Growing Zone 6

Coreopsis pumps out golden daisies from late spring to frost on a native perennial that shrugs off heat, drought, and poor soil.Also called tickseed, coreopsis is one of the hardest-working perennials for Alabama sun, with threadleaf types like 'Moonbeam' and 'Zagreb' forming airy mounds...

Coral honeysuckle covers a mailbox or fence in scarlet trumpet flowers that hummingbirds visit from spring through frost, without ever taking over.This is our well-behaved native honeysuckle, not the aggressive Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica) that smothers Alabama woodlands - coral honeysuckle is a modest...

Catmint blooms lavender-blue for months, thrives on neglect and drought, and bees work it constantly while deer and rabbits leave it alone.Catmint forms a soft gray-green mound that edges beds and walkways beautifully and reblooms strongly if you shear it back by about a...

Blazing star sends up vertical purple wands that bloom top-down in midsummer heat, pulling in monarchs and swallowtails from across the yard.This tough native prairie perennial grows from a corm, handles Alabama drought and clay once established, and returns reliably every year. The stiff...

The real French tarragon - keen anise-vanilla flavor with a faint numbing bite that makes bearnaise, chicken, and vinegar taste like France.This is French tarragon, the sterile clone propagated only from cuttings and divisions - the seed-grown Russian type sold cheaply elsewhere is coarse...

Bright lemon-and-thyme perfume that seasons roast chicken, butter, and shortbread without any of the sourness of actual citrus.A low, woody, evergreen sub-shrub that holds its leaves through most Alabama winters and keeps cutting through the cold months. It resents wet feet far more than...

Feathery fronds and crisp anise-sweet stems that lift roasted fish, pork sausage, and citrus salads from spring straight through fall.This is herb fennel, grown for its fronds, pollen, and seed rather than the fat bulb of Florence fennel. It is a strong perennial across...

Strawberries fruit their first season from a small bed or a few containers, and homegrown berries taste nothing like the firm shipping types.In Alabama the traditional method is an annual planting: set June-bearing plants like 'Chandler', 'Camarosa', or 'Sweet Charlie' in the fall, mulch...

Raspberries deliver a delicate, aromatic berry you rarely find fresh in stores, on compact canes that fit a small sunny corner.Be realistic about raspberries in central Alabama: they evolved for cool summers, and our July heat and humidity bring root rot, spider mites, and...

Persimmons hand you honey-sweet fruit in October after everything else is done, on a tree that needs almost no spraying and glows orange in fall.Asian persimmons are the ones to plant for eating fresh: non-astringent 'Fuyu' and 'Jiro' can be eaten crisp like an...

Pears are the low-maintenance fruit tree for Alabama yards - long-lived, heavy-bearing, and productive with far less spraying than peaches or apples.Fire blight is the one thing that kills pears in the Southeast, so stick with resistant Southern types: 'Kieffer', 'Orient', 'Moonglow', and 'Warren'...

Nectarines are peaches without the fuzz - firmer, more aromatic, and ripening right in the heart of Alabama's summer fruit season.Nectarines grow like peaches here and want the same conditions: full sun, fast drainage, and a variety matched to our roughly 600-800 chill hours,...

Mulberries crop heavily within a few years, feeding your family and every songbird in the county with sweet berries through late spring.Mulberries are practically carefree in Alabama - fast growing, drought tolerant once established, and unbothered by the disease pressure that plagues stone fruit....

Elderberry gives you creamy summer flower plates, dark berry clusters for syrup and jelly, and a native shrub pollinators and songbirds work all season.American elderberry is a fast, suckering native shrub that tolerates the damp, heavy spots most fruit refuses - ditch edges, creek...

Blackberries are the easiest fruit you can grow in Alabama - a short row of thornless canes yields gallons of berries by early summer.Modern thornless erect varieties like 'Ouachita', 'Natchez', and 'Navaho' were bred for Southern heat and humidity and need no trellis, just...

Apricots ripen sweeter off your own tree than anything shipped, and the pink-white spring bloom arrives weeks before the rest of the orchard wakes up.Apricots are the trickiest stone fruit for the Deep South: most standard varieties want 700-1,000 chill hours, and the ones...

Witch hazel opens spidery yellow flowers in late fall and winter when nothing else is blooming, then turns clear gold each autumn.Witch hazel is a large native shrub or small multi-stemmed tree that flowers on bare or nearly bare branches in the cold months,...

Weigela loads its arching branches with rosy trumpet flowers in late spring, and hummingbirds work it from the first day it opens.Weigela is an easygoing deciduous shrub covered in pink, red, or white tubular flowers in late spring, with many modern varieties reblooming lightly...

Viburnums stack three seasons into one shrub: spring flower clusters, summer berries that feed birds, and reliable fall color or evergreen structure.Viburnum is a large and varied group ranging from fragrant deciduous types to dense evergreen screening shrubs, all of them dependable landscape plants....

Rose of Sharon delivers big tropical-looking hibiscus flowers from midsummer to frost, exactly when most flowering shrubs have quit for the year.Rose of Sharon is an upright deciduous shrub that blooms through the hottest part of the season in white, pink, lavender, or blue,...