Fetterbush

The evergreen shrub that fills wet acidic shade where almost nothing else works. glossy foliage year-round and spring flowers for native bees.

Fetterbush is the native broadleaf evergreen shrub built for wet, acidic conditions in the Southeast, a place in the garden hierarchy where not much else offers both evergreen coverage and genuine ecological value. Clusters of small pink to white urn-shaped flowers line the arching branches in late spring, attractive to native bees. The glossy, leathery foliage holds its deep green through winter, providing structure when the rest of the shrub layer has gone bare. At four to eight feet, it works as a naturalizing shrub in wet woodland edges, along stream banks, or at the margins of rain gardens where periodic flooding is a regular event. It spreads by root suckering to form thickets over time: desirable for slope work, manageable with occasional edging where containment matters.