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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Raven ZZ Plant

The Raven ZZ Plant is a dramatic cultivar whose new growth emerges bright green then matures to near-black, glossy foliage. As tough and drought-tolerant as the classic ZZ, it adds bold, dark color with almost no effort.

houseplant

Rainbow Eucalyptus

A towering tropical tree whose smooth bark sheds in patches to reveal streaks of green, blue, orange, purple, and maroon, like a living rainbow. It is the only eucalyptus native to the Northern Hemisphere.

tree

Pitcher Plant

A carnivorous plant whose leaves form hanging, fluid-filled pitchers that lure, trap, and digest insects. Tropical Nepenthes species dangle their colorful 'monkey cups' from vining stems.

houseplant

Nimblewill

Nimblewill is a wiry, warm-season perennial grass native to North America that often invades lawns as a patchy weed. It greens up late and turns straw-brown early, creating unsightly dormant patches.

grass

Miracle Fruit

A slow-growing evergreen shrub from West Africa bearing small, bright red oval berries. It demands acidic soil, warmth, and humidity, making it a challenging container plant outside the tropics.

shrub

Lawson Cypress

Lawson Cypress, or Port Orford Cedar, is a tall, graceful conifer of the Pacific Northwest with flattened, fern-like fragrant foliage. It has produced hundreds of garden cultivars in many colors and forms.

tree

Kimberly Queen Fern

The Kimberly Queen Fern is an upright, sword-leaved fern that's tidier and more forgiving than the related Boston fern. Its stiff, vertical fronds make it a favorite for patios, porches, and bright indoor corners.

fern

Ghost Plant

The ghost plant is a hardy rosette succulent with pearly, pastel leaves that shift from grey-blue to pinkish or yellow depending on light. It is fast-growing, trailing, and extremely easy to propagate.

succulent

Flapjack Succulent

A striking succulent with large, flat, paddle-shaped leaves that flush vivid red along their edges in bright sun and cool weather. It forms rosettes that resemble a stack of pancakes, giving it the name flapjack.

succulent

Blue Chalksticks

Blue chalksticks is a spreading ground-cover succulent with slender, upright, powdery blue-green finger-like leaves. Its cool blue color and low, mounding habit make it a popular landscape and container plant.

succulent

Buddhist Pine

Buddhist Pine is a versatile evergreen conifer with long, soft, strap-like leaves, widely grown as a hedge, container plant, houseplant, and bonsai. Native to East Asia, it tolerates pruning and shade well.

shrub

Bilberry

A low-growing wild relative of the blueberry, native to northern European heaths and woodlands. It forms a small deciduous shrub bearing dark blue-black berries on distinctive angular green stems.

shrub

Arizona Cypress

Arizona Cypress is a tough, drought-tolerant evergreen conifer from the American Southwest, valued for its silvery blue-gray scale foliage. It makes an excellent windbreak and waterwise screen.

tree

Tricolor Beech

Tricolor beech is a striking cultivar of European beech with purple leaves edged in irregular bands of pink and creamy white. It is a slow-growing, eye-catching specimen tree that needs protection from harsh sun.

tree

Virginia Pine

A small, scrubby pine of the eastern United States that readily colonizes old fields and poor soils. Its short, twisted needles and persistent cones make it a common early-successional and Christmas-tree species.

tree

Rattlesnake Plant

A prayer plant with long, wavy leaves patterned in alternating dark and light green spots and rich purple undersides. Its dramatic markings come with calathea-typical demands for humidity and clean water.

houseplant

Pinstripe Calathea

The Pinstripe Calathea is a striking prayer plant with dark green leaves finely lined in pink or white, like delicate pinstripes. Beautiful but demanding, it rewards careful humidity and watering with vivid foliage.

houseplant

Ponderosa Pine

Ponderosa pine is a tall, drought-hardy evergreen conifer of western North America, known for its long needles, large cones and puzzle-piece bark that smells of vanilla or butterscotch. It is a major western timber tree.

tree

Painted Dropwing

Important note: the Painted Dropwing (also called the violet dropwing) is not a plant but a dragonfly, Trithemis annulata. Mature males are a striking violet-pink with red-veined wings, often seen perched at the edges of warm ponds and streams.

flower

Olive Tree

The olive is a long-lived evergreen Mediterranean tree, a fruiting tree cultivated for thousands of years. Gnarled, silvery and remarkably drought-hardy, it is also a popular ornamental and container plant.

tree

Korean Fir

Korean Fir is a compact, slow-growing conifer famous for producing showy violet-blue upright cones even on young trees. Its short needles show silvery undersides, making it a favorite garden and dwarf-conifer specimen.

tree

False Aralia

False aralia is grown for its delicate, lacy foliage - slender, saw-toothed leaflets that radiate like fingers and emerge coppery before darkening to near-black green. It brings a fine, airy texture to bright indoor spaces.

houseplant

Coulter Pine

A rugged southern California and Baja conifer famous for producing the heaviest pine cones in the world, sometimes weighing up to 5 pounds. Its stout, spiny cones and long blue-green needles make it unmistakable.

tree

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