Plant Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ plants, flowers, trees, and succulents — with care, light, water, and how to tell them apart.
Salvia
Salvia is the huge genus of sages, spanning the culinary herb of the kitchen, aromatic shrubs, and a vast range of ornamental perennials with vivid flower spikes that hummingbirds and bees adore.
herb
Weeping Cherry
The weeping cherry is an ornamental flowering cherry with gracefully cascading branches smothered in pink or white blossoms each spring. Its waterfall silhouette makes it a popular specimen and lawn focal point.
tree
Sea Thrift
Sea thrift is a compact, evergreen coastal perennial forming tidy cushions of grassy foliage topped with round pink pompom flowers. It is exceptionally tough, thriving in poor, salty, well-drained soils.
flower
Rubber Plant
A popular indoor tree with large, thick, glossy leaves that can grow tall and statuesque indoors. Burgundy and variegated cultivars add dramatic color to the classic deep-green form.
houseplant
Rubber Tree
The rubber tree is a striking indoor tree with large, thick, glossy leaves that can be deep green or burgundy. It is easy to grow and can become an impressive floor plant several feet tall.
tree
Valerian
Valerian is a tall perennial herb with frothy, sweetly scented flower heads borne on upright clump-forming stems. It is grown as an ornamental for its airy white-to-pink blooms and ferny foliage.
herb
Sea Holly
Sea holly is a striking, drought-tolerant perennial with spiny, thistle-like flower heads surrounded by metallic silver-blue bracts. It thrives in poor, dry soils and adds architectural texture and a long-lasting, otherworldly color to sunny borders.
flower
Watermelon
Watermelon is a sprawling, heat-loving vine in the gourd family grown for its very large fruits. It needs a long, hot season and plenty of room to develop well.
herb
Serviceberry
The serviceberry is a hardy deciduous shrub or small tree offering white spring blossoms, colorful summer berries, and brilliant fall color. It is a versatile four-season native plant beloved by gardeners and wildlife alike.
shrub
Texas Bluebonnet
The Texas bluebonnet is the iconic state flower of Texas, a spring-blooming wildflower lupine that carpets roadsides and fields in sweeps of deep blue with white-tipped flower spikes.
flower
Showy Lady's Slipper
Showy Lady's Slipper is a large, slow-growing native orchid prized for its inflated white pouch flushed with rose-pink. It is the state flower of Minnesota and one of the most spectacular wild orchids of North America.
flower
Wisteria
Wisteria is a vigorous woody climbing vine famous for dramatic cascades of fragrant purple, blue, or white flowers in spring. It is beautiful but can become invasive and needs firm pruning.
shrubCopper Pinwheel
A branching aeonium hybrid whose flat rosettes glow coppery-orange to bronze in strong sun. The warm metallic tones set it apart from the usual green and black aeoniums.
succulent
Vinca
A heat- and drought-tolerant annual with glossy leaves and pinwheel flowers, annual vinca blooms nonstop through the hottest part of summer.
flowerString of Dolphins
A trailing succulent whose curved leaves look like tiny leaping dolphins. A hybrid of string of pearls and candle plant, it makes a charming, sun-loving hanging plant.
succulent
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.
grassHaworthia
A small, slow-growing rosette succulent often called the zebra plant for the raised white bands on its dark green leaves. Compact and slow-growing, it thrives on neglect and tolerates lower light than most succulents.
succulent
Yellow Birch
A long-lived northern hardwood with shiny, peeling bronze-gold bark and twigs that smell of wintergreen when scratched, important for timber and wildlife value.
tree
Rue
Rue is an aromatic evergreen subshrub with blue-green, deeply lobed foliage, long grown as an ornamental and pollinator herb in dry, sunny gardens.
herb
Wormwood
Wormwood is a silvery, aromatic perennial herb best known as the signature botanical associated with absinthe and vermouth. Its finely divided gray-green foliage is aromatic and drought-tough.
herb
Puncturevine
Puncturevine is a low, mat-forming summer weed notorious for its hard, spiny seed burs that puncture bicycle tires and bare feet. It thrives in hot, dry, disturbed ground and is widespread in warm regions worldwide.
herb
Velvetleaf
A tall summer annual with large, soft, heart-shaped velvety leaves and yellow flowers, a major agricultural weed of corn and soybean fields. Its distinctive cup-shaped seed pods and fibrous stems make it easy to recognize.
herb
Powder Puff Cactus
A clustering pincushion cactus wrapped in silky white hairs, with hooked central spines hidden beneath. Rings of small creamy or pink flowers appear readily, even on young plants.
