State or province

District of Columbia

District of Columbia, United States of America: one ecoregion. Each with its climate now and toward 2050, and its conservation tier.

Landscape and climate

One ecoregion covers the District of Columbia: the Southeast US conifer savannas. It is a temperate grassland, savanna and shrubland system in the Nature Imperiled tier. That single entry is worth reading carefully, because the name does not describe what anyone sees here now. The ecoregion is the historic fall-line country where southeastern pine savanna met the harder ground upriver, and in a fully built city almost none of it remains as structure. The practical upshot is that a garden in the District is working inside an imperiled system with very little reference habitat nearby. Native oaks, understory shrubs and warm-season grasses do more here per square foot than they would in a place with intact habitat next door.

Native plants of District of Columbia

Species in the catalog recorded as native to District of Columbia, each with its climate-fit grade and planting guidance.

Allegheny blackberry American basswood American elderberry American hazelnut American holly American hophornbeam American persimmon American plum American sweetgum American sycamore Annabelle hydrangea Aromatic aster Arrowwood viburnum Big bluestem Black cherry Black chokeberry Black oak Black tupelo (black gum)Black walnut Black willow Black-eyed Susan Blackhaw viburnum Bloodroot Blue false indigo Blue flag iris Blue vervain Boneset Boxelder Bur oak Butterfly weed Canada lily Canadian serviceberry Cardinal flower Carolina allspice (sweetshrub)Chestnut oak Chinkapin oak Chokecherry Christmas fern Common blue violet Common hackberry Common ninebark Common witch hazel Common yarrow Cutleaf coneflower Dwarf crested iris Eastern cottonwood Eastern red cedar Eastern redbud Eastern white pine Flowering dogwood Fox grape Foxglove beardtongue Golden alexanders Groundnut Highbush blueberry Honey locust Indian grass Lady fern Little bluestem Mapleleaf viburnum Marginal wood fern Mayapple Maypop (purple passionflower)Mountain laurel Narrow-leaved coneflower New England aster New Jersey tea Northern maidenhair fern Northern red oak Northern spicebush Orange coneflower Ostrich fern Pawpaw Plains coreopsis Possumhaw Possumhaw viburnum Post oak Ramps Red maple Red mulberry River birch River oats Sassafras Shagbark hickory Short-toothed mountain mint Side-oats grama Silky dogwood Silver maple Smooth blue aster Southern red oak Stiff goldenrod Sunchoke Swamp milkweed Swamp sunflower Swamp white oak Sweet Joe-Pye weed Sweetbay magnolia Switchgrass Threadleaf coreopsis Trumpet honeysuckle Tulip tree (yellow poplar)Virginia iris Virginia sweetspire White oak White wood aster Whorled milkweed Wild bergamot Wild geranium Wild lupine Wild senna Willow oak Winterberry Woodland phlox Yellow buckeye

Country

Step up to the country it sits in.

United States of America

Ecoregions here

Southeast US conifer savannas