2343 Easy Plants | 2026 Guide - Page 33
Discover 2343 easy plants for your garden. Complete care guide.
2343 Easy Plants
Showing 1153-1188 of 2343
Stinking Iris
Iris foetidissima
Iris foetidissima, commonly called the stinking iris or roast-beef plant, is a tough evergreen perennial from the iris family (Iridaceae), native to woodlands and hedgerows across Europe and North Africa. Unlike most irises, which crave full sun, this shade-loving species thrives beneath trees and in the driest, poorest corners of the garden where little else survives. Its narrow, sword-shaped leaves release a pungent odor reminiscent of roasting beef when bruised or crushed, giving the plant its unusual common names. In late spring, dull purple flowers with a yellow flush appear, but the real spectacle comes in autumn, when large seed pods split open to reveal clusters of glossy, bright orange-red seeds that persist through winter, making it a favorite for dried flower arrangements and winter-interest borders.
Bearded Iris
Iris germanica
Iris germanica, the bearded iris, is a robust rhizomatous perennial grown for its large, ruffled flowers in late spring. Each bloom carries three upright standard petals and three drooping falls marked with a fuzzy beard, in a huge range of colours from deep purple and blue to white, yellow and pink. Sword-shaped grey-green leaves stand in fans above thick surface rhizomes.
Fringed Iris
Iris japonica
Iris japonica, commonly known as the Fringed Iris or Butterfly Flower, is an elegant evergreen iris native to China and Japan. It features delicate fringed petals in pale blue, lavender, or white with distinctive orange or yellow crests, blooming in spring. The plant spreads through creeping rhizomes and makes an excellent ground cover in shaded garden areas.
Variegated Japanese Water Iris
Iris laevigata 'Variegata'
Iris laevigata 'Variegata' is a perennial water/marsh iris, prized for its erect, sword-shaped foliage marked with striking creamy-white stripes on a green background. In late spring and early summer, it produces blue-violet flowers about 10 cm wide, featuring a white crest on the falls, and occasionally reblooms in autumn. It reaches between 60 and 90 cm in height and spreads to form compact clumps via rhizomes. It is an ideal marginal plant for pond edges, boggy areas, and water gardens, recognized with the RHS Award of Garden Merit for its reliability in cultivation.
Sweet Iris
Iris pallida
Perennial rhizomatous plant of the Iridaceae family, native to the Dalmatian coast of Croatia. It forms fans of gray-green sword-shaped leaves and 50 to 80 cm stems carrying fragrant lavender to nearly white flowers in spring and early summer.
Yellow Flag Iris
Iris pseudacorus
Iris pseudacorus, commonly known as Yellow Flag Iris, is a vigorous aquatic perennial native to Europe and Western Asia. It thrives in wetlands, pond margins, and water gardens, producing striking bright yellow flowers in late spring to early summer. Its sword-like foliage and bold blooms make it a dramatic feature in water landscapes.
Dwarf Bearded Iris
Iris pumila
Iris pumila is a low-growing rhizomatous perennial native to the grasslands and rocky steppes of eastern Europe and western Asia. Reaching only 10-20 cm in height, it forms dense mats of sword-shaped, blue-green leaves and produces large, showy flowers in shades of purple, yellow, blue, cream, and white, often with a darker spot on the falls. One of the earliest bearded irises to bloom each spring, it has been extensively used to breed modern dwarf and median bearded iris cultivars.
Siberian Iris
Iris sibirica
Iris sibirica, commonly known as Siberian Iris, is a graceful perennial flowering plant native to Central and Eastern Europe through Central Asia. It produces elegant, blue to violet blooms in late spring to early summer atop slender upright stems. Forming dense clumps of grass-like foliage, it is one of the most disease-resistant and low-maintenance irises available to gardeners. Its deciduous foliage turns attractive straw-yellow in autumn before dying back.
Blue Jacaranda
Jacaranda mimosaefolia
The Blue Jacaranda is one of the world's most spectacular flowering trees, native to northwestern Argentina and southern Bolivia. In spring, before the feathery fern-like leaves emerge, the tree erupts in a stunning display of violet-blue trumpet-shaped flowers that carpet entire streets and gardens. Growing up to 40 feet tall with a wide spreading canopy, it is a beloved ornamental tree planted across tropical and subtropical regions worldwide.
