by Lauren Goldsby | May 8, 2025
It’s that time of year when you bump into a bumble bee and watch butterflies fluttering around as you water the garden. If you’re like me, you’ve been waiting patiently for butterflies to start laying their eggs. Butterflies and moths lay eggs on specialized plants that caterpillars depend on once they hatch. These host plants provide caterpillars with food, shelter, and protection- and they can be anything from a small weed to a tall oak tree.
Freshly hatched Gulf fritillary on passionflower
Monarch butterfly on echinacea
While host plants feed caterpillars, nectar plants feed butterflies. Host plants are specific to each butterfly or moth, while nectar plants attract and feed many different species. Provide a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors of flowering plants to attract different butterflies. To support all life stages of butterflies it’s important to have both host and nectar plants in your garden.
Keep an eye out for signs of caterpillars on your host plants and remember that these plants are meant to be eaten! Because caterpillars feed exclusively on their host plants, they won’t harm the rest of your landscape. Before you reach for pesticides when you see leaf damage, take a moment to identify what’s causing it. It may just be hungry caterpillars getting ready to transform into butterflies. For more information see this EDIS publication about butterfly gardening in Florida, https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/UW057.
Zebra longwing caterpillar on passionflower
Want to support both caterpillars and butterflies with one plant? Try passionflower! Florida is home to 6 native species of passionflower. Maypop or wild passionflower, Passiflora incarnata, is the showiest of these. Flowers of pink and purple cover the passionflower from the summer to fall, offering nectar for bees, butterflies and hummingbirds. Passiflora species are host plants for the zebra longwing and gulf fritillary caterpillars.
Passiflora incarnata
Gulf fritillary (left) and zebra longwing (right)
Gulf fritillary (left) and zebra longwing (right)
by Beth Bolles | Oct 24, 2024
If you love wildflowers, the Fall season has so many plants for you to enjoy. We often think of wildflowers as those in natural settings, on roadsides, or in drainage spots. Here are a few wildflowers that make excellent landscape additions.
Goldenrods (Solidago spp.) are everywhere and the yellow blooms are stunning. If all the incorrect information about goldenrod as an allergy causing plant never existed (ragweed is the main culprit), we would see selections of goldenrod available in every commercial outlet. Many selections have an upright growth so add goldenrod against fences, in back of borders, or large clumps in sunny areas of your landscape.
Goldenrod as a landscape feature at Escambia Demonstration Garden. Photo by Beth Bolles, UF IFAS Extension Escambia County
If you have a moist area and love purple, Mistflower (Conoclinium coelestinum) makes a wonderful fall blooming feature. Plants will colonize an area with running stems so it tends to form a large clump in moist soils. You may notice this in ditches on a drive around your county. The clusters of flowers look fluffy and will be present for many weeks in both full sun or partial shade.
A clump of mistflower in a moist plant bed. Photo by Beth Bolles, UF IFAS Extension Escambia County
For dry and well drained spots of your landscape, the Woody goldenrod (Chrysoma pauciflosculosa) is a good choice. The small shrub offers bright yellow fall flowers that extend above a 2 foot tall plant. Plants tend to be evergreen when in the right location and additional new seedlings will emerge each spring if your landscape is suited for this plant.
Woody goldenrod in a home landscape. Photo by Beth Bolles, UF IFAS Extension Escambia County
For those enhancing a butterfly garden, add Purple false foxglove (Agalinis purpurea), a host plant to the Buckeye butterfly. Plants grow well in our acidic well drained soils with a little moisture. Numerous tubular pink flowers occur in the Fall until a frost. Plants reseed well.
The Purple False Foxglove with vivid pink blooms in a natural setting. Photo by Beth Bolles, UF IFAS Extension Escambia County
If you love all the colors and variety of wildflowers, it is a good time for finding seeds and plants to grow your own. Native nurseries and online retailers carry a wide selection for all seasons and many are low maintenance enhancements for our home landscapes. Like any other ornamental or grass, be sure to match the wildflower with your specific growing conditions.
by Daniel J. Leonard | Sep 19, 2024
Problem areas in the landscape – everyone has them. Whether it’s the spot near a drain that stays wet or the back corner of a bed that sunshine never touches, these areas require specialized plants to avoid the constant frustration of installing unhealthy plants that slowly succumb and must be replaced. The problem area in my landscape was a long narrow bed, sited entirely under an eave with full sun exposure and framed by a concrete sidewalk and a south-facing wall. This bed stays hot, it stays dry, and is nigh as inhospitable to most plants as a desert. Enter a plant specialized to handle situations just like this – Yarrow ‘Moonshine’.
Yarrow (Achillea spp.) is a large genus of plants, occurring all over the globe. To illustrate, Common Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) is native to three different continents (North America, Europe, and Asia), making it one of the most widely distributed plants in the world. And though it was commonly grown and used in antiquity for medical purposes (the genus name Achillea is a reference to Achilles, who supposedly used the plant as a wound treatment for himself and his fellow Greek soldiers), I and most of you are probably more interested in how it looks and performs in the landscape.
‘Moonshine’ Yarrow foliage.
All species of Yarrow share several ornamental traits. The most obvious are their showy flowers, which occur as large, flattened “corymbs” and come in shades of white, pink, red, and yellow. I selected the cultivar ‘Moonshine’ for my landscape as it has brilliant yellow flowers that popped against the brown wall of the house. Equally as pretty and unique is the foliage of Yarrow. Yarrow leaves are finely dissected, appearing fernlike, are strongly scented, and range in color from deep green to silver. Again, I chose ‘Moonshine’ for its silvery foliage, a trait that makes it even more drought resistant than green leaved varieties.
‘Moonshine’ Yarrow inflorescence.
