Vines can hide an ugly fence or add beauty to trellis or doorways. When grown over an arbor or pergola, they can create shade. But when gardeners think of vines, the first thing that comes to mind may be imported ones like Japanese and Chinese wisteria, English Ivy, or the dreaded oriental bittersweet, which can all be difficult to get rid of (and have notoriously escaped our gardens and aggressively displaced native plants in the wild). There are many native vines, though, that can play a useful part in your garden scheme.
Christina Koether, a backyard flower farmer, florist, and garden designer behind Nomadica in Weston, Connecticut, notes that tastes and awareness are gradually shifting: In October, for example, it will be illegal to sell both Japanese wisteria (Wisteria floribunda) and Chinese wisteria (Wisteria sinensis) in Connecticut. As a result, she says, “I think we will see native vines like Aristolochia macrophylla and Lonicera sempervirens become more popular again.”
Here are 11 native vines that garden professionals are using in their designs:
Dutchman’s Pipe (or Pipevine)
Looking for a native vine to cover an ugly deer fence on the woodland edge of her property, Koether decided to try planting a pipevine (Aristolochia macrophylla), whose heart-shaped leaves were a favorite in Victorian gardens until favor shifted toward the imported Chinese and Japanese wisterias for their showier flowers. “Pipevine—it’s one of my favorite native vines,” says Koether, who admits that technically, it’s native to areas slightly further south than Connecticut, where she gardens. “But I rolled the dice when I bought them, knowing the butterfly that relies on it would likely start coming further north as temperatures increase each year.” Sure enough, this year, Koether watched pipevine swallowtail butterflies lay eggs on the vine, which hatched into caterpillars. In addition to being the host plant for the pipevine swallowtails, who rely on this plant to survive, Koether appreciates the playful pipe-shaped flowers in the springtime.
California Pipevine
Out on the west coast, Andrea Hurd, the founder of Mariposa Gardening & Design Cooperative in Oakland, California, points to the California native pipevine (Aristolochia californica), which has larger, distinctive purple-striped, pipe-shaped flowers. “We have a garden where it has gotten well-established,” she says. According to the California Native Plant Society, this plant is common in moist woods and along streams in northern and central California. Like its cousin Aristolochia macrophylla, it is the host plant for the pipevine swallowtail, and there are other regional Aristolochia to explore, depending on where you garden.
Coral Honeysuckle
Not to be confused with Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica), which is considered invasive in most states, coral honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens) is native to the southeast and grows as far north as Maine and inland to the midwest—and is a favorite of several garden pros. Gena Wirth, a landscape architect and partner at SCAPE’s New York office, recently moved into a home in Brooklyn with a large fence that backs onto a subway corridor, on which she is experimenting with a number of native vines, including coral honeysuckle. “Lonicera sempervirens is such an easy-to-grow, adaptable plant that thrives in full and part sun environments,” says Wirth. “I love planting it in arches and garden windows, as its flowers reach for the light.” Koether notes that she also likes to use cuttings of both the greens and the flowers in her floristry work.
Trumpet Vine
If you want to attract hummingbirds, look to trumpet vine (Campis radicans) and its orange, trumpet-shade flowers. It’s native to eastern North America, as far north as Ohio and South Dakota. Fast- and high-growing, trumpet vine has a reputation for being aggressive (great if you want it to screen a fence), but the experts from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, in their guide Great Natives for Tough Places, say that it can be controlled with pruning if you want to contain its vigor.