Hoary Ragwort
Jacobaea erucifolia
Hoary Ragwort (Jacobaea erucifolia, syn. Senecio erucifolius) is a rhizomatous perennial herb in the daisy family (Asteraceae), native to Europe and western Asia. It forms upright, branching stems up to 60cm tall covered in fine grey-white down that gives the plant its "hoary" look, with deeply pinnate, lobed leaves. From July to August it bears flat-topped clusters of small, bright-yellow daisy-like flower heads. It thrives in damp, calcareous grassland, field margins, roadsides and waste ground, spreading readily by seed and creeping rhizomes. Every part of the plant contains pyrrolizidine alkaloids that are toxic to humans and animals, especially livestock.
Silver Ragwort
Jacobaea maritima
Jacobaea maritima, commonly known as Silver Ragwort or Dusty Miller, is a perennial subshrub prized for its striking silvery-white, felt-like foliage. The leaves are deeply lobed and covered in fine, matted hairs that give the plant a woolly appearance and help it conserve moisture. While it produces small, yellow daisy-like flowers in the summer, it is primarily grown for its decorative foliage which provides a brilliant contrast to green-leaved plants and colorful blooms in garden beds and containers.
Common Ragwort
Jacobaea vulgaris
Common ragwort (Jacobaea vulgaris, syn. Senecio jacobaea) is a biennial herbaceous plant in the daisy family (Asteraceae), native to northern Eurasia and now naturalized worldwide. It forms a leaf rosette in its first year and a flowering stem up to 2 m tall in its second, bearing clusters of bright yellow daisy-like flowers from summer into autumn. It grows wild on wasteland, roadsides, and poor grazing pastures. WARNING: this plant is toxic, containing hepatotoxic pyrrolizidine alkaloids dangerous to horses, cattle, and humans, particularly when dried in hay.
Skyblue Clustervine
Jacquemontia pentanthos
Skyblue Clustervine (Jacquemontia pentanthos) is an evergreen perennial vine from the Convolvulaceae family, native to Tropical Americas including Brazil. It produces an abundance of funnel-shaped, sky blue to pinkish-lavender flowers with white throats that open at dawn and close after dark. A fast-growing vine highly valued for covering fences, pergolas, and trellises in tropical gardens.
Pink Jasmine
Jasminum polyanthum
Jasminum polyanthum is a vigorous, twining evergreen climber native to China, prized for its profuse clusters of intensely fragrant, star-shaped white flowers with pink-tinged buds. Blooming from late winter through spring, it can reach up to 5 meters and is a popular choice for both indoor and outdoor growing. Its fast growth rate and ease of care make it ideal for trellises, arches, and hanging baskets.
Jatropha (genus)
Jatropha
Jatropha is a genus of over 170 tropical and subtropical shrubs and small trees in the family Euphorbiaceae, native to the Americas, Africa, and Asia. Popular ornamental species include J. integerrima (peregrina/spicy jatropha), J. podagrica (buddha belly/gout plant), and J. multifida (coral plant). They produce vibrant red, coral, or pink flowers and feature a characteristic succulent-like swollen stem. All parts are severely toxic — seeds, leaves, and white latex contain toxalbumins curcin and jatrophin.
Leatherstem
Jatropha dioica
Leatherstem (Jatropha dioica) is a small succulent shrub in the spurge family (Euphorbiaceae), native to dry, rocky terrain from Texas south through Mexico to Oaxaca. Its arching, leathery, nearly leafless stems reach 30-90 cm tall and are flexible enough to be tied in a knot without snapping. The plant spreads slowly into low colonies via underground runners and produces small white flowers in spring and early summer. Its most distinctive trait is the milky sap, which is clear to pale yellow but turns blood red on contact with air, giving rise to the Spanish name "sangre de drago" (dragon's blood).
Peregrina
Jatropha integerrima
Peregrina (Jatropha integerrima) is an evergreen shrub or small tree in the spurge family (Euphorbiaceae), native to Cuba and Hispaniola in the Caribbean. It produces red, pink, or white flowers almost year-round, attracting hummingbirds and butterflies. Low-maintenance and drought-tolerant once established, it is nonetheless TOXIC: the milky sap irritates skin and eyes, and all plant parts are poisonous if ingested.
Marsh jaumea
Jaumea carnosa
Marsh jaumea (Jaumea carnosa) is a low perennial in the daisy family that grows in coastal salt marshes, tidal flats and at the base of sea cliffs, from British Columbia down to northern Baja California. It creeps along on underground rhizomes and sends up soft, pinkish-green stems usually 15 to 35 cm tall, lined with fleshy, narrow leaves that look a lot like ice plant. From late spring into fall it carries small yellow daisy-like flower heads, about 2 cm across. It can live on seawater by storing salt in its cells, so it holds ground where few other plants survive, and it is used in coastal restoration and erosion control.
