Greek Yarrow is a slow-growing, tidy, dense evergreen ground cover. This beauty is a reliable heavy-bloomer bearing bright white clusters of tiny flowers for many weeks in late spring. Attracts bees and butterflies.
Woolly Yarrow is a low growing evergreen ground cover forming loose clumps of charming, fuzzy grey-green leaves.Clusters of cheerful yellow blossoms pop up in late spring. Attracts bees and butterflies.
A natural hybrid from Bulgaria, this unusual and charming miniature yarrow produces clumps of small white flowers over carpets of attractive silvery leaves. Expanding gradually by root, this plant can form loose colonies.
A cheerful early-blooming groundcover. Great between stepping stones.
Rocky Mountain Columbine: Glorious light to deep blue and white flowers. An excellent border perennial, grand for cutting, in bloom for several weeks and will grow in sun or light shade. Pollinators: bumblebees, hawk moths. Tolerates clay. Firewise. More info here.
An all-white variation on our native Rocky Mtn. columbine. Lovely in shadier areas.
Lovely red and yellow bell-like flowers hang like tiny lanterns. Attracts hummingbirds and long-tongued insects. Best in part shade. Firewise. More information here.
Golden-spurred Columbine, a native of the canyons of the Southwest produces fragrant cheerful yellow flowers with long outward-curving spurs In late spring. The fragrant blooms rise on slender stems above beautiful blue-green, fernlike foliage. Tolerates clay. Firewise. More information here.
This short, relatively compact shrub is closely related to Curleaf Mountain Mahogany, Fairly slow-growing and evergreen. More information here.
Purple Prairie Clover produces lovely purple bottle-brushes on erect stems. Perfect specimen plant or as part of a meadow or prairie planting. Long-lived, with a deep taproot. Often found on eroded, depleted soils, including caliche. Supports bees and butterflies and fixes nitrogen.
Low carpet of semi-evergreen foliage topped with shocking salmon-colored flowers in late spring. Wonderful addition to any rock garden. Firewise.
When this Iceplant is in bloom, the shiny lavender flowers practically knock your eyeballs out! Vigorous and hardy. Firewise.
Sand Pink forms large hummocks packed with narrow evergreen foliage. In late spring it is covered with extremely fragrant little white flowers like snowflakes. Attracts butterflies. Firewise.
‘Flashing Lights’ Dianthus (Pink): This evergreen dianthus is not pink, but a deep, brilliant red. The mound of narrow, dark green, grassy leaves is attractive year-round. Great for low edging at the front edge of a bed or in a rock garden. Attracts butterflies. Firewise.
‘Firewitch’ Dianthus (Pink) is a bouquet of electric magenta flowers with frilly edges over a mound of attractive gray-green foliage. Excellent rock garden plant, or use at the front of a border. Attracts butterflies. Firewise.
Thin purple petals of this Conflower drape delicately from a bold brown center. It is lovely in a bouquet and also great for naturalizing en masse in the garden. Its deep taproot allows it to thrive in dry soils. Nectar plant for Monarch and other butterflies. Tolerates clay. Pollinators: bees, butterflies.
Grassy Bells, an ideal rock garden plant with small tufts of grassy leaves covered in bell-like flowers. The blossoms are violet-blue, on short, outspreading stems. Perfect for edging or containers.
This is the prostrate form of the native Mormon Tea shrub. Thin stems intertwine on the ground to gradually form a thick, sprawling, evergreen groundcover. In mid-summer dozens of bright red berry-like flowers appear, nestled down in the foliage. From Tibet, rare.
Showy Fleabane is an erect native Daisy (or Fleabane) with narrow leaves and cheerful purple that flowers in early to mid-summer. Usually occurs in woodland openings or edges. Attracts native bees and butterflies.
A beautiful mat-forming buckwheat topped with delicate round flowers–pale yellow, fading to pink or orange. Excellent rock garden plants. Supports native bees. Choice!
