Join / Renew / Gift Donate Shop Member Portal Language

Search
npsot_bluebonnet_full_color

Native Plant Society of Texas

Clear Lake Chapter

Plant of the Month: Rosy Palafox

Presented by Taro Bush
March 14, 2022

Botanical name: Palafoxia rosea
Common names: Rosy Palafox, Rose Palafoxia
Family: Asteraceae (Aster)

[MUS—EASY AND FUN]

[TARO] Hi. My name is Taro. Welcome to March’s Plant of the Month. The Asteraceae family is one of the largest flowering plant families with over 32 thousand known species worldwide. Today I’m talking about Palafoxia rosea, commonly known as Rosy Palafox. The picture on the right is a Rosy Palafox flower. The three smaller photos show other members of the Asteraceae family.

Rosy Palafox is an annual. It grows 18 to 24 inches tall. Leaves are lance-shaped and alternate. The small flowers are pink. Flower heads are made up of disc florets–ray florets are absent. Bloom time is June to November.

Water use is low. It’s drought and heat tolerant. Light requirement is sun to part shade. Rosy Palafox prefers deep dry sandy soil and grows well in disturbed areas.

All species of Palafox are native to North America, found primarily in prairies, plains, meadows, pastures, and savannahs in the southern United States and northern Mexico. In our area, it is reported in Montgomery, Harris, Galveston, and Brazoria counties.

Producing abundant nectar and pollen, Palafoxia is a magnet for butterflies and other small insects. This plant is best used in mass plantings and for background groupings. Palafoxia is a good choice for a well-drained sunny garden.

Propagation is from seed. Sow directly in the fall or grow in containers or a greenhouse in winter. Palafoxia reseeds readily–you’ll need to deadhead if you don’t want it to reseed. Thank you for watching plant of the month. Yay!

[MUS—AND THAT’S IT]

Related Posts

Plant of the month for August is Splitbeard Bluestem, Andropogon ternarius, and also called Feather Bluestem or Paintbrush Bluestem. It is a native. It's a warm season grass. It's a perennial. It's a bunchgrass. By warm season, it means that it's dormant in the winter and starts growing in the spring as the weather warms up. A bunchgrass tends to stay in a small circle or a bunch. The grass has numerous thin basal leaves, which usually stay about 12 or 15 inches tall, which makes it ideal in our home landscapes. It grows best in part shade to full sun. And this grass will be available at our plant sale on October 20 and 21. It prefers to grow in sand or well-drained soil, which we kind of struggle with here, but it does do well. It's shade tolerant and drought tolerant. I know the camera has a hard time focusing on those light hairy little seeds. The bloom time is from August to November. In late summer, it will send up its bloom stalk, which may be up to three feet tall. And, as the seeds on the long slender stalk mature, they'll split into two tiny stems about two inches long, each with seeds of fluffy white tufts. The seeds are wind distributed. The plants may be started from seed or another way is to dig your mature plant and with your shovels, cut it into maybe four sections, which then can be replanted in other places in your yard or shared with some of your neighbors. It's an easy plant to grow. Splitbeard can be found on the prairie with Little Bluestem and it's great when it's seen in the afternoon sun en masse; reminds me of snowflakes on the branches. And it can be used in a winter dried arrangement in the house. Native bees can use Splitbeard Bluestem for nesting materials. And until their bloom stalk is sent up, the narrow basal leaves are hard to distinguish from other bunchgrasses such as Sideoats Grama. And there it is. And you note how the seeds are all on one side, thus its name. We don't have any of this one for sale at our fall sale. Maybe we will in the spring, in April. But it was interesting, I thought, when I looked for Splitbeard Bluestem in the Wasowski book of Native Texas Plants these two bunchgrasses were on the same page. So, that is the story of the Sideoats Grama and the Splitbeard Bluestem.

Plant of the Month: Woolly Bluestar

February 15, 2023

Our Plant of the Month for February 2023 is Amsonia tomentosa, commonly known as Woolly Bluestar, Woolly Amsonia, Small Leaved Amsonia, or Gray Amsonia.

Oyster Mushroom

Plant of the Month: Oyster Mushroom

January 9, 2023

Our plant of the month for January isn’t a plant at all, it’s a fungus!
Botanical name: Pleurotus ostreatus
Common name(s): Oyster Mushroom, Pearl Oyster Mushroom

About the Region

2026 Fall Symposium Logo

This low-elevations region of Texas extends inland from the barrier islands, about 60 or so miles, and stretches from Brownsville to Louisiana. In total, it covers about 9.5 million acres, with a high point of 150 feet in elevation. More than 1000 species of plants can be found in this region. On the southern end, species more common in Mexico (such as Sabal mexicana) and Central America occur.

The barrier islands provide us with dune systems, and clay flats to the inland side, which have species found in these areas alone. Many plants here, such as Ipomoea pes-caprae (beach morning glory), can be found throughout tropical regions of the globe. I’ve encountered the same species on the beaches of Guam.

Once inland, vast marshes and wet prairies occur. Occasionally, oak (Quercus fusiformis) groves can be found. Common grasses include species of Bothriochloa, Paspalum, and Sporobolus; eastern gamagrass (Tripsacum dactyloides); and switchgrass (Panicum species). Many rivers and creeks cut through the Gulf Prairies, and along these riparian areas various species of trees, Sabal minor, and other plants adapted to clay soils can be found. Due to overgrazing, farming, and fire suppression, woody species such as mesquite (Prosopis glandulosa) and huisache (Acacia farnesiana), and invasive species such as chinaberry (Melia azedarach), Brazilian pepper (Schinus terebinthifolius), and Chinese tallow (Sapium sebiferum) have increased and displaced our native flora.

Source: Wildflowers of Texas by Michael Eason