Rush
Juncus
Rush is the common name for plants in the genus Juncus, a large group of grass-like, clump-forming perennials found in wet meadows, marshes and pond edges worldwide. Rushes are prized for their cylindrical, leafless, evergreen-to-semi-evergreen stems that form neat upright or arching tufts, and for their small brown or green flower clusters that appear along the stem in summer. Low-maintenance and slow-growing, rushes are a favorite for rain gardens, bog gardens and container water features.
Soft Rush
Juncus effusus
Juncus effusus, commonly known as soft rush, is a cosmopolitan wetland perennial in the Juncaceae family. It forms dense, upright clumps of smooth, cylindrical, evergreen stems that lack true leaves, giving the plant a distinctive tufted, rush-like silhouette. Found naturally along pond margins, marshes, ditches, and other saturated soils worldwide, soft rush is a true hydrophyte that tolerates standing water and is widely used in water gardens, rain gardens, and wetland restoration projects.
Common Juniper
Juniperus communis
Common Juniper (Juniperus communis) is an evergreen coniferous shrub or small tree in the family Cupressaceae. It holds the distinction of having the widest natural range of any woody plant, spanning the circumboreal regions of Europe, Asia, and North America. It produces aromatic bluish-black berries (seed cones) widely used to flavor gin and as a culinary spice.
Creeping Juniper
Juniperus horizontalis
Juniperus horizontalis, commonly known as Creeping Juniper, is a hardy, low-spreading evergreen conifer native to North America. It forms a dense mat of blue-green to silver-blue foliage that hugs the ground, making it an outstanding groundcover for slopes, rock gardens, and open landscapes. Highly tolerant of cold, drought, salt, and poor soils, it is one of the most versatile and resilient conifers for temperate gardens.
Japanese Garden Juniper
Juniperus procumbens
Juniperus procumbens, commonly known as Japanese Garden Juniper, is a low-spreading evergreen conifer native to southern Japan. It forms a dense, cascading mat of blue-green needle-like foliage and is highly prized in bonsai cultivation, especially the compact 'Nana' cultivar. Ideal for ground cover, rock gardens, and slope stabilization, it thrives in full sun with excellent drainage.
Savin Juniper
Juniperus sabina
Juniperus sabina, commonly known as Savin Juniper, is a low-growing, spreading evergreen conifer in the cypress family (Cupressaceae), native to the mountains of central and southern Europe, the Caucasus, and parts of western Asia and Siberia. It typically forms a dense, sprawling shrub reaching about 1 to 2 meters in height with a spread of 2 to 3 meters or more, though some forms can become semi-erect. The scale-like, blue-green foliage is aromatic when crushed, releasing a strong resinous scent from the essential oil sabinene. As a dioecious species, individual plants are either male or female; female plants produce small, berry-like blue-black seed cones. Extremely hardy and drought-tolerant once established, Savin Juniper is widely planted as a groundcover, on slopes, and in rock gardens for its low maintenance and tolerance of poor, rocky, or alkaline soils. All parts of the plant are toxic if ingested, so it should be sited away from children and pets.
Rocky Mountain Juniper
Juniperus scopulorum
The Rocky Mountain juniper (Juniperus scopulorum) is a slow-growing, cold-hardy evergreen conifer native to the mountains and foothills of western North America, from British Columbia and Alberta south through the Rockies to Arizona, New Mexico, and western Texas. Depending on the cultivar, it grows as a narrow columnar tree or a broad shrub, reaching 9-12 m (30-40 ft) tall in the wild, with scale-like, blue-green to silvery foliage and small, berry-like blue-grey cones. Exceptionally drought-, wind-, and cold-tolerant, it thrives in rocky, well-draining soils and is a popular choice for windbreaks, hedges, and xeriscape gardens across USDA zones 3a-7b.
Flaky Juniper
Juniperus squamata
Juniperus squamata, commonly known as Flaky Juniper or Himalayan Juniper, is a low-growing coniferous shrub native to the mountain ranges of the Himalayas, China, and Taiwan. Its most popular cultivar, 'Blue Star', is prized for its striking blue-gray needle-like foliage and compact mounding form, making it a staple in rock gardens, foundation plantings, and landscape designs.
