Native Plant Database

Pick the right native plant for the right place.

This searchable database of 300+ plants native to the lower Midwest includes trees, shrubs, vines, grasses, sedges, rushes, and wildflowers suitable for landscaping as well as species for creating wildlife habitat, stabilizing streams, and for other ecological purposes. Most plants in the database are available from Grow Native! professional members who sell plants. A few species in the database are not readily available for sale, such as common violets found in yards, but are included here because of widespread interest.

Soil Moisture definitions:
Dry=Appropriate for sites with consistently little moisture where water doesn’t remain long after rain. For example, rock gardens or dry soil gardens.
Moderate=Appropriate for sites that tend to be neither markedly or consistently dry nor markedly or consistently moist.
High=Appropriate for sites with ample moisture that may also be occasionally saturated throughout the year.
Wet=Appropriate for sites with poor drainage including those that are consistently saturated and boggy, soggy, or muddy.
Aquatic=Appropriate for sites where roots will grow entirely submerged underwater.

Note, while a plant may be associated with particular ecological communities in nature, when in cultivation that plant may tolerate a wider range of growing conditions. Further, species in the database are often listed as capable of growing in more than one condition. As an example, Equisetum hyemale is listed as tolerating High, Wet, or Aquatic soil moisture conditions; thus Equisetum hyemale will appear in the results when “High,” “Wet,” “Aquatic,” or any combination of these, are chosen under the “SOIL MOISTURE” option in the database filters.