Plant Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ plants, flowers, trees, and succulents — with care, light, water, and how to tell them apart.
Iris
Irises are elegant perennials with sword-like leaves and intricate flowers featuring upright "standards" and drooping "falls." The bearded iris is the most widely grown garden type.
flower
Blue Flag Iris
A native North American wetland iris with striking violet-blue flowers veined in yellow and white. It thrives in marshes, pond margins, and wet meadows.
flower
Irish Yew
Irish Yew is a distinctive columnar cultivar of English yew with a tight, upright form, dark needles whorled around the stems, and red arils.
shrub
Sweet William
Sweet William is a short-lived cottage-garden classic bearing dense, flat clusters of fringed, often bicolored flowers with a clove-like fragrance. It's typically grown as a biennial, blooming in its second year.
flower
Blue-eyed Grass
A dainty native wildflower that, despite its name and grassy leaves, is actually a member of the iris family. It produces small, star-shaped blue-violet flowers with bright yellow centers atop slender, flattened stems.
flower
Potato
The potato is a cool-season nightshade-family plant grown for its starchy underground tubers, among the world's most widely cultivated staple crops. It is grown from 'seed potatoes' that sprout into leafy plants.
herb
Tree Aeonium
A branching, shrubby succulent that holds glossy leaf rosettes atop bare woody stems. Popular dark cultivars like 'Zwartkop' turn nearly black in strong sun.
succulent
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.
flower
Goatsbeard
Goatsbeard is a robust, shade-loving perennial that produces tall, feathery plumes of creamy-white flowers, resembling a giant astilbe. It is a striking native woodland plant for moist, partly shaded gardens.
shrub
Clematis
Clematis is a versatile climbing vine renowned for its large, showy flowers that cover trellises, fences, and arbors in a spectacular seasonal display.
shrub
Fringe Tree
A small native tree or large shrub that produces airy, cloud-like clusters of fragrant, fringe-like white flowers in late spring. Its feathery blooms give it the name old man's beard.
tree
Old Man Cactus
A columnar cactus famously cloaked in long, shaggy white hairs that resemble an old man's beard. The wool shields the plant from sun and cold while hiding sharp spines beneath.
succulent