

Lodgepole Pine is a slender, adaptable western North American pine with paired needles and small prickly cones. Many populations have serotinous cones that open only after fire.

tree

Beardtongue

A North American native perennial with upright spikes of tubular, two-lipped flowers in white, pink, purple, or red. Loved by hummingbirds and bees, and tough in lean, well-drained soil.

flower

Joe-Pye Weed

Joe-Pye weed is a tall, native North American perennial topped with large, domed clusters of mauve-pink flowers in late summer. A pollinator powerhouse, it brings height and butterfly-friendly blooms to moist, sunny gardens and rain gardens.

flower

Stevia

Stevia is a tender perennial herb in the daisy family, native to South America. It forms a bushy, branching plant grown in gardens and containers.

herb

Douglas Fir

Douglas fir is a towering western North American conifer prized as a timber and Christmas tree, recognizable by its soft flat needles and distinctive three-pointed bracts protruding from the cones.

tree