An amazingly statuesque Buckwheat! Add elegant structure to your xeric flower garden with this native beauty! Off-white flowers top the long stalks in mid-summer.
A compact high elevation Idaho buckwheat with narrow leaves and charming yellow flowers.
This Buckwheat features white pom-pom like flowers over expanding tuffets on tight gray-green leaves. Choice!
This beautiful little plant appears to be a variety of Sulfur Buckwheat. Its sculpted leaves and diminutive shrubby form make it an outstanding rock garden plant. Blooms earlier than our regular Sulfur Buckwheat.
Sulfur Buckwheat is arguably the best all-around landscape plant native to S. Idaho. Bright yellow flower heads rise over a mat of spoon-shaped leaves and mature into a lovely copper color over the summer. The basal leaves turn reddish-green in the fall and are attractive all winter long. Boise foothills native. Pollinators: butterflies, bees. Firewise.
Woolly Sunflower, also called “Oregon Sunshine” (in Oregon!), is one of the real standouts among native Idaho flowering plants. Relatively abundant but usually small in the wild, Woolly Sunflower grows to impressive size in the garden with a bit of extra water. It puts on a beautiful flush of yellow daisies in the late spring; foliage is semi-evergreen and handsome otherwise.
Yellow Stork’s Bill grows into long-lived, beautiful mounds of graceful foliage that are nearly evergreen. Delicate pale yellow flowers pop up in the early summer. Doesn’t mind heat and lean soil.
Lydia broom, a well-behaved flowering shrub, is a stunning sight in late spring,–covered with bright yellow pea-like flowers. Otherwise, the evergreen mound of wiry stems provide good structure year round. Tolerates clay. Don’t confuse with invasive Scotch Broom. Choice!
Sticky Purple Geranium makes a lovely addition to informal meadow-like landscapes. Native to higher elevations in Idaho and across the mountain west, it thrives in moist to dry settings. Blooming in mid-spring, it attracts a variety of native pollinators and honeybees. Firewise.
Utah Sweetvetch is a low, sprawling plant with beautiful pea-like blossoms. Winds in and around larger plants. Supports native pollinators and fixes Nitrogen in the soil.
Hairy Goldenaster covers itself completely with small yellow aster-like flowers in early summer. Needs no water once established.
Large yellow daisies pop out on this mountain meadow plant in early summer.
This vigorous native perennial grows as large as a shrub then dies back to the ground each winter. Its atrractive maple-like leaves are accented with many beautiful hollyhock-like pink flowers. More information here.
Lewis Flax, a vigorous native that produces masses of cheerful little blue flowers from late spring through mid-summer. Each flower lasts only a day, drops to the ground and is replaced by more the next morning. Charming. Pollinators: bees.
Fremont’s Mahonia is a large, evergreen shrub native to the deserts of S. Utah and Nevada. Prickly leaves shade from turquoise to purple in different seasons. Rare! More information here.
Bradbury’s Beebalm is shorter and earlier blooming than the more common Monarda fistulosa. This more compact beebalm will work well as an edging plant or at the front of a bed. Tolerates poor soil and dry conditions. Can spread gradually by root.
Hopflower Oregano is an outstanding mounding or draping plant, producing hundreds of small lantern-like flowers on wiry stems. Terrific for edging, cascading over walls or filling in between larger plants.
Tall flower spikes loaded with ruby red flowers. Eye-catcher. Native to hot, dry sites with well-drained soil. Great for hummingbirds, other pollinators. Firewise. More information here.
Davidson’s Penstemon is a choice landscape plant with a low, sprawling woody structure that allows it to function like a ground cover. If given some sun protection in winter it will be completely evergreen. Lavender tubular flowers show up in late spring. Likes well-drained soils. Firewise.
A substantial penstemon with spikes of white to pale pink flowers in June. Unlike most penstemons, it prefers slightly moist, well-drained soil in full sun or part shade. Firewise.