Making themselves at home

This August I’m keeping an eye on native plants I’ve recently added to the garden. I have to admit that not every native I’ve brought home has settled in easily. But an inventory of the newish plantings under the shade of our dawn redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides) shows that some are chugging along.

Before recent additions: shade-tolerant plants under the dawn redwood

    I have high hopes for New York ironweed (Vernonia noveboracensis). This will grow to a shrub-sized perennial, up to 6 feet high and 4 feet wide, with purple flowers in late summer and fall. 

New York ironweed blooming last fall

Doug Tallamy’s Bringing Nature Home web site notes that ironweed is a caterpillar host plant for 18 species of moths and butterflies in my area. So far it’s only about a foot tall, but it has pleasing feathery foliage. When the sheet composting area decomposes enough for planting, I might move the ironweed forward away from the tree, since it grows in sun in the wild.

    I love the dark reddish-brown flowers of Carolina allspice (Calycanthus floridus), a beetle-pollinated magnolia relative also known by the common name of sweetshrub for its flowers’ fruity scent. 

Carolina allspice flowering in Central Park

I first planted this shrub in significant shade next to a Japanese stewartia (Stewartia pseudocamellia). It has survived and flowered, but it’s not making many branches. When we took down the hemlocks near the dawn redwood, a sunnier patch opened up. I took the opportunity to try Carolina allspice again.

    Another native shrub that seems to be thriving is coastal doghobble (Leucothoe axillaris). Its best feature is its low, arching sprays of shiny leaves. Native plant expert William Cullina explains that the common name describes the tangled thickets leucothoe creates in the wild that even a dog can’t wriggle through.

Shiny foliage of coastal doghobble

     Leucothoe is often recommended with other broadleaf evergreens for foundation plantings. I inherited lots of those: rhododendrons (Rhododendron spp.), mountain laurels (Kalmia latifolia), and Japanese pieris (Pieris japonica), but I’d never grown leucothoe until I realized it was a native that might do well under the shade of the dawn redwood, and so it has. Those leaves are still shiny and pristine in August, which is more than I can say for most of the foliage in the yard. I haven’t seen any flowers yet. They’re going to be little dangling white bells.

    By the way, neither Carolina allspice nor the leucothoe is actually native in the Northeast. They’re both from the Southeast, but since they can grow here, I’ve decided to give them a try. We each get to decide how native our natives are going to be. If I were a true purist, I’d restrict myself to plants from my ecoregion, the Boston Basin. So far I’m not willing to be that exact.

The Boston Basin is my ecoregion

    A true New England native is already established next to the dawn redwood: winterberry (Ilex verticillata). This has grown into a small double-stemmed tree and produces masses of red berries that birds eat during the fall and winter. I’m glad to know that it also provides caterpillar forage for 42 moth and butterfly species.

Winterberry fruit in late fall