Maypop (purple passionflower)

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 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 rounded, multi-stemmed deciduous shrub native across eastern and central North America, grown for its edible nuts and its season-opening catkins. Showy 2-3 inch yellowish-brown male catkins dangle from bare branches in early spring before the ovate, double-toothed leaves emerge; small egg-shaped edible nuts ripen inside leafy husks by mid- to late summer. Easygoing in average soil and tolerant of clay and black walnut, it suckers into thickets that screen and shelter wildlife.

A tough, medium-sized native tree of the eastern and midwestern United States, grown as much for its showy edible orange fruit as for its distinctive thick, dark gray bark broken into rectangular blocks. Small urn-shaped white-to-greenish-yellow flowers open in May and June, and the sweet fruit ripens after frost. Largely dioecious - a female tree needs a male pollinizer nearby to set fruit - and notably drought- and walnut-tolerant once established.