Native Plants

Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?

A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.

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Ask Mr. Smarty Plants

Ask Mr. Smarty Plants is a free service provided by the staff and volunteers at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.

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Please forgive us, but Mr. Smarty Plants has been overwhelmed by a flood of mail and must take a break for awhile to catch up. We hope to be accepting new questions again soon. Thank you!

Need help with plant identification, visit the plant identification page.

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Saturday - September 07, 2013

From: Brick, NJ
Region: Mid-Atlantic
Topic: Plant Identification, Seeds and Seeding
Title: Plant ID from Brick, New Jersey
Answered by: Barbara Medford

QUESTION:

I live in Brick, New Jersey. I planted some wildflower seed from an assorted packet. There is a very tall, thick center stem with orange flowers. I'd like to send photo but don't know how.

ANSWER:

We are sorry, we are no longer able to accept pictures for plant identification. If you go to our Plant Identification Page, you will find out why. Also on that page you will find instructions for submitting photos to several online forums that do accept pictures for identification.

That really is not enough of a description for us to even attempt identification. The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center is committed to the growth, propagation and protection of plants native not only to North America but to the area in which those plants grow naturally. We would recommend purchasing only seeds or seed mixes native to the specific area in which they will be planted; in your case, Ocean County, NJ. Otherwise, you are at the mercy of the company that prepares the seed mixes. You may not only have seeds for plants from other parts of North America but from other parts of the world; plants that may well be totally inappropriate for you to grow in your garden.

In an effort to help you, we went to our Native Plant Database and, using the Combination Search on that page, searched on New Jersey for the state, "herb" for Habit, orange for Bloom Color, July through October for Bloom Time and 1-3 ft. for height. This yielded 5 results, none of which may be the plant you are looking for, but now that you know how to use our Native Plant Database you can try your own search, remembering that only plants native to North America will be in our database. Here are the selections that resulted from our search:

Asclepias tuberosa (Butterflyweed)

Hypericum gymnanthum (Claspingleaf st. johnswort)

Lilium philadelphicum (Wood lily)

Ratibida columnifera (Mexican hat)

Rudbeckia fulgida (Orange coneflower)