succulent
White Oak
White oak is a majestic, long-lived North American hardwood with rounded leaf lobes and prized, water-tight timber. A keystone forest tree, it can live for centuries and supports a vast web of wildlife.
treePhilodendron White Knight
A dramatic variegated climbing philodendron with dark green to nearly black leaves splashed in pure white, set on distinctive dark maroon-and-white stems. Each leaf shows unique, unpredictable variegation.
houseplant
Red Twig Dogwood
A hardy deciduous shrub prized for its brilliant red winter stems, white spring flowers, and white berries. Especially striking in snowy landscapes when the bare crimson twigs glow.
shrub
Rose
The rose is the world's most beloved flowering shrub, a thorny perennial grown for thousands of years for its fragrant, many-petaled blooms in nearly every color but true blue.
shrub
Velvet Shield Anthurium
This collector's anthurium is grown for its large, velvety, heart-shaped leaves emblazoned with bold, contrasting white veins. The thick, dark foliage has a stiff, almost cardboard-like texture that gives it its nicknames.
houseplantRosemary
An aromatic, woody Mediterranean herb with needle-like evergreen leaves and a piney fragrance, grown as a culinary herb and as a drought-tolerant ornamental shrub.
herb
Tulip Tree
One of the tallest eastern hardwoods, named for its showy tulip-shaped greenish-orange flowers and uniquely four-lobed leaves. A fast-growing member of the magnolia family.
tree
Rose of Sharon
A hardy deciduous hibiscus that blooms profusely in late summer with showy, often two-toned flowers. Upright and easy to grow, it brings tropical-looking color to temperate gardens when little else is flowering.
shrub
Trillium
A cherished woodland wildflower built entirely in threes: three leaves, three petals, and three sepals. Slow-growing and long-lived, it is a hallmark of healthy spring forests and should never be picked or dug from the wild.
flowerParlor Palm
A compact, slow-growing palm that thrives in low light, making it a classic indoor plant since Victorian times. It forms delicate clumps of feathery green fronds.
houseplant
Weeping Nootka Cypress
Weeping Nootka Cypress is a graceful evergreen conifer with sweeping, drooping branchlets that hang like curtains from upturned limbs. It is a striking, hardy specimen tree for cool climates.
treeAngel's Trumpet
A tropical shrub or small tree bearing enormous, pendulous trumpet-shaped flowers that release a powerful fragrance at night. It is grown as a dramatic ornamental in warm climates.
shrub
Watercress
Watercress is a fast-growing semi-aquatic perennial in the cabbage family, with crisp dark-green leaves on sprawling, rooting stems. It naturally grows in cool, clean flowing water.
herbSago Palm
An ancient, palm-like cycad with a stout trunk and a symmetrical crown of stiff, feathery dark-green fronds. Despite the name it is not a true palm.
shrub
Willow Oak
A fast-growing red-oak with narrow, willow-like leaves that lack the typical oak lobes, prized as a tough shade and street tree across the southeastern United States.
treeMexican Giant
A large, statuesque echeveria forming a single chalky-white rosette that can span a foot or more. Heavy farina coating gives it a frosted, almost porcelain look.
succulent
White Ash
A large native shade tree once widely planted for its strong wood and purple-bronze fall color. Now severely threatened by the invasive emerald ash borer.
tree
Ponytail Palm
Not a true palm but a succulent with a swollen, water-storing trunk and a fountain of long, curly leaves. Its bulbous base gives it the nickname elephant's foot.
succulent
Wild Bergamot
An aromatic North American mint-family perennial topped with ragged lavender flower heads that are magnets for bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds.
herb
Potentilla
A small, tough deciduous shrub that blooms nonstop from late spring to frost with cheerful yellow, white, pink, or orange flowers. Cold-hardy and undemanding, it suits borders, edging, and harsh sites.
shrub
Wood Anemone
A low-growing spring ephemeral of European woodlands that carpets the forest floor with star-shaped white flowers before the tree canopy leafs out.
flower
Polka Dot Plant
A compact, bushy plant grown for its colorfully spotted leaves splashed in pink, white, or red over green. Cheerful and easy, though it gets leggy without pinching.
houseplant
Thyme
A low, woody Mediterranean herb with tiny aromatic leaves, valued as a drought-tolerant ground cover and a superb bee plant.
herb
Quaking Aspen
A fast-growing native tree whose flat-stalked leaves tremble in the slightest breeze and turn brilliant gold in fall. It forms vast clonal groves and is the most widely distributed tree in North America.
tree
Zebra Plant
The zebra plant is a striking Brazilian houseplant prized for glossy dark leaves boldly striped in white and short-lived golden bract spikes. It is notoriously fussy about humidity and watering.
houseplant