Eastern Red Cedar
Juniperus virginiana
Juniperus virginiana, commonly known as the Eastern Red Cedar, is an evergreen conifer native to eastern North America. This tree is famous for its aromatic, durable, and rot-resistant wood, often used in chests and closets. Its foliage is dense, consisting of scale-like leaves that remain green year-round, though they may take on bronze tones in winter. It produces small bluish cones that resemble berries, serving as a vital food source for various birds.
Water-willow / Shrimp Plant (genus)
Justicia
Justicia is a large genus of approximately 600 species in the family Acanthaceae, comprising tropical and subtropical herbs and shrubs. The most popular ornamentals are Justicia brandegeeana (Shrimp Plant) and Justicia carnea (Brazilian Plume Flower), beloved for their distinctive colorful bracts and flowers. They thrive as houseplants and in subtropical gardens.
Shrimp Plant
Justicia brandegeeana
Justicia brandegeeana is a tropical evergreen shrub native to Mexico, belonging to the Acanthaceae family. It is widely grown as an ornamental plant for its distinctive shrimp-shaped bracts that range from red to pink and yellow, with small white flowers emerging from within. It can reach up to 90 cm tall and blooms nearly year-round in warm climates.
Mother of Millions Hybrid
Kalanchoe × houghtonii
Kalanchoe × houghtonii is a succulent hybrid between Kalanchoe daigremontiana and K. delagoensis, both native to Madagascar. Commonly called Mother of Millions Hybrid, it produces scores of tiny plantlets along its leaf margins that readily root wherever they land. A fast-growing, eye-catching ornamental, though severely toxic to pets and humans and potentially invasive in warm climates.
Velvet Elephant Ear
Kalanchoe beharensis
Kalanchoe beharensis is a striking succulent native to southern Madagascar, known for its large, velvety, triangular leaves covered in soft brown or silver hairs. In its natural habitat, it can grow into a tree-like shrub reaching up to 3 meters tall. The thick, felted leaves give this plant an almost otherworldly appearance, making it a favorite among succulent collectors. Despite its exotic looks, it is remarkably easy to care for, thriving on neglect and requiring minimal watering.
Flaming Katy
Kalanchoe blossfeldiana
Kalanchoe blossfeldiana is a flowering succulent native to Madagascar, known for its vibrant, long-lasting blooms that appear in fall and winter. It is an easy-care plant, perfect for beginners.
Calandiva
Kalanchoe calandiva
Calandiva is a double-flowered cultivar series of Kalanchoe blossfeldiana, native to Madagascar. Its lush, rose-like blooms with at least 8 petals make it one of the most decorative succulent houseplants available. Hardy and low-maintenance, it thrives with minimal care.
Horned-leaf Kalanchoe
Kalanchoe ceratophylla
Kalanchoe ceratophylla is a perennial succulent native to tropical Asia, ranging from the Indian subcontinent through southern China, Indochina, Taiwan to the Philippines. A member of the Crassulaceae family, it produces small yellow-green bell-shaped flowers in winter and spring. It is valued as an ornamental plant and for its traditional medicinal uses, being drought-tolerant and easy to grow.
Mother of Thousands
Kalanchoe daigremontiana
Kalanchoe daigremontiana, known as Mother of Thousands, is a fascinating succulent native to Madagascar. It is famous for producing tiny plantlets along the margins of its fleshy, lance-shaped leaves — each one capable of falling off and rooting on its own. A resilient, low-maintenance plant that thrives with neglect, it is mildly toxic and can become invasive outdoors in warm climates.
Mother of Millions
Kalanchoe delagoensis
Kalanchoe delagoensis, commonly known as Mother of Millions or Chandelier Plant, is a striking succulent native to Madagascar. Also known by its synonym Bryophyllum delagoense, this fast-growing plant is famous for producing tiny plantlets along the edges of its tubular, mottled leaves — a form of vegetative reproduction that makes it incredibly prolific. Upright stems can reach 120 cm, topped in winter and spring with clusters of pendant, tubular orange-red flowers. Because of its aggressive spread via these plantlets, it is classified as an invasive weed in Australia, Florida, South Africa, and several Pacific Islands.
What are Easy Plants?
Easy Plants are ideal for beginners or people with little time for care. These species are tolerant of watering mistakes, light variations, and don't require constant attention. Perfect for those just starting out with plants.
Tips for Growing Easy Plants
To succeed with easy plants, remember: less is more. Avoid overwatering, choose a spot with adequate light, and let the soil dry between waterings. Most of these plants prefer to be 'forgotten' occasionally.