Ostrich fern

A fast-growing, tendril-climbing native vine of the eastern United States, named "maypop" for the fleshy egg-shaped fruits that pop underfoot. Its intricate 2.5-inch fringed flowers - white-to-lavender petals beneath a pinkish-purple filament crown and a raised central androgynophore - are precisely engineered for large carpenter bees. Woody in warm-winter climates and herbaceous (dying to the ground) where winters are cold, it climbs to 6 to 8 feet on a trellis and produces edible yellowish maypops in fall.

A tall, tuber-forming perennial sunflower native to eastern North America - also called Jerusalem artichoke or sunroot - grown both for its 2-4 inch bright-yellow late-summer sunflowers and its knobby edible underground tubers. Rough-hairy stems rise 6 to 10 feet bearing ovate, serrate leaves on winged petioles. It spreads aggressively by rhizome and self-seeding to form colonies; Missouri Botanical Garden flatly calls it "weedy and invasive" and difficult to remove once planted.

A herbaceous, tuberous perennial vine of eastern North America that twines 8 to 16 feet up surrounding vegetation through moist thickets, bottomlands, marsh and streambank edges. From mid-summer into fall it carries fragrant, maroon-to-reddish-brown pea-like flowers in compact racemes from the leaf axils, followed by edible seeds; the underground tubers are an edible, protein-rich staple long gathered as Indian potato. A native legume and a documented larval host for the Silver-spotted Skipper, it spreads vigorously by seed and tubers.

A native evergreen fern with leathery dark blue-green fronds in upright vase-shaped clumps. Among the most drought-tolerant native ferns - useful for drier-shade settings where most other ferns fail. The "marginal" name refers to sori (spore clusters) carried at the leaflet margins. Evergreen through winter in zones 5+; reliably long-lived (20-30+ years).

A fast, suckering native shrub of streambanks and moist thickets across eastern North America, grown for huge flat-topped cymes of tiny lemon-scented white flowers in early summer and the clusters of dark elderberry drupes that follow. Spreads by root suckers into naturalized colonies 5 to 12 feet tall and wide; the flowers feed butterflies and the showy fruit feeds birds. The raw berries are not eaten fresh - they are cooked into jelly, pie, and wine.

A drought-and-flood-tolerant native shrub of eastern North America with brilliant three-season interest - spring white-pink flowers, glossy black antioxidant-rich late-summer berries, and brilliant wine-red fall foliage - plus an extraordinarily wide cold-hardiness range (USDA 3a-8b). The berries are astringent fresh but the basis of a small but growing commercial industry (juices, wines, jams, supplements) for their exceptionally high anthocyanin content. Spreads by suckers; site where colony formation is welcome.

A full-shade woodland-floor community for deep shade beneath a closed canopy: an understory shrub, spreading groundcovers, spring ephemerals, and a large fern - eastern North American natives that expect low light and leaf-litter soil.