If sited in the right place, most Yarrow species are easy to grow; simply site them in full sun (6+ hours a day) and very well drained soil. While all plants, Yarrow included, need regular water during the establishment phase, supplemental irrigation is not necessary and often leads to the decline and rot of Yarrow clumps, particularly the silver foliaged varieties like ‘Moonrise’ (these should be treated more like succulents and watered only sparingly). Once established, Yarrow plants will eventually grow to 2-3’ in height but can spread underground via rhizomes to form clumps. This spreading trait enables Yarrow to perform admirably as a groundcover in confined spaces like my sidewalk-bound bed.
If you have a dry, sunny problem spot in your landscape and don’t know what to do, installing a cultivar of Yarrow, like ‘Moonshine’, might be just the solution to turn a problem into a garden solution. This drought tolerant, deer tolerant, pollinator friendly species couldn’t be easier to grow and will reward you with summer color for years to come. Plant one today. For more information on Yarrow or any other horticultural question, contact your local UF/IFAS County Extension Office.
by Carrie Stevenson | Sep 11, 2024
The ornate passionflower attracts human and insect attention, alike. Photo credit: Mike Clark
There are some things in nature that look so bizarre, so beautiful, or so ornate that one can scarcely believe they’re real. This was how I felt the first time I looked closely at a passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) bloom. Between the deep shade of purple, the squiggly intricate filaments of the “corona” above the petals, and the bright green stigma and ovary, it seemed like something from the imagination of Dr. Seuss.
A Gulf fritillary butterfly visits the passionvine in my yard. Photo credit: Carrie Stevenson, UF IFAS Extension
Our vine is full of blooms right now, and every time I walk past the arbor I stop in admiration. I’m not the only one—the plant is covered up with Gulf fritillary butterflies, small orange and black near-mimics of monarchs. Like the monarch, they possess chemical defense mechanisms that make them taste bad to would-be predators. Fritillaries are so fond of passionvines as a nectar source that they are sometimes referred to as “passion butterflies.” Adult females frequently lay their eggs on the plant, as well.
Carpenter bees are big fans of the flower, digging for pollen throughout its bloom time. The leaves also attract pollinator insects; they have “extrafloral nectaries” that secrete a sugary substance at their bases, attracting bees and ants.
A carpenter bee visiting a passionflower. Photo credit: UF IFAS
Passionfruit are quite large for such a delicate vine—spherical, green, and about the size of a chicken egg. The plant is also known as a “maypop.” I’ve seen two explanations for this; the fruit’s skin is fairly thin, so it will respond with a satisfying “pop” if stepped on. Alternatively, the name could come from the idea that if the fruit drops into the soil and overwinters, a new vine will “pop” out of the ground the following May.
The passionfruit of the native Passiflora species. Photo credit: Mark Bailey, UF IFAS
The fruit is edible and has been prized for millennia as both a culinary and medicinal plant. Passion fruit juice has a strong, tropical flavor and contains fiber, vitamins A & C, and iron. It’s often used in jellies, ice cream, and other desserts. The pulp is edible raw, including the seeds. Most commercial production is in the equatorial regions of the world, particularly South America. Parts of Africa and Oceania produce it as well, along with more local sources in Florida, Puerto Rico, California, and Hawaii.
There are 500 varieties of Passiflora, with our native P. incarnata being one of the most cold-hardy of the varieties. The genus and common name “Passion” reference an early association of the flower with the crucifixion of Christ, with the flower parts imbued with symbolism and used by early Spanish missionaries to teach religious concepts to indigenous people in the Americas.
by Beth Bolles | Sep 4, 2024
Two years ago, the Escambia Master Gardener Volunteers were gifted with the flowering perennial Sweet Almond bush (Aloysia virgata). It has quickly become a favorite plant of volunteers and garden visitors due to its many attractive features.
Although, Sweet almond bush is not a Florida native, it is Florida-friendly plant for zones 8b -10b. Plants grow very large, from 6-10 feet with branching that can spread out in all directions. In North Florida, plants can be damaged by a freeze but either return from the base or from growing points higher on branches.
One of the best features are the fragrant white flowers spikes that will be present late spring through fall. Many types of pollinating insects will be attracted to the flowers, although sometimes flowers are too high on the plant for many of us to get a good look at pollinator details.
Sweet almond bush blooms. Photo by Beth Bolles, UF IFAS Extension Escambia County
We have plants both in full sun and partial shade that are performing well in the Escambia Demonstration Gardens. Plants do receive water when rainfall is lacking for about 5-7 days (or all of August this year in the Northwest Panhandle). You can shape your plant with a little light pruning during the growing season to keep branches a little more in bounds. Don’t forget to start a few new plants from these cuttings and then share a low maintenance plant with your neighbors.
by Beth Bolles | Aug 20, 2024
Salvias are a popular group of plants for attracting pollinators and adding lots of color to the landscape. A unique salvia that offers velvety flowers is the Mexican bush sage, Salvia leucantha.
In our heat, Mexican bush sage can tolerate partial shade and likes average water with well drained soils. Plants will not overtake a spot only growing 2-4 feet. The velvety portion of the flower is a purple calyx with the flower petals emerging white or purple. Flower stalks will extend above the foliage to be available to many bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds.
Mexican bush sage planted with ‘First Knight’ pennisetum. Photo by Bolles, UF IFAS Extension Escambia County.
During cold winters, plants can die back to the ground but often return each spring. It is always good to take a few cuttings for new plant starts just in case your plant dies back from heavy rains or drought conditions.
Mexican bush sage can be an accent plant in your garden or used in a small mass of 2-3 plants. Consider adding it with contrasting textures and colors so later summer flowers are easily visible.
