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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Hellebore

An evergreen shade perennial that blooms in late winter and early spring, when little else does, with nodding, cup-shaped flowers in white, pink, plum, and green. Long-lived and deer-resistant.

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Geranium

The familiar bedding "geranium" is actually a Pelargonium, a drought-tolerant flowering plant with rounded leaves and bold clusters of red, pink, or white blooms. True Geranium species (cranesbills) are separate hardy perennials.

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Flowering Kale

Flowering kale is a cool-season ornamental grown for its showy rosettes of frilly leaves in pink, purple, white, and cream. The color intensifies in cold weather, making it a star of fall and winter displays.

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Flowering Tobacco

An ornamental relative of commercial tobacco grown for its tubular, star-shaped flowers that open and release a jasmine-like scent in the evening. It comes in white, green, red and pink, attracting moths and hummingbirds.

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Foamflower

Foamflower is a charming native woodland perennial with maple-like, often patterned leaves and frothy spikes of tiny, star-shaped white or pink flowers in spring. It forms a delicate groundcover for shady gardens.

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Astilbe

A shade-loving perennial topped with feathery, plume-like flower panicles in pink, red, lavender, or white above fern-like foliage. Prized for bringing color and softness to moist, dappled gardens.

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African Milk Tree

The African milk tree is a fast-growing, upright succulent with ridged, branching green stems that resemble a cactus. Despite the look, it is a Euphorbia that exudes milky white sap when cut, not a true cactus.

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Alocasia Polly

Alocasia Polly is a compact hybrid houseplant with dramatic dark green, arrow-shaped leaves edged in wavy margins and boldly veined in silvery-white. It is striking but somewhat fussy, demanding warmth and humidity.

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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.

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Hairy Bittercress

A small annual weed in the mustard family that forms a basal rosette and shoots tiny white flowers in early spring, followed by seed pods that explosively fling seeds. It is a common nuisance in nursery pots and garden beds.

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Franklin Tree

The Franklin tree is a rare deciduous tree extinct in the wild, surviving only in cultivation from seed collected in the 1700s. It bears fragrant white camellia-like flowers in late summer and fiery red fall color.

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Bradford Pear

Bradford pear is a fast-growing ornamental cultivar of Callery pear known for a uniform teardrop shape and clouds of white spring flowers. It is now widely regarded as an invasive species with notoriously weak, breakage-prone branching.

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Bindweed

Bindweed is a fast-twining perennial vine with arrowhead leaves and small white-to-pink morning-glory flowers that smothers gardens and crops. Its deep, persistent root system makes it one of the hardest weeds to eradicate.

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Speedwell

Speedwell is a hardy perennial prized for its upright spikes of densely packed blue, purple, pink or white flowers that bloom for weeks in summer. It is a magnet for bees and butterflies and thrives in sunny, well-drained borders.

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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.

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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.

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Natal Plum

Natal plum is a glossy, spiny evergreen shrub from South Africa with fragrant white flowers and red plum-like fruit. It is a tough, salt-tolerant choice for warm-climate hedges and coastal gardens.

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Dianthus

Dianthus, commonly called pinks or carnations, are flowering plants known for their fringed, clove-scented blooms in shades of pink, red, white and bicolor. They are classic cottage-garden favorites that bloom prolifically in cool weather.

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Dogwood

Flowering dogwood is a small ornamental tree beloved for its spring display of showy white or pink bracts. Native to eastern North America, it offers four-season interest with berries and red fall foliage.

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Camellia Tree

The camellia is a glossy-leaved evergreen shrub or small tree bearing large, showy rose-like flowers in shades of red, pink and white during fall, winter and spring. It is a classic shade-garden ornamental.

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Beet

Beet is a cool-season root vegetable grown for its rounded, swollen root and its leafy greens. The familiar deep-red root is the most common, but golden, white, and striped types also exist.

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Cauliflower

Cauliflower is a cool-season member of the cabbage family grown for its dense white head of immature flower buds, called a curd. It is one of the more demanding brassicas, needing steady cool conditions to head up well.

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Balloon Flower

Balloon flower is a long-lived perennial named for its puffy, balloon-like buds that pop open into star-shaped blue, pink or white blooms. It is an easy, deer-resistant plant that flowers reliably through summer.

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Stokes' Aster

Stokes' aster is a clump-forming perennial bearing large, frilly, cornflower-like blooms in blue, purple, white, or pink atop neat evergreen foliage. It is a long-blooming, heat-tolerant native of the southeastern US.

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