A 3 to 5 foot tall native perennial with an equally wide spread. It is great on a prairie or in a wild garden. In the border just be aware that you will need to give it space and consider removing the seed heads if you don’t want too many seedlings. The Branched stems have masses of sunflower-like heads. The petals as well as the cone-shaped center disk are yellow. The 2 inch flowers are nicer than “real” native sunflowers because the petals remain though out the summer and into fall where the sunflower petals fade as the seeds are produced. It tolerates both dry sandy soil and clay and needs little care other than to cut it back when it is done. You can do this in spring if you like the branching skeleton for winter interest. This multipurpose butterfly magnet is great for arrangements and doubles as a bird feeder.
$4.00Tag: Native

This nice little native woodland plant makes a wonderful ground cover for your garden, too. It does best in shaded areas that have moist acidic soils. Wild Ginger only gets about 6” tall and is deer resistant! The heart shaped leaves can be 6” but more often are 3” and the leaves and stems are fuzzy. It is nice with ephemerals as it will stay around when they fade. There is a little dark red to brown flower that is often not noticed as it hangs down below the leaves. It is an important plant for the Pipe vine swallowtail Butterfly. It is edible and has been used medicinally.
- Asarum canadense Wild Ginger and virginia waterleaf

This native perennial is 2-3 feet tall with iris or cattail like leaves rising up directly from a rhizome. You can tell them apart as these will have a mid-rib. Some leaves will have a spadix grow from them. These are 2-4” long, semi-circular and covered with green/yellow flowers in a diamond pattern. The crushed leaves or root stock has an unforgettable scent. These plants like to grow with wet feet but will do fine in a garden situation. They even live over the winter in pots. They creep by the roots stock but are not difficult to remove if you get too many. They will creep slower in drier soils. Acorus has been used medicinally in the past but please enjoy it only in your garden for its gorgeous upright form as recent studies have found that some varieties are carcinogenic.
- Acorus Calamus, Bunny Tails grass and Pepper Fish